I heard the sentiment a couple of days ago, from someone who should have known better, and I answered clearly enough: “Yes. You’re right. What you’ve got in your head that you’ve decided is hypnosis… THAT is complete and utter bollocks. But then, I wouldn’t expect any more of you than that.”
Swirly Bollocks
So my rapport-building skills were not at their best on that day. But really, I have heard this sentiment repeated so often in different ways, from so many different people, who really should know better than to talk about something of which they have no knowledge and no experience.
Common objections to hypnosis come in at least three broad forms. Firstly, there’s the all-encompassing: “There’s no empirical evidence for it” argument, that I had with a pharmacist a little while ago.
No empirical evidence..? Oh, okay. So a woman comes into my office, having had a lifetime of bird phobia, having seen counsellors, undergone CBT, desensitisation and seen various psychiatrists that never touched the problem – and then, coincidentally in the time that she was sitting in my room, while I was coincidentally talking about ending her phobia, she coincidentally stopped having it. No empirical evidence? The assertion isn’t only unintelligible. It’s moronic.
Having established his profession with him, I thought it best to simply reply to him on his own level: “What scientific papers have you read on outcomes using an empirically-based methodology involving hypnosis?” He shrugged and mumbled something, and so I followed up: “Because, if you haven’t done the research, then don’t start the discussion. Otherwise it’s prejudice.”
Then there is the: “We all know it’s stage trickery” argument. Which would be a half useful argument if I was a stage hypnotist getting people to French-kiss mops. In that case, you use whatever you can to establish compliance. But I’m not a stage hypnotist. Telling me that someone who has come in to see me because they were terrified of birds for 60 years and who walked away 2 hours later able to feed the ducks on the local pond is the subject of a trick is simply incoherent.
“Oh, right. Okay. Someone just paid me a fee to get me to trick them into thinking they were no longer afraid of birds.” Who is being tricked, here? The client feeding the birds? Onlookers? The birds? I mean, what are you saying? Think a moment, will you?
The “trick” argument is bloody rude, too. Here’s a question I asked of someone who tried it on me:
“You do realise that you are calling me one of two things when you say it’s all bollocks, don’t you? Either I’m deluded about the changes that go on before my very eyes – or I’m a conman. Just so we can get things clear between us, which is it that you think I am? – A madman or a liar?”
Then there is the “lack of theory” argument. This one utterly makes me howl. “There’s no theoretical model for the effectiveness of hypnosis. Therefore it can’t work.”
This assertion is also close to being unintelligible, and yet I’ve heard it time and again from so-called “scientists”. They are no such thing. They are sheep in white lab coats. Just because someone doesn’t understand something, it doesn’t make it untrue. Edison invented the electric light bulb in 1878. Lorentz published his first paper on the theory of the electron in 1892. If we followed the argument that because we don’t understand it, it doesn’t exist, Edison would have had to drum his fingers for 14 years before filing his patent. It’s a nonsense.
As for me, I’m just waiting for the lightbulb moment to happen in hypnosis. Until then, I’m expecting to hear a lot more “bollocks”. But while a lot of bollocks is spoken around me, I’m also expecting to help a lot more people out of a hole, too
And in the end, that’s what really counts.
