Hypnosis By Design Podcast
Hypnotist vs Hypnotherapist: Understanding the Key Differences Ep#015
Welcome, reality designers, to the Hypnosis by Design podcast. I'm your host, Denny Van. I am a master hypnotist and instructor. I am a ICBCH approved instructor, and that stands for the International Certification Board of Coaches and Hypnotists. I highly recommend joining if you're a coach or a hypnotist. But today, I want to talk about a very important topic. Recently, I was asked, Denny, I want to become a certified hypnotherapist, and I said, oh, are you already a licensed therapist? And they said, no. So I want to make sure that I clear up for anyone looking for services and for anyone offering services. There are legal consequences to not knowing. So in this situation, ignorance is not bliss. So hypnotist versus hypnotherapist, this is what I want to get into detail with, because understanding the key differences is very important. And there are distinct qualifications and legal requirements of a hypnotist and hypnotherapist. So for full disclosure, I am a hypnotist, not a hypnotherapist. I had an opportunity back in my college career to go down that path. However, from my own personal experience, that way wasn't in alignment with this energy. And being someone who is a 5-1 manifestor, left-angle cross of education, to me, education is very important. I am self-educated. I apply critical thinking, and I worked in traditional education as of now for about almost 30 years. So I started working at the university level, offering my services on a contractual basis for about 30 years. And so I see from freshmen's in college to PhD level in college and all the way through, I see a pattern. And that pattern doesn't align with me. However, if you are a therapist, I highly recommend really applying these techniques, not only to yourself and discovering for yourself and your own energy, what works, and then applying that to your practice, if you are a licensed therapist. So getting into this crucial understanding of this difference between a hypnotist and a hypnotherapist. If you are a therapist and you're licensed, you can call yourself a hypnotherapist. If you are not and you want to take our 100-hour certification course, you can call yourself a hypnotist. And we're going to get into the details of what you can and can't do with both. So with both practitioners, whether you go see a hypnotist or you are a hypnotist, or whether you go see a hypnotherapist or you are a hypnotherapist, both learn hypnosis the same. So I have within a possibility of a training. If I have a group of people going through a training, many experience that there are already therapists in the training. So throughout my teaching career, I have had therapists in courses. So they get the same training. However, they're applied differently. And this is what's important to understand if you are seeking to become certified hypnotist or a licensed hypnotherapist. And we're going to explore why these differences between these and highlighting the risks associated with maybe using someone who's unqualified or someone who might be misrepresenting themselves as a licensed therapist. So if you take a 100-hour certification course, and then you put up your placard and say, I'm a hypnotist, but you're not a licensed therapist, you are opening yourself up to all kinds of consequences that you really should research. But I am not legal advice. I am not medical advice. I am not education advice. I am here to just provide knowledge and educate if this is a path that you're already on, or if this is a path you want to be on and knowing the difference. All right. So again, a hypnotist is someone who has completed a training in hypnosis techniques, but does not necessarily have the formal education in training. Listen up. This is important in diagnosing mental health or therapy. So a hypnotherapist is licensed to diagnose, provide those kind of medical mental health services. So, hypnotists are usually for entertainment purposes. And I love doing entertainment. And actually, as of this recording, I am in a course on entertainment hypnosis. And it's just phenomenal what you learn. But this is for purposes for coaches to help clients with issues like mindset issues, adjusting for self-sabotage, stop smoking, maybe some weight loss or stress production. So a hypnotist does not diagnose or treat any kind of medical issue. A hypnotherapist will diagnose and treat medical issues. A hypnotist is not covered under insurance. Hypnotherapy might be depending on your insurance covered. So these are the differences that are very vital to understand because hypnotherapist is typically licensed. Must be licensed. Actually, legally, you have to be licensed and is a mental health professional. And this is this is someone who receives specialized training. And many times within their specialized training, they learn very specialized techniques. And this may work with clients on more complex issues, such as diagnosing anxiety disorders, phobias, or trauma related conditions, and then prescribing medications as part of their treatment plan. So, now let's say you are looking for someone to help you. How do you know who to look for? So it's crucial to choose a qualified hypnosis practitioner. I am not for everyone. I'm not. So it's important to really note for yourself. And especially if you're in a different country, because in some countries, it's illegal for non-licensed professionals to practice therapy or counseling or even hypnosis without a license. So definitely, the responsibility is on you to find out where am I in the world and what are the laws? Because it is essential that individuals who are seeking hypnosis services, that they understand the credentials of the practitioner that they're engaging with for either a treatment plan or medical services. So as an instructor myself, I train people, some of who might be licensed. They are licensed therapists and they want to become an ad hypnosis to their treatment plans. And this ensures that they have both the necessary skills and the guidelines. And there are stricter guidelines and stricter roles and greater consequences with therapists. So if you are a hypnotist, it's really important to understand there is a clear line differentiating the two. And if you're looking for someone, it's also important to understand those guidelines. So again, I am not a licensed therapist. Our self-directed healing method does use a waking state hypnosis technique that can be beneficial for those looking for alternative or even complementary healings. So if you're already seeing a therapist, something like this would be complementary to your therapy. And traditional therapy approaches may work for some people. Others prefer self-directed. They want to learn about themselves. They want to strategize and experiment with themselves. This allows them greater control over their own treatment process. And traditional therapy often involves the client recounting their story. You have to tell the therapist what triggered, what was the trigger of the story. And then they receive a diagnosis. And this might be followed up with pharmaceutical treatments to manage the symptoms. However, this approach can sometimes lead clients to being triggered again while they're telling the therapist the story. And their nervous system is reliving this traumatic experience during the retelling of their story. So this can be distressing for individuals and may not always result in long term healing. So I know for myself, when I was going through a period and going to therapy, when I would tell the therapist the triggering story, it would literally take my body like two weeks. So I'd be like, we need to see each other once a month because it took that long for my body to recover. And I discovered ways of processing this myself and disconnected myself from that treatment plant. But this was a very personal decision that I researched and came to on my own. So I encourage you to do the research yourself and make that decision. For some, it works. For others, there are other choices that you might not be told about. So non-traditional self-directed healing approaches like hypnosis might offer or self hypnosis might offer. This is an alternative method that doesn't require reactivating the traumatic experience in the nervous system. Instead, what we do is create a space using hypnosis and drop seeds of change in the subconscious within this mind while integrating and releasing, then reprogramming what no longer serves within your nervous system. This process allows individuals to access deeper levels of awareness within themselves, leading to more profound transformation. We have living proof of this and you can experience this yourself. However, traditional therapy often involves diving into, I mean, you got to get into the details of the client's story and then identifying them with the diagnosis. And then pharmaceutical drugs are often prescribed to control the symptoms. That's it. You're covering your masking symptoms. But this approach can be triggering for clients as, you know, I've experienced myself by reliving this past trauma instead of integrating the knowledge, wisdom, and understanding of it and then releasing what no longer serves. So I am a survivor, not a victim. So from my perspective, my choice on nontraditional path, I chose the survivor path instead of the victimhood path. I'm having symptoms. I need more drugs. I need to tell the story over to retrigger so that you can see my symptoms and prove that I, you know, this is, this is from what I see from my body. And as a manifester, not just any manifester, a five one. So this is the heretic coming out and showing me. And I could look at it in so many different ways. I could be offended by it or I can find the gift in it. One of the hardest things to do is to really look at it and find the gift. And I realized I was going down a path of victimhood, but I am no victim. And learning this with a skilled practitioner because I worked with coaches and therapists who were really able to help me strategize my own plan. And this, a skilled practitioner will guide you through learning how to use hypnosis effectively without re traumatizing or reinforcing negative patterns or behavior. And then this is where understanding your human design comes in. We look at the basic profile, what energy centers in your profile are defined and which ones are undefined. What is your authority? We look at certain things and then we begin to decomdition and reprogram them so that you can sit in your natural energy who you are and then begin to see your own path become uncovered instead of given to you and told what to do, you are then initiated within your own energy center to focus in on what is in alignment with where you are right now. So if you're curious about taking that first step towards becoming a certified hypnotist, definitely we want to chat about that. And this next step in your journey could involve picking a date for us to connect and discuss how we can work together and achieve your goals. And we're going to explore whether our intentions and values are in alignment. So with that said, if you have any questions about the difference between a hypnotist and a hypnotherapist, I definitely want to hear from you. And if you're loving this content, be sure to subscribe, like and share because this helps us get our message out there. And definitely we want to get this amazing message out there because it is transforming lives. So I want to hear from you. I want to know what you loved and I want to know what you would love more of. And in the meantime, keep being amazing.