What is Confidence?

There are many definitions of confidence, for this blog we are going with – Confidence is the belief and feeling that you are safe to take a risk. This risk could be a:

• Social risk – such as speaking up or asking someone on a date.
• Financial risk – making a business deal, starting a company, buying property.
• Physical risk – trying out a new activity or committing to a tackle at 5-a-side.

Whatever it may be, confidence is the results for our life experience filtered through our biology.

• Life experience can teach us that taking risks is rewarding or that it hurts and isn’t worth it. This could be from direct experience or by observing or being taught by others.
• Biology can grant us physical strength, a thick skin or a lack of awareness.

Hypnotherapy for confidence

Hypnotherapy for confidence looks to reduce confidence limiters and enhance access to sources of confidence.

Reducing the impact of confidence limiting life lessons and beliefs- Hypnotherapy for confidence

These can take the form of:

• Single event learnings (traumas) – The person has experienced one or more traumatic events which taught them that life is not safe. These may be incidents of abuse, bereavement, accidents or any number of other things. When the person is aware of them. These may be treated with EMDR, dissociative approaches, in-life regressions and several other ways. Treatment will look to dispel the excessive impact a single event can have on our instinctive assessment of risk.
• Multiple events learning – This is where a person has encountered many upsetting events and challenges but may have little memory of specifics and often a poor memory of childhood in general. Various techniques such as inner child, parts therapy, timeline work and many others can help to process this without having to uncover specific events.
• Internalised beliefs and assumptions (Cognitions) – These are the learnings we took from our experience as well as observing others and being taught by them. Wherever they came from they exist within our minds as assumptions. These will usually be automatic and unconscious. The therapist will help to identify beliefs, help to challenge them and then using various techniques (for example EMDR, parts therapy, direct suggestions and hypnotic CBT) will look to alter them to more effective beliefs.

Increasing sources of confidence – Hypnotherapy for confidence

If you’ve had the chance to read my blog on sources of confidence you will know that there are at least 8 sources of confidence. In brief these are:

1. Winners’ confidence – Confidence due to a history of winning.
2. Competence confidence – Confidence because you know you are good at something.
3. Endurance and coping confidence – Confidence which arises by knowing that you will survive and cope with difficulties and thus often prevail.
4. Ego confidence – The belief, right or wrong, that you are great and what you do succeeds.
5. Habitual confidence – The persistence of confidence beliefs beyond the evidence for them out habits of belief.
6. Size confidence – Confidence due to possessing physical power.
7. Risk taker confidence – Confidence due to reduced awareness and sensitivity to risk and consequence.
8. Group confidence – confidence due to possessing the support of others who you trust.

Several of these can be enhanced by the hypnotherapist, some can provide an immediate boost and others help grow confidence over time.

Short-term confidence boosters

These are techniques which can help access confidence quickly or immediately. However, many of their benefits are short lived so it is important to translate them into real world success and long-term confidence quickly.

• Hypnotically revisiting examples of times of winning and pride can bring those feeling into the present. Imagining future successes can also do this.
• Direct suggestions that encourage a strong ego can boost confidence. If these are used to help recognise existing traits and abilities, they may become long-term sources of confidence.
• By imagining themselves as physically larger than they currently feel a client can become more confident. The use of direct suggestions can also help with this. As with all visualisations the hypnotist will not only call upon their skills to enhance this but is likely to be using knowledge of body language to encourage the client to express their size.
• Various techniques can be employed to give the idea of having a thicker skin or to gently insulate nerve sensitivity, against the buffets and blows of the world.

Long term confidence enhancers

You might call these the slow confidence builders. Less punchy than the short-term boosters but a better investment over the long term

• Suggestions which encourage recognising the presence and value of skills and abilities the client already possesses can help grow confidence. Further, helping the client to recognise the journey and effort they went through to acquire these abilities can help them to recognise deeper strengths they possess. This feeds into the basic belief that they can do what I set out to do.
• Suggestions and mental rehearsal of survival and growth beliefs can nurture long-term endurance, and ultimately confidence. An example of such a belief might be, ‘When I speak at meetings, sometimes my contribution isn’t great and that can be a bit embarrassing, and it isn’t the end of the world, I can cope with being a little embarrassed’. The key to these beliefs is that they should acknowledge the discomfort/challenge of the situation and recognise that this can be coped with or survived.
• Goal setting which includes envisaging overcoming challenges along the way as well as achieving the goal can also helpful.

Dr Matt Krouwel is a hypnotherapist in Birmingham (UK) with over 25 years experience of helping people. He is a member of both the BSCH and NCH.

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If you would like to know about building confidence why not read – Hypnotherapy for confidence 

8 sources of self-confidence?

1.Winners’ confidence – Humans have a competitive urge. When a human competes and wins the so called ‘Winner’s effect’ is triggered. The Winner’s effect is a surge of dopamine, testosterone and drop in cortisol. Dopamine increases motivation to do the activity again. Testosterone physically builds the body. A reduction in cortisol is effectively a reduction in stress. Winning means you feel better, are stronger and want to repeat that experience. This trio of effects builds a sense that you are capable and will succeed.

2.Competence confidence – This is the long-term growth of skill in one or more areas. Some people look to excel in one   area, often a sport or career. This can lead into which Winner’s effect type of benefit (see above). Others look to build competence across a broad range of area, commonly doing well at work, being fit and healthy and having a few    hobbies that they are good at. Whichever strategy is used the lived experience of choosing to get better at something     and then getting better at it gives a strong sense that you can achieve what you set out to do.

 3.Endurance and coping confidence – A fundamental of confidence is that you can overcome cope with challenges and difficulties. Difficulties are inevitable, most confident people instinctively minimise these by thinking of them as    ‘challenges’ and as temporary. However, sometimes challenges cannot be overcome which is when a confident person has a protective psychology. The confident person usually recognises that failing at a task is different from failing as a person.  Further, they will have survival beliefs such as ‘It is bad that I have been unable to do X, but I can cope with this, I will survive having failed at this task and it is not the end of the world’.

4.Ego confidence – This is the most easily adopted and most easily broken confidence. Ego confidence comes from the perception of having power and status. The power and status may be real or perceptual. Power and status rely on others acknowledging your authority or fame, if they don’t, it vanishes.

5.Habitual confidence – Confidence can have a persistence beyond the reasons for it. If a person has had success and achieved, or just lived in a physically, emotionally and socially safe environment for long enough all the assumptions from this will often stay with them even when no achieving or safe. As with all confidence this can motivate further action which allows them to come back to a place of achievement.

6.Size confidence – Physical power is one of the most primal sources of confidence. Those who are physically larger, taller or broader, tend to be more confident. This does not appear to be an entirely straightforward relationship. Often very large people have confidence issues. This may be due to factors such as being targeted for social abuse and feeling different.

7.Risk taker confidence – Some people feel less than most. Something in the integration of their nervous system means that they feel less pain, which includes emotional and social pain. This means that their experience of social, emotional and physical risk-reward is different to most people, with the perceived risk being much lower. As such they tend to take bigger risks. Equally, as they need more stimulus to feel things they are often driven to take these risks. The taking of risks often results in positive outcomes which can result in winner’s confidence (see above).

8.Group confidence – Being part of a well bonded and mutual supporting team, group or family can be a powerful source of confidence, primarily by providing safety. There is safety in being part of a group, others will support you when needed. The safety provided by being part of a mutually supporting group allows people to take greater risks than they may otherwise. Equally, those who identify with a group will often experience the groups achievements as their own, especially if they directly contributed to that success.

To find out how confidence can be grown why not read hypnotherapy for confidence

Matt is a hypnotherapists working in Birmingham (UK) and online . He is member of both the BSCH and the NCH.

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• The patient/client can get to know the therapist – This can be very helpful as it means they are more comfortable when it comes to the hypnosis.
• The therapist can get to know the patient/client – This allows the therapist to formulate the best strategy for the client/patient. Hypnotherapy is more personalised than any other form of psychological intervention and the therapist benefits from a little space and time to work a few things out.
• It provides an opportunity to explain issues like confidentiality and what is expected of you in therapy.

What does a free initial consultation in hypnotherapy look like?

How long is it?

It can be anything from a 5-minute phone call to an hour in the consulting room, this will often vary with the issue being worked with. Typically, I take:

• 5-10 minutes on the phone for smoking and vaping cessation.
• An hour for everything else.

Is it in-person, online or by phone?

Again, this varies from hypnotherapist to hypnotherapist. Typically, I will make a phone call for smoking and vaping cessation and everything else should match how the therapy is to be done. By this I mean; if we are going to meet in-person for therapy, then we should meet in-person for the initial consultation and online if we are going to work online.

Can you skip the free initial consultation in hypnotherapy?

Yes. However, I offer it, and will push for it, for a reason. I will still need to gather the information so most of the first session will be spent on that anyway and it is unlikely that there will be much time left for anything other than an introduction to hypnosis, let alone serious therapy.

To book your free initial consultation in hypnotherapy

Contact Matt on – 0778 909 7741

Matt is a hypnotherapists with over 25 years experience. In addition to his work with patients and clients he has taught hypnotherapy and lectured at medical schools around the world. He is member of both the BSCH and the NCH.

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Hypnotherapy for functional digestive disorders

One of hypnotherapies most well researched, yet least well-known areas to the public, is how effective it is in treating functional digestive disorders. Functional digestive disorders are those where nothing is physically observably wrong, i.e. no tissue damage or unusual masses, and yet the digestion does not work as you would want. The most well know examples are irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) and functional dyspepsia.

Gut-directed hypnotherapy (GDH)

A specific set of techniques have been brought together to treat functional digestive disorders, these are collectively known as Gut Directed Hypnotherapy (GDH) and include:

• Direct suggestions for gut calm, gut health and gut strength.
• Visualisations: these can be the patient’s own imagery or standard ones can be used. In the ‘The River’ imagery is used to send calming imagery to the gut, to flow freely and calmly. In ‘The warm hand’, a warm light is transferred from the hand into the gut, sending a signal directly to the digestion to both clam.
• Desensitisation is used to reduce anticipatory tension around situations and trigger foods.
• Recordings are used to regulatory and frequently reinforce imagery and direct suggestions.

Historically, most of this work has been done in-person and on a one-to-one basis. However, research has found that other ways of conducting hypnotherapy for IBS are not only viable but possibly more effective.

Group hypnotherapy for IBS?

Hypnotherapy has been conducted to groups of people for various issues for years but has never become the normal way of practicing. It may not have caught on because of the additional administrative burden. However, there is good evidence that for IBS work it is associated with better outcomes than individual therapy. Various theorises for this have been forwarded, such as peer support and the effect of group oxytocin bonding, but none have yet been demonstrated scientifically.

So, with group work appearing beneficial to people with IBS, it is natural that ways of reducing the administrative barriers are sought. This is where video conferencing come in.

Online hypnotherapy for IBS

Research has demonstrated no significant difference between the experience of being hypnotised in-person and online (Rasch & Cordi 2024). Further, the outcomes of hypnotherapy for IBS appear to be similar when done in-person and online. Which leads to the question; what happens if you combine group hypnotherapy with online hypnotherapy?

Online group hypnotherapy for IBS

Luckily for us a team working out of Sweden has decided to address this question. A report of a pilot study of gut directed hypnotherapy for IBS which was conducted to an online group has recently been published.  The key characteristic are:

• 51 adult participants, 42 of whom were female.
• All participants fulfilled Rome IV criteria for IBS.
• 8 sessions of live video conferencing therapy were conducted in groups of 6-8 participants over 12 weeks.
• GDH was based on the North Carolina protocol of hypnotherapy for IBS.

Key Results

• More than half were classified as ‘Responders’. A responder was someone whose symptoms reduced by ≥50 points on the IBS-severity scoring system (IBS-SSS). This is a commonly used and generally accepted measure of change which makes a substantial enough difference to be beneficial.
• Median IBS-SSS scores dropped by over a quarter from baseline to assessment 6 months after treatment.
• Other metrics showed a reduction in anxiety and depression and a general improvement in health-related quality of life.

Study limitation

The main limits to the studies generalisability come from it being a pilot study. Pilot studies are usually conducted to see if the evidence justifies the cost of a larger study. As such they tend not to be quite as rigorous as a full study, and a couple of aspects jump out:

• Small population – 51 participants is unlikely to be a sufficiently large sample to get a full representative distribution of people living with IBS.
• No formal control group – A comparison group was used from a previous study. This is not a true comparator as it was not time-synchronous with the treatment group and thus is open to different variables.

Neither of these invalidate the research, they simple caution against over-generalisation. These findings do however represent the highest level of evidence currently available to us and thus current evidence says that group online hypnotherapy is a valid approach.

Group online hypnotherapy for IBS – Implications for hypnotherapists and People living with IBS

The first thing we can say is that as it appears that group online hypnotherapy for IBS is effective and as such is a valid approach. This approach could make hypnotherapy for IBS:

• Easier to access – Hypnotherapists specialising in IBS have tended to be few and far between. By going online those specialisms become much easier for potential patients to access.
• Cheaper to access – By offering group work a hypnotherapist can reduce the price for individual patients.
• Potentially more profitable for hypnotherapists – As groups can be up to 8 participants the hypnotherapist could be offering group entry at substantially less than their one-to-one rate whilst still earning more overall.

Is group online hypnotherapy the way of the future?

From an evidence perspective it is too early to say if group online hypnotherapy for other issues will be effective. However, we may be able to say that it looks like a valid way forward for functional disorders which is justifiable on the reduction of cost and increase accessibility.

Dr Matt Krouwel has a PhD in treating IBS with Hypnotherapy and has been a hypnotherapist for over 25 years.

References

Lövdahl, J., Törnblom, H., Ringström, G., Palsson, O. S., & Simrén, M. (2026). Online Group Hypnotherapy for Irritable Bowel Syndrome—a Pilot Study. Neurogastroenterology & Motility, 38(5), e70328.

Rasch, B., & Cordi, M. J. (2024). The influence of experience and modality of presentation (online vs. offline) on hypnotizability. Frontiers in Psychology, 14, 1293070.

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Hypnotherapy for Vaping – number of sessions

This can vary depending on the hypnotherapists approach. However, most hypnotherapists are treating vaping as closer to a bad habit than a persisitent addiction. This means that they are taking briefer, more intense, approaches which tend to be 1-3 sessions. Personally, I favour the single session approach for stopping habits like vaping (and smoking). For more information about hypnotherapy sessions in general click here!

The case history

Should you go to a hypnotherapist to become stop vaping then they are likely to take a case history. In addition to some general details about your life they are going to be interested in a few vape related areas such as:

• What caused you to start vaping? – Was it to stop smoking? Was it just because it was the thing to do?
• When and where do you vape – For some people this is all the time (in bed, at work, on planes), but many vapers will have times and places where they are freer with it.
• What are your reasons for becoming a non-vaper? – These may vary from person to person, but common themes are health concerns and issues with the social acceptability of vaping.

Hypnotherapy for Vaping – Hypnotic trance

Hypnotic trance is usually entered by a combination of guided focusing and relaxation exercises. Sometimes a visualisation element may also be present. During the process the hypnotist moves the subjects focus of attention onto their inner mind. The effect of which is:

They enter a sleep like state – This differs from the sleep of bedtime in that the mind remains alert and to a degree aware.  Most people find this state relaxing.

Creating change

Most hypnotherapists will do some combination of:

• Obtain unconscious buy in to change – Most hypnotherapists will look to create acceptance of the change within the unconscious. This is done in several ways from the use of suggestions and metaphors to psychodynamic approaches.
• Deconditioning of habits – This is where the therapist uses hypnotic suggestion or visualisation to overwrite the old habit behaviours with a new response.
• Emphasis benefits and positive future – Through a combination of suggestions and often visualisations patients are encouraged to acknowledge and even experience the future benefits of becoming a non-vaper.

Hypnotherapy for Vaping – Does it work?

Medical research is a slow business and at time of writing I have been unable to find any serious research on this topic. However, my experience with patients has been very positive so far, take this feed back for example from a review :

” I honestly don’t know how he did it, but Matt somehow managed to change my mindset and convince my brain that I no longer needed to vape. It sounds unbelievable, but it worked.” 

Call or email to find out more!

Dr Matt Krouwel PhD is a Birmingham based hypnotherapist who has been helping people with nicotine addictions for over 25 years. He is a member of both the BSCH and the NCH.

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Hypnotic direct suggestions

Put simply hypnotic direct suggestions are:

Simple, direct commands delivered to a hypnotic subject to illicit a temporary or permanent change.

Examples might include:

• “When I awaken you, you will have no memory of what was said.” – a direct suggestion for post-hypnotic amnesia.
• “As a result of the work we have done today you are going to feel more confident.” – A direct suggestion for increased confidence.
• “When you wake up in the morning you will find that you have no desire to smoke.” – A habit breaking suggestion.

Although hypnotherapists will often rely upon other techniques to create change, it is rare that they won’t include some direct suggestions when working with a patient.

Hypnotic direct suggestions as cognitions

A cognition, as seen in cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT)  may often take the form of  a statement of a belief. It is theorised by some hypnotherapists that direct suggestions represent new cognitions around which beliefs, new behaviours and reinforcing feedback loops will form. If we take the example from above of

“As a result of the work we have done today you are going to feel more confident.”

The suggestion makes the person believe they are confident. In believing they are confident they then behaviour more confidently. In behaving more confidently two things will tend to happen:

1. They will notice themselves acting more confidently, which will tell them that they are more confident, which further reinforces the idea that they are confident. Confidence then becomes a habit.
2. Others react to their enhanced confidence in positive ways. Consciously and / or unconsciously this tells the patient that these ways of behaving are rewarding (they get the date, they get the promotion, they get the respect) and thus they are reinforced.

So, if direct suggestion are so beneficial why do hypnotherapists use other techniques?

Strengths and limitations of hypnotic direct suggestions

As with all approaches direct suggestions have strengths and limitations which make them more, or less suitable in different situations.

The main strengths of the direct suggestion are its:

• Force – Direct suggestions have authority. As such they are easy for hypnotherapists to deliver them emphatically which conveys power.
• Clarity – Direct suggestions have a very clear meaning. They make it obvious when and where an effect will happen, or what a person will be. In this way they focus the hypnotic subject’s resources on to that circumstance.

These characteristic make them especially useful for:

• People who preference clear guidance.
• In theory they may be more suitable when hypnotic subjects enter a deeper trance state as many people argue that the unconscious preferences simple messages.

However, as with all things there are limitations.

limitations

Because direct suggestions are specific, they run the risk of getting it wrong, some of the main ways this occurs are:

• Asking too much of the subject too soon – Many therapy patients require groundwork before making big changes. If the ground work is not sufficient then powerful direct suggestions may not work or their effects may not last for long.
• Misunderstanding the subject’s needs – Should a hypnotherapist give a suggestion that does not match the subject’s life, way of thinking or expectations then things may go as planned. They may resist or reject the suggestion or it may only work in some circumstances. Equally, if it does not fit their life then it may undermine the rapport they felt with their therapist.

Direct suggestions are a staple of the hypnotherapists tool kit. However, many other techniques are used in hypnotherapy  they are not the only form of suggestion. In-direct or permissive suggestions.

Dr Matt Krouwel PhD is a Birmingham based therapist with over 25 years experience of teaching and practicing hypnotherapy . He is a member of both the BSCH and the NCH.

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Many hypnotherapists will use versions of what is called inner child work. There are several formal definitions of the Inner child. Few hypnotherapists use these definitions rigidly. Within the context of hypnotherapy, the inner child is most often represented as:

A part of the mind which has been traumatised. As a traumatised part it has broken off and become separate.

This is sometimes called a wounded inner child. This traumatised part is often represented as a child because it was created by childhood psychological trauma.

• Note – There are joyful and playful variants of the inner child. These are less commonly engaged with in hypnotherapy.

The creation of an inner child through trauma.

An inner child may be created by a single trauma, or several lesser traumas. Children do the best they can with what they have got. What they have to work with is often restricted by society and their lack of life experience. As a result, they tend to adopt strategies which are imperfect. The child will have found a way to protect themselves emotionally from the trauma by separating (dissociating) themselves from the emotional pain. In the process they will have developed an inner child.

How inner child behaviours manifest.

There are two things tend to result from the presences of a wounded inner child:

1. From time to time the Inner child takes over – Frequently this takes the form of meltdowns, tantrums and behaving in a way which matches or mirrors the origin trauma.
2. Coping strategies are adopted – These are often behaviours which allow for the person to move out of their mental pain such as: drug use, excessive eating, self-harm, arguing and fighting. Alternatively, they may be externalised behaviours such as arguing, fighting or vandalism.

How would a hypnotherapist work with an Inner child

There are several likely steps to this process:

• Initial work will be done to ensure the patient is in a strong mental potion for the subsequent work.
• They will access the inner child through the imagination in a hypnotic state. This may be done by eliciting the inner child’s voice or by imagining them them. In this way communication between the patient and the Inner child can be initiated.
• Communication is conducted between patient and the inner child. This may be done to understand the development of the inner child and what it is doing, or reassure it that it is accepted and safe.
• Reintergration will be sought. This may be after a single session or several encounters. The aim of the reintegration is to bring the experience which the inner child developed to help with back into the whole. This allows for the development of a new way of being informed by the wider adult understanding and opportunities.

Does it work?

With the right patient, at the right time, Inner child work can produce powerful shifts which can appear to be almost miraculous. However, with most patients it opens them up to change which will require behaviour change techniques to capitalise upon. Following Inner child work such techniques as…

• Direct hypnotic suggestion.
• Desensitisation.
• Goal setting.
• EMDR.

…may be used to help the patient create lasting change.

Dr Matt Krouwel PhD is a Birmingham based hypnotherapist with over 25 years experience. He has taught hypnotherapy around the world at private institutions and medical schools. He is a member of both the BSCH and the NCH.

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• In life regression – This is where a person revisits an earlier point in their life.
• Esoteric or past life regression – This is when someone visits an earlier life. As only a small percentage of people believe in past lives this form of regression is more controversial than in-life regression.

It is important to clarify which you mean when discussing these as they are often confused.

Characteristics of a regression

A regression is a specific state and as this state matters therapeutically it can be helpful to understand it. There are couple of things which a regression is not.

1. Regression is not remembering – Remembering is the act of being in the present time and calling up memories of the past. The key feature being that you are grounded in the present. Hypnosis is associated with increased recall (hypermnesia) but this is used in different ways to regression.
2. Regression is not reliving – Reliving is when you are so deeply in the past that you act and recall as if back then. Say you had returned to the age of seven you would respond as a seven-year-old and possess no memories beyond the age of seven. When someone mentally returns to the past this full it is referred to as revivification. Such states have value

So, what is regression?

Regression is…

… returning to the past with a degree of awareness of everything which has happened since. You go back to the age of seven and are experiencing much of it as if it were happening now but maintain an awareness that you are older.

This has potentially great therapeutic value as you may be seeing and experiencing things with more experienced eyes.

Why conduct a hypnotic regression?

Regressions are done for one of several reasons, such as:

• To help remember the origin of a problem – By gaining insight into the origin of a problem a client will feel more in control. This approach would be used when the origin is unknown but it runs the risk of creating a false memory if not handled skilfully.
• To release trapped emotional energy at the start of a problem – This is sometimes known as catharsis. Catharsis is frequently powerful, often to a level that can resolve a problem. However, most commonly catharsis is a release of energy which opens the door for change, but other approaches are required to make that change permanent. Catharsis is so powerful that there is the potential for re-traumatisation. As such many therapists will avoid it wherever possible and only allow it under highly supported circumstances.
• To alter problem behaviour by changing the perception of the initial experience – By returning to a known event and experiencing it with an older (wiser) perception the mind can recontextualise it within that mature understanding. What was devastating as a child, is something that you have survived as an adult.
• Other reasons – Sometimes a hypnotherapist will be asked to conduct regressions to help recover lost information. They may also be asked to help someone in their philosophical or spiritual journey.

Dangers and limitations of hypnotic regression

Anyone can regress spontaneously, but a hypnotic regression should be carefully managed by a professional to reduce the risk of problems arising. The two most important factors are

• Appropriate psychological preparedness – A hypnotherapist should ensure that their client is in a strong psychological state prior to any regression. This is done by using psychological control exercise and ego strengthening suggestions. Typically, a hypnotherapist will not conduct a regression on the first session.
• Careful questioning – By using open questions and avoiding leading questions the therapist reduces the chance of a false memory being created.

Dr Matt Krouwel PhD is a hypnotherapist based in Birmingham (UK) with over 25 years experience. He has taught hypnotherapy around the world at private institutions and medical schools. He is a member of both the BSCH and the NCH

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What is a Part?

Within the concept of parts therapy, our minds are comprised of different parts which are responsible for our different psychological processes, beliefs and behaviours. Parts do a job, which typically they get on with automatically without any issues. However, in therapy we encounter parts which are creating a problem. Example of this might be a part that encourages:

• Someone to engage in risky behaviour.
• Self-sabotage.
• Avoiding challenges where there is a risk of failure.
• Procrastination.
• Internal conflict.
• Perfectionism.

A common way in which you spot someone who is psychologically set up to think in terms of parts is when they say:

“There is a part of me that thinks…”

The experience of an inner critical voice is another example which indicates that someone thinks in terms of parts. An example of this mental model which involves more than one part is the Angel and Devil parts combination. This is often experienced by people when making a decision.

• The angel (or good) part of their mind wants them to do what is best overall. This could mean it is the right thing to do for health or wellbeing of finances.
• The devil (or bad) part of their mind however wants them to do what is most enjoyable. This could be eating something which is unhealthy or buying something expensive and unnecessary.

As they make the decision they may switch between the two parts of themselves. These are just a few examples of the many ways in which a parts model may be expressed or experienced. Other include inner critical voices,

Assumptions we make about Parts in Parts Therapy

Before a therapist uses parts therapy, there are a set of assumptions and principals which are useful for them to take on board.

• Meeting a need – The part, regardless of what behaviour is occurring, is attempting to fulfil a legitimate need within the client. Typical needs are around requirements of stimulation or safety. Problems arise because the method of fulling the need does not work in the wider context of life.
• Good intent – The part only wants what is best for the person. Unfortunately, the part may not be aware that in the wider context of the person life what they are doing is doing more harm than good.
• Parts are open to change – As long as a part can satisfactorily still meet the need they are fulfilling then they can change behaviour. For the therapist this means that the part generally needs to be brought into contact with the larger context of the client’s life so that more appropriate ways of meeting need can be found.
• The mind has the answer – It is believed that with access to the wider mind the client will have the answer. An adult client is an expert upon themselves and has a vast experience and knowledge of their life. As such they are best placed to find a new way of meeting the need in a way which works better in their overall life. This can be done consciously or unconsciously.

As noted above, a part may have a good intention and be meeting a need and yet be causing an ongoing problem. This is usually due to a mismatch between how the part is meeting the need and the life the client is attempting to live. Occasionally it may be that the need being met is no longer relevant. But why does this mismatch happen in the first place?

Why do problems develop with parts?

There are a couple of common reasons for the parts desire to meet a need causing problems in the client’s life. These are:

• The part developed at an earlier life stage – A classic example of this is when a part is developed in childhood. In childhood we have limited resources of freedom, money and life experience. When children we come up with ways of meeting our needs which work sufficiently to survive childhood, but don’t always translate well into adulthood.
• Lack of flexibility – A strategy may have developed that is good enough most of the time. A good example of this is the ‘Push on through’ strategy. In this the person has learnt that they cope, and often thrive, by pushing through and working harder. A lifetime of using this strategy reinforces how effective it is … until the day when it doesn’t work. When it doesn’t work the person doubles down and applies it more, and more and more. This depletes and burning them out. Often, they don’t understand what is happening and as such are unable to formulate a new strategy for this particular situation.

What is Parts therapy?

Parts therapy is when the therapist uses the parts model of mind to create change. This is best done when the client has indicated that they naturally think in terms of parts. The therapist then helps the client access the part, begin negotiations and then thus create deep psychodynamic change.

Stages of Parts therapy

1. Invoking the part – The therapist will relax and focus the patient upon the part. This may be by listening to its voice or allowing the imagination to present them with an image of it.
2. Initiating communication – If it does not happen as part of the process of invoking the part therapist is likely to prompt two-way communication. This may often be as simple as getting the client to thank the part for communicating and getting an acknowledgement of that.
3. Awareness of the need the part meets – The therapist will help the client to understand the role the part plays in their life by encouraging the part to share the need it fulfils. This is not strictly necessary for change but does make it easier. Further, if the client understands what the part is doing for them it becomes easier to negotiate with it.
4. Change – The part is invited to change what they do in such a way that they continue to fulfil need but using behaviours that are more appropriate to the client’s life. Should this prove difficult other parts may be accessed to help.
5. Reintegration – The changed part is reintegrated into the client. This brings the changes back into the client as a whole.

The outcome of this may be a revolution in the client’s life, or it may just mean that they are now in a place where change is possible. It would be normal to follow this up with behaviour or symptom change techniques such as EMDR, Systematic desensitisation, visualisation or hypnotic direct suggestions.

Dr Matt Krouwel PhD is a hypnotherapist with over 25 years experience. He has taught hypnotherapy around the world at private institutions and medical schools. He is a member of both the BSCH and the NCH

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Psychodynamics in hypnotherapy

There are many approaches and techniques in the modern hypnotherapist’s tool kit which have their roots in the psychodynamic. Here are a few examples:

• Regressions – Regression is psychologically travelling back to an earlier point in life. They may even go back to a previous life if this fits the patient’s belief system. This is done to uncover the origin point of a certain behaviour. As the patient retains much of their mature awareness during the regression they bring a more worldly-wise perspective to that experience. This allows insight into how the behaviours developed. Alternatively, it may allow  the safe release of trapped emotional power.
• Parts therapy – In this the unconscious is perceived as made up of multiple different ‘parts’. Each part has a different role which has developed in response to life learning. Sometimes a part no longer works effectively. This is usually because life circumstances have changed but a part has not adapted. By engaging with the part, or several parts, the hypnotherapist attempts to get the part to adjust to the new circumstances and reintegrate in to the whole self. Parts can also become dissociated and may need help in becoming reintegrated within the whole.
• Inner child/ younger self visualisation – From a hypnotherapy perceptive the inner child, or younger self, represents a dissociated younger version of the self. The disassociation usually occurs due to some traumatic life experience, or period of difficulty. This dissociated younger self may need to be reintegrated into the person as a whole to help them become truly psychologically whole.
• Symbolic representations – There are many approaches which seek to initiate psychodynamic change using commonly understood metaphors. Good examples of this are visualisation approaches where people organise their inner world into boxes or by imagining cleaning a house. They may build a better mindset through the metaphor of constructing something or repairing it. Archetypes may be invoked by going on a quest to seek a wise person. Often such visualisations will be created in response to imagery which has been suggested by something the patient said.

Hypnotherapy claims a particular access to the unconscious which has led to the development of therapy techniques that look to create unconscious change without bringing things into conscious awareness. It is theorised that this means there is less conscious resistance to change.

Unconscious psychodynamic techniques

Occasionally a hypnotherapist will use a technique that is intended to create change unconsciously by initiating unconscious processing.

• Ideomotor response (IMR) approaches – An IMR is a small unconscious movement which the hypnotherapist can install in a patient via suggestion to aid with communication with the unconscious. Sometimes an IMR process will be used  to create psychodynamic change. The therapist will install IMR indicators and then set the unconscious to make a change. Parameters intended to ensure safety will be given. Neither the hypnotherapist nor the patient is likely to be aware of what exactly is happening, but the IMR will let the hypnotherapist know when the change has been done.
• Amnesia – Suggestions for amnesia can be given for the therapy to make it unconscious. The therapy itself could be suggestions, visualisations or any other technique the therapist chooses. By making the patient consciously forget what has happened the work becomes unconscious and thus operates without conscious resistance.

For many people psychodynamic change may be their whole therapeutic journey. However, to achieve specific change it is usual in modern hypnotherapy to integrate direct change work, such as direct suggestions or behavioural techniques. Further, most hypnotherapists will start with direct change work unless psychodynamics are clearly indicated.

The author

Dr Matt Krouwel PhD is a hypnotherapist based in Birmingham (UK) and is a member of both the BSCH and the NCH. He has taught hypnotherapy students internationally about psychodynamics in hypnotherapy.

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