Of CEU's and past life regression

Spent this weekend taking continuing education classes for my hypnotherapy certification with Pat O'Malley in Beecher, IL (which is about an hour outside of Chicago if traffic is clear). We studied pain management and past life regression which was fascinating and cool. I learned so much. Pat is an excellent teacher and someone that's simply really great to be around. She holds guided meditations at her home on Tuesdays, and if you're in the area, I recommend going.

It was also really interesting to discover even my own prejudices about hypnotherapy. Before I started any training in it I really thought it was going to be a very mystical thing, but there's really nothing mystical about it. It's all about relaxing your body so that the suggestions you want to give yourself can be delivered more directly into the subconscious where real change can occur. Since it's difficult to both relax yourself and talk to your subconscious (right side of the brain) without engaging the conscious part of the mind (left side of the brain), you need a hypnotherapist to facilitate. It's so powerful because the brain is so amazing, so capable. But it's not magic. Hypnotherapy only works if you're doing it for something you want in your life. It's not mind control (oh, if only it could be I'd have Stel taking out the garbage every day with a big smile on his face!). But I am amazed at what can happen - I've had several people come to me to quit smoking that have been able to do so in one session, which, I've been told is very unusual. I attribute this partly to my skill, but mostly to the client's willingness and desire. I did a session once so that I could feel more awake in the mornings and it's really helped. Is that because I'm open to the power of suggestion? Yeah. That's exactly why. Because I *wanted* to feel more awake when I got up I let myself be open to the power of that suggestion. What you need is to come from the point of "I really wish I could..." and mean it. There's not a single bit of me that really wishes I could wake up at the crack of dawn and go to a gym. No amount of hypnotherapy could get me to do that.

So, anyway, even though I *know* all of this, I still thought that the past life regression was going to be kind of spooky, and it wasn't at all. It's not about the actual past life (and you don't even have to believe in that to engage in a session). It's about the symbols we keep and the stories that we tell ourselves that manifest in undesirable ways in our psyches and bodies. It's less to do about "past life" regression and more to do about trying to go back to find the root, the source of the problems. Once that is accomplished, the person then knows what to work on or let go, and usually what has been ailing them clears up as they clear up their relationship to the source. Sounds a bit Matrix-y but it's really very straight-forward.

I love this work! Both doing it myself and helping others. It's a great intellectual and creative outlet for me and knowing that I'm helping make a difference in other people's lives is terribly satisfying. I know that sounds corny, but I was the little kid that got sucked in every time I heard the "I want to teach the world to sing" Coke commercial. Really. I was.