My Voice Will Go with You

Sidney Rosen (Editor). W. W. Norton & Company 1991, Paperback, 256 pages, $9.84

In your journey of learning how to hypnotise you will at some point come across the name Milton Erickson. You could spend a life-time studying him and still only be scratching the surface of the art of influencing change in a person. Erickson is considered to be THE MASTER of modern hypnosis – he was a medical doctor who lived in the 20th Century and pioneered what some people now call conversational hypnosis and the use of hypnotic metaphor.

I first came across this book about five years ago … and I’m still dipping into it every now and then. I probably started at the wrong end of the spectrum, only reading this book after having first delved deep into the hundreds of case history materials and books that Milton generated over his lifetime.

The ‘tales’ in the book are examples that Erickson presented to medical audiences and represent different cases and how he worked with them. The tales are delivered in the same style in which he delivers his interventions. In other words the tales are hypnotic metaphors in their own right. And you don’t have to worry about this at all if you are just starting out to learn how to hypnotize. Just read the book for what it’s worth – at the minimum you will get some insight into the range of issues that hypnosis can be applied to.

You won’t find a ‘how to hypnotise’ analysis inside this book. It doesn’t teach hypnotic techniques in the way you might expect or teach you how to do what Erickson did. But as an introduction to the art of metaphor and conversational hypnosis, this is a gem. Once you’re someway down your learning journey of hypnosis, come back to this book and re-read it … and you’ll discover things in there you didn’t see the first time through.

Have a nice trip

The Wandering Hypnotist

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