Is Hypnosis Dangerous?

tldr: No, hypnosis is perfectly safe when done by a trained professional hypnotherapist like Lee McKing especially for the purpose of hypnotherapy to resolve issues of mental health, behavioral, phobias etc

There are all sorts of questions and misconceptions surrounding hypnosis

Whether it is safe or dangerous

Or whether hypnotherapy is losing control and leaking secrets

Even if you know you are talking to a trained certified hypnotherapist

There still might be some concern whether it is safe or not

I will tell you now

I rather you be aware of the people who learnt and practice hypnosis without openly saying they know it

Than to be afraid of the ones who openly share they have attended courses and is a certified hypnotist, especially to help mental health issues, resolving of fears and phobias etc

Kinda ironic when you think about it, ain’t it?

To avoid the ones who truly want to help you, yet unknowingly approaching the ones who might want to do something awful to you

Of course, if you know of hypnosis and how it works, you can better protect yourself from people with ulterior motives like the hypno-gang

Anyway, I want to focus on the safety or danger of doing hypnosis without professional training

Can you hypnotize someone unintentionally to begin with?

The short answer is yes

We sort of do it sometimes to be precise

Just that it may be positive or negative effect, and because it is unintentional

The effect may be short or long

Not that you remain in trance mind you

Rather the emotional effect on you

For example, you might meet your friends and you are excited to share an idea

Thinking and hoping they get as excited for you as you feel

However, they might have a negative mindset or perception or say nasty words to you which dampen your spirt

That is a form of hypnosis

Which, in a long term effect sort of way, causes you to drop that once exciting idea

So depending on the words used, the emotional effect, the setting or situation

It may be minor, or cause long-lasting “psychological damage”

Especially if its a parent’s negative remarks to you as a child

The main thing is that hypnosis is a tool, like how money or a knife is a tool

With the right training, a knife can be an excellent tool to assist with cooking and making some gorgeous dishes

But it can also be used for harm and negative intent

Then of course, you might get people who play with knives thinking it is cool

But that lack of awareness and training causes injuries instead

What can happen if hypnosis is done without a professional?

You can find all sorts of hypnosis scripts online these days

Heck

You can even ask ChatGPT or some other AI tool to generate it for this or that

Would that work as a form of hypnosis?

It sort of depends on the one reading and the one listening

Whether there is trust and the listener is a good hypnotic subject or not

So yea, it can work for some, and not for others

And if it does work, it can have a good or a bad effect too

It’s a tricky situation though

As the risk of something bad happening increases the more you do hypnosis without training

In 2011, three students died within a couple of months from each other after being hypnotized by their school principal in Florida

The principal learnt hypnotherapy through books, so no proper training

Yet, with permission from the respective parents, he hypnotized over 75 students to aid them with exam anxiety, study stress, or even sports performance enhancement

I’m guessing that he likely learnt traditional hypnotherapy, which is a more deeper and relaxed type of trance

And perhaps, in some cases, he might not have brought the students out fully, or they are very good subjects and thus, can get into trance easily even without being formally hypnotized

Unfortunately, one went into a trance while driving with his girlfriend, causing a car crash and his passing

Another girl committed suicide after realizing that hypnosis to improve her exam scores didn’t work

While the third boy, apparently was in a state of numbness for a prolonged length of time, and also subsequently committed suicide

This series of unfortunate events cause the principal his job, but also showcases how untrained hypnosis can be dangerous even when done with the right and best of intentions

What about direct danger of hypnosis?

I recently shared about a client who borrowed a book from the library and did a past life regression hypnosis on her son

He ended up seeing himself as a German soldier killing people

His mother attempted to bring him out of hypnosis, but didn’t do it the right way

And he came out seeing an overlap of the bloody scene with the physical reality of his home

Such things can happen when the person performing the hypnosis says the wrong thing

I had another client who engaged a student hypnotist

This hypnotist was learning in a particular hypnosis school in Singapore so yea, you might think that is ok

Just that perhaps unfortunately, due to the lack of experience, the student hypnotist retraumatize the client

The student hypnotist brought the client back to a memory of when she was 8 years old, and she was choking on an ice cube

However, instead of resolving this trauma properly, somehow he/she messed it up and thus, why I say retraumatized

The client end up having a new issue – fear of choking – when previously she didn’t have this issue at all

This caused her to develop such a huge fear of choking, she avoided eating anything, even soft foods, and unable to drink beyond a tiny sip of water

Her situation was so bad, she was warded in a hospital at that time and that’s when she sought my help instead

So yea there is potential danger behind hypnosis, if you don’t know what you are doing

Just like with any tool

Without the right knowledge and experience, attempting to pretend to be some expert can lead to some potential injury or harm being done to you or the other person

How to approach hypnosis or hypnotherapy?

If you are interested to learn about it just to be aware, sure go ahead

That’s perfectly fine

You can find a lot of information on my hypnosis blog too, although I probably share more about modern hypnosis or conversational hypnotherapy

If you want to hypnotized yourself, you can consider self hypnosis that is a milder effect, or for generic such as confidence boost, being calm and relaxed

I think those are generally ok

Please don’t attempt a past life regression hypnosis just because you think it’s fun…

I’m serious ok?

The hypnosis I share on my blog is generally simple and safe

Very light trance if there is any

And more towards a discovery or alignment of yourself then anything

Although if you are looking for something light and experiential

Something like an arm levitation or magnetic hands is pretty ok too

Just maybe be careful around stuff that makes you forget a name or a number for now

Anyway I have a simple arm levitation here done many years ago which you can play with safely

What about professional hypnotherapy?

Now if you want to seek a professional hypnotist or hypnotherapist for the purpose of therapy and resolving of issues

Make sure you have a good chat with them and see if they can help you or not

Feel free to check with them if there are any possible risks or dangers too

For example, I had a client ask me to make her stop eating sugar and salt because she wanted to remove them from her meals

I told her, it is not a good idea because sugar and salt is in a lot of food

Fruits have sugar, does it mean she will no longer eat fruits?

Yet fruits are healthy and full of vitamins

Essentially, her idea and approach is not a good path, and may cause detrimental health effects if she were to successfully remove the sugar and salt from her food through hypnosis

Whereas another guy wanted to stop eating rice via hypnosis

However, he will consider to eat noodles or bread, he just wanted to stop eating rice

So that is fine cause there is still some carbohydrates in his meals yea?

I made him taste crab whenever he eats rice, cause he hates the taste of crab, and it worked

That very day, his mom made biryani for dinner and he vomited when he ate the rice!

Ok that sounds funny

Here’s another article on why I cannot just make you forget your ex

As long as you trust your hypnotist and he/she knows what to do to get you to the best state you want to be, as well as caution why certain things cannot be done

Then you will be in safe hands