Dr. Milton H. Erickson M.D.

MILTON H. ERICKSON M.D. (1901 -1980) has done more than any other individual this century to change the way in which Hypnotherapy is practiced.

As a young boy Dr. Erickson's perceptions differed from others' due to his constitutional challenges: for one, Dr. Erickson was color blind, and could only see the color purple, to which he enjoyed immensely, and often wore nothing but purple suits and ties. Dr. Erickson was tone deaf, and could not recognize, nor execute the rhythms of music and song. He was also dyslexic, and only learned of his challenge many years later.

These are but a few of the many differences within the man called the Father of modern day hypnosis, which stimulated wonderment and curiosity which eventually led to Dr. Erickson's lifetime internship in the research of the relativity of human perception, hypnosis.

As if it wasn't enough to go through life with the above listed challenges, Dr. Milton Erickson suffered further from not one, but two bouts of polio, the first of which was so severe, the family doctor predicted imminent death. Dr. Milton Erickson overheard the prediction spoken to his mother, and his annoyance with the doctor seemed to have helped him survive the episode, though he remained physically weakened for much of his life, and had to spend long periods of time in a wheelchair. The determination which was thus revealed in childhood drove Dr. Milton Erickson to gain degrees in medicine and psychology; he then became a psychiatrist, working first in a number of institutions and later as a professor of psychiatry. Dr. Milton Erickson was a fellow of many international professional bodies and was the founding president of the American Society for Clinical Hypnosis.

In 1948 he settled in a modest house in Phoenix, Arizona, where he practiced. privately. In later years, as Dr. Erickson's fame spread, more and more of his time was taken up with lectures and seminars on his approaches to, Hypnosis, Hypnotherapy and psychotherapy.

Dr. Milton Erickson M.D. had a strong, flexible and clever mind, grounded in a deep and unshakable common sense. His personality was that of a true warrior, comfortable and at peace with his beliefs and ideas.: There was none of the obsessional, or neurotic qualities that many of the founders of schools of psychotherapy seem to have displayed.

He was informal. He did not clothe himself with an aura of authority, or mystery as some Hypnotists had tended to; nor did he use fixed hypnotic induction techniques. Sessions often consisted of little stories, otherwise termed metaphor, jokes, and down-to-earth advice blended into a life-changing whole.

Dr. Milton Erickson was flexible, and never used the same detailed hypnotic approach twice. He would always adapt his approach to the particular client according to his, or her personality, experience, age, capacities, social and physical environment, and used whatever means lay to hand to facilitate change.

He was holistic. Dr. Milton Erickson M.D. did not focus attention purely on what was going on in the client's mind, but was very much aware of whatever existed in the client's life outside the consulting-room, and made active use of it as part of the process of change.

He was non-dogmatic. Consistent with his general flexibility, Dr. Milton
Erickson never seems to have propounded any dogmatic basis for his approaches. He taught by example, via analogies, metaphors, and condensed accounts of various cases, and he never propounded any overall theory.

Dr. Milton Erickson M.D. was rather unique for his time, in that he truly believed everyone to be an individual with specific needs and learning's of their very own. He further believed that everyone had all the life learning's needed to achieve their specific desires, and that these life learning's only had to be arranged in such a manner that the individual could make use of.

One of the primary focuses which made Dr. Milton Erickson’s hypnosis work so profoundly effective was the fact that he truly understood that, no one outside of the client him/herself could decide upon what the best measures would be to achieve the desired results. Dr. Milton Erickson understood that no one could ever walk in another’s shoes so to speak, because personal life histories and understandings can be so different from one person to the next. He further realized that everyone’s home, and professional lives are so different, that the only person who could possibly understand someone’s situation is the person himself. For to do so, a person would have to have lived the same life, attained the same belief and value structure. Once all this has been matched, the same kind of internal talk and pictures that come up regarding whatever the matter would also have to be in place. Then, if someone was able to meet such specifications, that person would also have to match up with personal family types situations, along with living and work related issues.

Having these, and many more understandings, are the unique qualities Dr. Erickson had in regards to individuals, and are what allowed him to provide his unique form of individualized hypnotic inductions and therapies. I once read in some text that you could fix a person beyond any doubt with fifteen to twenty years of therapy, but put that person back in the middle of his or her family for five minutes, and it’s all wiped out. Our own personal life imprints learned at a very young age create our internal core selves. If our therapies aren’t exactly suited, how can we expect then to work. Dr. Erickson understood this, and although much of his work directed clients towards getting married, and having lots of children, his directions were primarily that people did it their way, with their own life learning's, and so here too, at Hypnotic Advancements, what is offered is an approach based upon the man's life work, to help you attain your life's desires,... "Your Way".

Milton H. Erickson Foundation
http://www.erickson-foundation.org/


email: dr_frank@hypnoticadvancements.com

Mailing address:
Dr. Frank Valente
Hypnotic Advancements
3126 McCarthy Court
Mississauga , ON
Canada L4Y-3Z5

© 2004, Dr. Frank Valente DCH

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