by Cal Banyan
My mouth fell open and I had to shake my head in disbelief when I got an email from a fellow hypnotist today. To sum up the shocking point in her email, she stated that she was resigning from the National Guild of Hypnotists (NGH), and joining the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis (ASCH), because she thought this change in membership would get her more clients and students for her classes. I thought to myself, “What is she thinking!?”
First off, just in case you didn’t know, I’m a member of the NGH. It is the only hypnosis organization I belong to other than the 5-PATH® International Association of Hypnosis Professional, which I founded for the ongoing development of 5-PATH® hypnosis professionals around the world (but that is a different story). I feel no need to join any other organization, and I don’t expect I ever will.
Here is the inside truth, unvarnished and straight at you. In the vast majority of cases, probably better than 99%, the number of clients you have and will ever get, do not come from who you are associated with (membership-wise) in any hypnosis organization. This is because your potential clients have no idea what the heck the different memberships mean.
ASCH will only allow membership if you are a licensed professional, and in the past, has worked against hypnosis professionals who are not licensed and do not have academic credentials such as a PhD or MD.
NGH is an inclusive organization that works to bring all hypnosis professionals together so that the profession can grow, so more people can be helped through the use of professional and ethical application of hypnotic techniques and processes. And, I believe, it would be a fair estimate to say that unlicensed hypnosis professionals are probably helping as many people, or perhaps even more people than the members of ASCH. Furthermore, the NGH does more to protect the right of non-licensed hypnosis professionals to practice (and therefore help more people) than any hypnosis organization of any kind located anywhere in the world.
So, having said all of that, it is important that all hypnosis professionals, licensed and un-licensed, understand that we don’t get clients because of belonging to one particular hypnosis organization or another. People choose an individual hypnotist for a number of much more important reasons.
Here are just a few:
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They liked your website.
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They liked your advertisement in the phone directory.
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You helped their friend of family member (referral).
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They took your self-hypnosis, or other class and like you as a person and as a professional.
And, all of these factors have one thing in common, this person who called your office to learn more about your service or to make an appointment with you, believed they could trust you to do good work and help them succeed.
I tell every class that I train, “Hypnosis is a confidence game. If you don’t get their trust, then there will be no game.” The most important factor leading up to whether or not someone chooses you to work with him or her is whether or not you appear to be trustworthy. Since very few people have any idea about what the major hypnosis organizations stand for, or require for membership or certification, then belonging to one organization over another does not have any effect on whether they trust that you can help them.
At our center, we have helped thousands of clients. Each and every one of the hypnotists who have ever worked at our center have all had to have a current membership with the NGH and have all been certified by them. (My certification course results in NGH certification.)
The person who emailed me stating that she was changing from the NGH to ASCH, left me thinking, “What was she thinking?” I still don’t know. I mean, this makes no sense to me at all.
