Hear Me On These PUA Podcasts!

The Secret Seduction Podcast is a great new blog aimed at guys who want to get better results in their dating lives, and their self-image and development (but they're good for girls, too!). The guys on the podcasts are smart, and savvy, and the material they cover about personal development and dating are useful and deep. Plus--I'm part of the discussion on three podcasts! Go to the blog and have a listen: http://secretseductionpodcast.wordpress.com/

Brain twister!

This floats around the internet, but it's always fun. Do you know why it works? Can you raed this? Olny 55 plepoe out of 100 can. I cdnuolt blveiee that I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd what I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno’t mtaetr in what oerdr the ltteres in a word are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is that the frsit and last ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can still raed it whotuit a pboerlm. This is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the word as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? Yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt! If you can raed this forwrad it. It works because our mind processes information in chunks. If you read a lot, you've trained your mind to absorb chunks, in this case word-chunks. The more familiar words will be recognized in the same way you'd recognize a single letter that was drawn backwards. For other, less familiar words, you'll read over them and get clues based on their position within the sentence and your knowledge of grammar.

The Strongest Induction?

Recently I was talking to someone about the strongest hypnotic induction. What do you think it is? Dave Elman talks in his book about getting clients into a trance in 90 seconds that was so deep they could do dental surgery without pain and with minimal bleeding. Milton Erickson specialized in getting in possible results with impossible clients.. You can go to youtube.com and search for "rapid inductions" and you'll see people being dropped right off their feet and into deep trance in a number of different ways. So what's the strongest way? For me, the answer is NONE of them. when I first started studying hypnosis, I was perplexed as to how Elman could get such a deep state of trance so very quickly. The clue was there, but I was making a mistake that a lot of people make when they first start. I thought it was something in the induction. It's an understandable mistake. Fans of direct suggestion talk about the power and authority, prestige, of the direct suggestion, while fans of Ericksonian hypnosis talk about the irresistible subtlety of those language patterns. But the bottom line, the real power in the induction is YOU. The confidence and the experience that you exercise is what really determines how deep and how consistently you can get people into trance. The secret is touched on by Elman in his book "Hypnotherapy." At the time the book was written, he was only teaching hypnosis to doctors and dentists, and he tells the story of how he insisted that his students practice on a certain number of their patients every single day. One dentist/student, who didn't begin to actually practice until several week into the class drew Elman's ire, and he explained that without the consistent practice he'd never get good at hypnosis. No matter how much studying you do in hypnosis, your strength will come from the amount of practice, with different people and in different situations, that you do. You have to do it with awareness, but also consistency. Experience is a big ingredient in your confidence and control. Now there are some people who want to learn hypnosis because they feel it will give them greater confidence in social situations, and it can be a tool for gaining confidence. And it will be, IF you go out and practice. Push your boundaries! Because for real power in hypnosis, that's something you have to bring to the situation from inside you. Sure, some people are natural hypnotic subjects, with good intelligence and great imagination, and they'll drop as easily and deeply into trance as you want them to go. But you can't rely on the client always being able to go, no matter how much they want to. You have to have strong skill, and for that you need confidence in your own ability to hypnotize, and also confidence in being able to motivate your subject to get to the place you want them to go. That means being well familiar with different levels of trance, and well familiar with the different ways to communicate that trance in a way the subject can relate to. Then the induction becomes the magic spell that the uninitiated think it is.

The McGurk Effect--how one sense perception messes with another

They say, "It's not what you say, but how you say it." Scientists are discovering that's more true than you ever imagined! would you beleive that what you see affects what you hear? That's the McGurk Effect, Check out the video to learn all about it: I came across this on Mind Bending Videos (http://www.mindbendingvideos.com/) Sign up with them for even more thought-provoking stuff!

Changes coming to article hosting

If you're a regular to the blog, you know that I occasionally post longer, more in-depth articles that are in downloadable PDF format. For a long time I've had them hosted at a document download site that offered a number of nice features, and required nothing from those seeking to access the documents (you guys).

I recently discovered that not only have they changed to demand people register for the site now, but they want to collect money.

I didn't know anything about this, and so I'm going to be changing that very soon. In the meantime, if there's a downloadable article you've seen on the blog that you'd like in PDF format --free of charge-- just email me. If a time comes when money is demanded for them, it'll be as part of one of my books, not from some anonymous 3rd party website. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Do you have to be a BITCH?

(This came out of a discussion in a confidence workshop I was giving)l.. There are women who believe that "bitch" is synonymous with a confident, assertive woman. From my perspective, this is structured on some false beliefs that will sabotage a woman's effectiveness in the long run. One of the most common: a lot of women are raised in a culture that implicitly or explicitly inhibits them from asserting themselves when they have to or want to, so they internalize a certain amount of pain and frustration. When they get past the inhibition and get comfortable asserting themselves, they feel that someone has to feel pain, so they can only assert themselves if they do it at the expense of the feelings of the other person. (This can also be a rationalization for not asserting one's self!). They link their assertiveness with a sadistic edge and inflict pain and frustration on others. Conversely, there are some women who feel a need to belittle and undermine others for the sake of thier own self-image, and justify that as "assertiveness," but it's a kind of rationalization. A lot of people who aren't comfortable being assertive think that it needs a hurtful edge in order to be effective, but in fact, this can work to a person's detriment. Even when bitchiness achieves it's desired goal, it's overkill creates animosities that can sabotage your efforts in the future. Anyone can be confident, uncompromising and goal-oriented without needless cruelty (notice I say needless--sometimes it's called for!!) A person who is generally personable and confident actually has the freedom to be bitchy or cruel on occasion and will be forgiven, while kindness from a bitch counts for nothing. If you're cooking something, you can always increase the heat if you have to, but once the food burns, you can't take the heat away. (Was it bad to use a cooking metaphor? ;^{P~ ).

Firey Trances--The All Blacks Haka Dance

When someone is trying to intimidate you and dominate your environment, what can you do? Last Wednesday's I was co-instructing an intro class in hypnotic inductions. The question arose about whether trance has to be that sleepy, zombied-out state that you see in the movies. Definitely NOT! Any focused, emotional state is a kind of trance. Athletes talk about "being in the zone" Shamanic cultures use ecstatic dancing, dervishes whirl, and New Zealand Rugby team, the famous All Blacks, do the "Haka," a ferocious Maori war dance. Some key elements for any of dynamic trances include mental focus, rhythm, breath, emotional intensity, even physical challenge. See them all here: You can see the powerful effect it has on the practitioners, and maybe even on you too (if you're not feeling anything, just watch it a couple of times), but also try to notice the effect it has on the other team and even the audience. It can be very intimidating. It not only fires up the players, but dominates the playing field and the arena. How do the opponents cope with it? Samoans (also a Polynesian culture) have their own war dance: The Welsh hold the field and refuse to yield, which seems to take the All Blacks by surprise (you can see their surprise!) The British fans, in a show of solidarity, all sing together and literally drown out the Haka cry, reminding them they're not on home turf: The Irish challenge the "prestige" of the Haka by violating the space of the All Blacks: What about you? When someone is trying to intimidate you and dominate your environment, is there anything you can take away from these videos?

Unique and powerful display of Mirroring and Matching

In this video, you can see two early experts of NLP demonstrating Mirroring. A display of Matching occurs around 2:00, and the video finishes up with a very sophisticated pattern break. Study it carefully!! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j5lU52aWTJo