A FARANG HYPNOTIST IN THE LAND OF SMILES

A FARANG HYPNOTHERAPIST IN THE LAND OF SMILES

An interview with John Krukowski, C.H.

1. OK, LET'S CUT TO THE CHASE: GIVE ME ONE OF YOUR MOST INTERESTING CASES IN THAILAND INVOLVING HYPNOSIS, ESPECIALLY IF IT'S A SEXY ONE.

Well, as for most interesting it is hard to say. I guess It would have to be a young Thai lady in her late 20's who was doing her best to get over a guy who she figured out was not the right man for her. It was difficult in that she gave up her virginity to him. He had not called her for some time and she was learning the hard lessons of life. In fact she had already decided to move on with her life. Then he started calling and emailing her from abroad. This to say the least was playing a big number on her head. Let me tell you this guy was a pro at playing head games and the guilt trip game. I have seen some of his emails to her and this guy deserves some sort of award. So now here she is not knowing what way is up only knowing that she wants to move on. It was having a big negative effect on her work and personal life. One of my special fields is relationships. Depending on what you want, it can help you strengthen your relationship, or get over one. Without hypnosis it would have taken her a good 6 to 12 months to get over this on her own. That time was cut to about 1 day with hypnotherapy. She was able to return to work and get on

Well, first let me put this to rest once and for all. You would never do anything while hypnotized that you would not do if you were not. If that were the case everyone who knows Hypnosis would be best friends will Bill Gates about now. Last I checked his bank account was still bigger by far than anyone else. He his not writing checks to hypnotists. The instinct for self preservation is the strongest drive we have. Procreation is the second strongest. We would never do anything that would cross that line of putting ourselves in harm's way. Even in the deepest state of hypnosis a person would drop a lit match as the flame got near their fingers. However you must know that the line of what we will do and what we won’t do is different for everyone. I am sure it would be no problem to hypnotize Ted Bundy to kill again. But he seemed to do just fine on his own. The same is true for trying to hypnotize a woman to have sex with you. She would not do it hypnotized

It all depends on the person and the type of therapy. Most of my walk-in clients are women for weight management. Because the goal of the therapy is to drop the weight or in some cases gain weight, there are no sexual suggestions made. Only a small portion of the types of therapy I do may involve sexual arousal. With that for both men and woman I roll tape. If any client wants to bring someone along I always welcome it. When a person is in a deep state of hypnosis they can’t tell if they are experiencing a hypnotic suggestion or the real thing. Again it all depends on what type of therapy I am doing. Certainly there are some gold diggers out there who may try to accuse a hypnotist of something less than professional. But I think this is true with any profession. Often cases brought to court are dropped. This is simply because anything done with hypnosis can just as easily be undone with hypnosis. If they want to take it to court it is because they don’t want it undone. It’s not like some surgeon doing the wrong operation, you can always be brought back to the state you were in before you even walked in the door. It’s rather hard to convince a judge or jury to rule for the plaintiff once they know this simple fact.

Age regression and age progression is very common in my therapies. Age regression I use a lot with smokers who want to quit. I take them back to a time before they first lit up so they can remember what it was like. Then I take them forward to let them experience where smoking is taking them. It is interesting to see them gasping for air and taking shallow breaths as they actually experience the advance stages of lung cancer. When you can’t breath nothing else matters. I also have sent some of my male smoking clients home impotent for a week (only if I felt it was necessary) to let them experience one of the other wonderful benefits of smoking. Few people think about the negative effects smoking has on your sexual prowess. How it clogs all you arteries, and even reduces the intensity of a orgasm. Once you experience that with age progression, giving up the habit become much easier. It leaves little doubt as to what is more important, smoking or sex. Age regression is mostly used as a discovery tool. You have to think of any problems we have as a weed. Identifying the seed that started that weed growing is a important part of the therapy. I

have a few examples on my website as to how it can be applied. www.hypno-therapy.us One of the more interesting sessions I had was with a 50-year-old CEO. I ended up taking him back to first grade where the seed was planted. During the session it was necessary to make him forget about things that happened after first grade. He was talking the same way he did when he was in first grade, and he was even writing in 1 inch tall block letters. Although much of his life was spent dealing with his burden, it only took a few sessions to identify the cause and as fast as you could snap your fingers the problem was resolved. As for past life regression, I view that as a novelty. In fact, I don’t even know how to do past life regression. People seem to have enough problems with this life.

This was all before the days of the Internet. Around the mid-90's my mother was diagnosed with colon cancer and was only given a short time to live. At the end of her life she was in a hospital bed and being given some serious doses of morphine. She was having some serious hallucinations too not to mention being in la la land. When I discovered that pain management with hypnosis can be more effective than morphine, that is all it took to start me on my way. Now pain management is one of my specialties.

As for coming to Thailand, I have always wanted to come here. For the last 10 years or longer I wanted to see the temples and just do the whole tourist thing. I finally decided I needed to take a break. So I finished with all my clients and planned an 8-week trip to the land of smiles. But because I decided to come when the Olympics were starting I had to make it 9 weeks because of flight availability. I first arrived in late July 2005 and it only took me about 48 hours to decide to move here. So I closed my practice and sold my house. Now here I am. The other reason is, I think, only five hypnotherapists in all of Thailand, and I would be number six. None of them have had the extensive training I've had. I view myself as more traditional and not holistic. I do a lot of medical hypnosis. That is to say I work together with my clients Doctor on things that have a medical basis such as cancer, IBS, hypertension, and even Fibromyalgia to name a few. In the States about 40% of the people I saw were referred by their physician or surgeon. The wonderful thing is insurance companies are starting to pay for some Hypnotherapy. It took them a while to figure out that it was more expensive to keep people on drugs, and not get them better. That is very significant as that adds credibility to what I do. Now all that remains is letting people know I am here.

I would not doubt there will be plenty of men with sexual problems. A significant number of my male clients were for erectile dysfunction, and premature ejaculation. I am sure that will be wonderful news for those who eat blue pills regularly. The effectiveness of hypnotherapy depends on how much of the problem is in your head. If 90 per cent of the problem is in your head you can expect a 90 per cent improvement. Getting hard in a few minutes instead of waiting 30-plus minutes is wonderful too.

8. MANY FEEL THAT STAGE HYPNOSIS AND PARTICULARLY TV HYPNOSIS IS DANGEROUS BECAUSE THE HYPNOTIST HAS NO WAY OF KNOWING HOW HE HAS AFFECTED THOSE IN THE AUDIENCE. YOUR THOUGHTS?

Simply put, this is the first I have heard of this claim. Suggestions can be directed at one or many people. Every stage hypnotist I know only directs suggestions to people who are participating in the show. As hypnosis can’t make you do things you would not do, simply remember that the people on the stage with the hypnotist volunteered to be on stage and they want to experience hypnosis in a entertaining way. The ones sitting watching the show did not want to participate and would reject any suggestions even if they were hypnotized during the show. I have been a regular weekly guest on a radio talk show in Connecticut. I would never dream of doing any hypnotic induction on the air. The very real possibility of having someone drive off the road or rear end a car is there.

Any suggestions given would only affect people already in a hypnotic trance. So unless an actual induction was done little or nothing would happen. Plus the fact people would only respond to suggestions by the hypnotist who hypnotized them. So worrying that some person on the street could somehow take advantage of this is false. As a hypnotherapist I am governed by ethical guidelines. Hypnosis is a very powerful tool, and is not a toy for personal amusement. The people who come to see me have real problems, and are looking to simply make their lives better. Even bar girls have problems.

9. UNUSUAL CASES?

I have had tons of cases that one may call unusual. I am not sure where to begin. The stock broker with a gambling problem, the news anchor who was camera shy, a compulsive liar, people addicted to sex. A (very happy) woman who was a compulsive masturbator, OCD cases, An A-10 fighter pilot who had panic attacks, I had tons of 9-11 people because I was in Connecticut. And a lot sexual performance issues with men.

10. LET'S TALK SOME ABOUT THE METHODS YOU USE TO TAKE PEOPLE UNDER.

The methods I use greatly vary. The stereotypical image of me waving a pendulum is just out of Hollywood. But, yes, I do have a pendulum and I even have a photo of me with it on my website for the people who expect the stereotype. The key to being a good hypnotherapist is knowing a lot of ways to hypnotize someone. I can honestly say I have never done it exactly the same way twice. Most of my clients prefer a nice recliner. As for getting someone over a love affair, as with any form of therapy I need to listen to them as to what the issues are. I also have to listen to what their subconscious is saying, too. That was difficult to learn to do. It involves reading body language. The subconscious does not lie, it is incapable of that. I have been told on many occasions that Thai’s are expert at this. I would have to agree with that assessment. When with a person in a state of hypnosis I am not just sitting talking, I am reading their body language. Their subconscious is talking to me and responding to the hypnotic suggestions. Things I watch for are body shifts, REM or eye flutter, changes in breathing, changes in just about everything. Then to put it simply I help the subconscious sort things out. The subconscious always wants to do what is best, but it does not always make the right decision.

A good example of this is what is called a secondary gain. The most common one I encounter has to do with overweight women. They want to get rid of the fat, but find it impossible to do. So they come to me for a series of sessions and after the first session they actually put weight on moving in the opposite direction. This is my clue that a secondary gain is at work. The next question I ask is have they been sexually assaulted in the past and 9 of 10 will answer yes. So in this case the subconscious wants to become fat and unattractive so as to not be a target for another sexual assault. Then I must address the secondary gain first before the weight will come off. This is a perfect example of the conscious and subconscious disagreeing on things. For men who have sexual issues, the anticipation that they will have a problem adds to their anxiety and simply because they expect a problem, there is one. There is no one size fits all approach on this. Every person has his own reason that causes his particular problem.

As for some of the more interesting issues, I would have to say it was a 35-year-old woman who was a chronic masturbator. She finally decided to get help when she crashed her car one too many times. She had a whole army of vibrators, dildos and whatever you could possibly imagine. She told me that her first orgasm was when she was only 8 years old. She was in a pool and discovered just how good the filter return jet felt if she stood in front of it. From the time she was 14 she would get off about 20 or 30 times a day. She even showed me a little 3-inch vibrator that was in her words “great for traffic jams.” I wondered if she may want to drive a cab in Bangkok? She told me that before she came in for her first session with me she masturbated about 10 times in her car in my parking lot. She was worried that she may not want to have sex after. I would never do that to anyone. So after listening to her story for about 45 minutes, and watching her try her hardest not to do herself in my office. She said it was difficult because talking about it made her horny and want to do it more. So very simply the hypnotic suggestions I gave her were to support the idea that quality is better that quantity. The orgasms would be much more intense if you wait. I also reinforced that and let her experience some real mind blowing orgasms if she waited a day. The wonderful part about hypnosis is the ability to make orgasms so much more intense. In particularly self hypnosis you can learn to do this yourself. So there were no sexual suggestion with her, I only address her desire to control her over indulgence.

Another interesting one was a stock broker with a gambling addiction. He first called me and told me of his dilemma. He said he won over $200,000 gambling the previous year. I congratulated him, but then he told me he still lost money. My thoughts were at that point “I hope it’s your money you lost and not your clients.” He assured me it was his money. He wanted to still gamble with his buddies at the country club, but to avoid casinos like the plague. About the time he was seeing me there a lot was happening in the American stock markets. A lot of heads were rolling because of some corruption and the investors were all excited over that. Stock brokers were to keep a low profile until the heat was off. This is one of the few times I actually caused a phobia (at his request) to deal with the problem. He felt comfortable and secure with his buddies at the county club. They were all businessmen like himself. They all knew each other well. So simply the suggestion was “It’s not the people you know that you have to worry about; some person at the casino may recognize you as a broker and question who’s money you are using." This was all it took and as far as I know he has not been back to a casino. His job was more important than going to the casino. This satisfied his desire to still gamble with his buddies, but made him stay away from casinos.