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By Pat Shure • Photo by Susan Ayer

Kathy Braun, the Clinical Hypnotherapist of Ann Arbor Hypnotherapy, is my cousin. When she relocated to Ann Arbor about fifteen years ago we all wanted to hear about her hypnosis practice. I was interested, but skeptical. I thought the “hypnotic state” was fiction. Kathy wouldn’t talk about her practice—explaining that the sessions she has with her clients are strictly confidential. She preferred to talk about what she calls her “bragging rights” back in the day when she was in a New York Shakespeare Festival production of Measure for Measure starring Meryl Streep.

But as time went on, and she began to accumulate interesting testimonials on her website, more and more people seemed convinced that something real was happening. I wanted to see for myself, so I asked her if I could observe a session. She asked one of her clients, a medical student who was coping with test anxiety, if it would be okay for him to have an observer at their next session. He agreed, I watched the session, and it changed my mind about hypnosis. I saw that the hypnotic state is not just fiction, it’s a very real mental state. It’s my hope that my interview with Kathy will help readers understand how hypnosis works and how it can enable healing.

Pat Shure: Can you talk a little about the hypnotic state?

Kathy Braun: Sure. There’s a lot of misunderstanding and frankly, nonsense, about what hypnosis really is. When you think about it, hypnosis is the only healing modality that’s also used for entertainment. “Hey, let’s get a hypnotist for the senior party—or for the wedding rehearsal—or just for fun!” You never hear “Hey, let’s get a dentist to do a root canal for the senior party!”

Of course, with entertainment, anything goes. When a magician says “And now ladies and gentlemen, watch me saw this lovely lady in half!” the audience enjoys the show—they know he’s not about to commit murder. They know it’s a trick, and by now, most people know what the trick is. But they’re not there at the show for healing, they’re there for fun.

Entertainment hypnosis works on the idea that most people don’t know a crucial core truth about hypnosis. “He made me cluck like a chicken,” they’ll say. But in reality a hypnotist can’t make anyone do anything. It simply doesn’t have that property. Hypnosis absolutely cannot overcome free will. If it did, hypnotists would be billionaires—they’re not. If it did, prisoners of war would come home working for the enemy—they don’t.

Pat Shure: So, exactly how does it work?

Kathy Braun: Clinical hypnotherapy has a whole other purpose than entertainment. Like any other clinical modality its purpose is to help restore health and well-being.

Science steps in here to help, because hypnosis is a mental state that can actually be measured. The EEG, or electroencephalogram, measures the bioelectrical activity in the brain.

So, if you had an EEG measurement when you were asleep your brain waves would show one pattern—generally, in sleep, a pattern that could be described as a gently rolling ocean. In a hypnotic state you’d show what science has named an alpha wave.

Generally speaking (because there are exceptions) when we’re awake our brain is producing either an alpha or a beta wave. Most of the time when we’re awake we’ll show a beta wave. On the monitor it looks angular and sharp. It’s very fast. Every second it waves–goes up and comes down—about 17 to 21 times. That’s per second. Fast.

If you’re feeling super anxious or having a panic attack you’d probably register at the high end of the beta spectrum. If you’re just walking around being awake you’d probably register at the low end. Nevertheless, even the low end is fast.

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Pat Shure: Okay, and what about alpha waves?

Kathy Braun: In a small minority of the time, you might show an alpha wave. An alpha wave isn’t angular, it’s rounded. Even visually, compared to the beta wave, it actually looks much more relaxed. It resembles the sleep wave, that is to say rolling and rounded, but with a bigger amplitude (the height of each wave). The important point about the alpha wave is that it’s considerably slower than the beta. Every second it waves only 8 to 12 times a second. Much slower. And from a subjective point of view, it feels much different. It feels super relaxed.

Usually an alpha wave will present itself in very specific settings. Here we’re talking about hypnosis, but you can also see an alpha wave in people who are in deep meditation. There’s definitely an overlap between the hypnotic state and the meditative state.

PS: What’s good about the alpha state?

KB: There are many wonderful things about the alpha state. First of all, it feels great. It’s the very opposite of feeling anxious.

Second of all, all by itself, it leads to healing. The body/mind much prefers to feel super relaxed than to feel super anxious and that preference plays out in many different manifestations of well-being or its absence.

Third, it’s the state that’s most desirable for effective Suggestion Therapy, to further goals that have been mutually chosen by therapist and client.

And fourth, a terrific benefit from my point of view, is that it’s easily learned. I regard accessing the alpha state, and all its benefits, as a skill. I love to teach it. Teaching it is a central part of my approach to working with clients.

PS: What about all the exotic things one hears about hypnosis?

KB: Oh, it’s fascinating, no doubt. When I was in hypno school we watched a program from the BBC about a surgeon in Madrid who only uses hypnosis as an anesthetic. Not me, I must say. Neither doing that kind of hypnosis, nor wanting it for myself. If I have to have surgery where someone is cutting into my body, give me conventional anesthesia, is what I say.

But that being said, in the last thirty years there’s been a lot of scholarly work concerning the placebo effect—it’s currently in the process of making a full 180 degree turn regarding the opinion about its worth. In the past it was regarded as sort of a nuisance that shows up in approximately 30% of double blind drug trials across the board—with every type of disorder and every type of drug. That’s a huge number. Now it’s being seen as a vanguard effect that demonstrates the incredible potential of the power of the mind.

By the way, may I insert something here or do you have a question?

PS: No, go ahead.

KB: I forgot to say a few more basic truths about being in the hypnotic state. One, you remain conscious, you don’t fall asleep. Hypnosis as sleep is very old school. “Watch the moving stopwatch. You are falling asleeep.” Of course, if you’re sleep deprived, simply becoming profoundly relaxed does tend to make you want to go home and take a nap. Good, I say. Sleep deprivation is not good. Feels crappy and also not good for the health. And the stats tell me that many, if not most Americans, are sleep deprived.

Also, here’s a biggie—the hypnotic state is not a truth serum. You can actually tell a lie when you’re hypnotized. When I was in hypno school this reality about hypnosis surprised me the most. But it’s true. You remain in control. I tell my clients: “I can’t put you in a trance, extract your PIN number from you, go to your bank, take out your money, and run away. Not possible."

And then there’s the myth I call “The Screenwriter’s Favorite.” For example, the plot goes that a terrorist comes into the office during your session, shoots the hypnotherapist, and you're stuck in hypnosis forever. Nonsense. You’d just open your eyes.

PS: What are your favorite issues to work with?

KB:Well, of course I love helping people banish anxiety. Anxiety is an emotional toxin which is debilitating to health and well-being. My mission is to help all my clients be peaceful and happy.

Smoking cessation is way up there. People often come to me because they’re due for surgery and their surgeons won’t operate on someone who smokes. It’s an intensive care program. I use hypnosis combined with EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique), also called tapping, a form of simple energy work. I never make guarantees—I think it would be unethical—but if I made guarantees I’d guarantee my smoking cessation program because the success rate is so high.

But my number one favorite is trauma release. I use it in many situations, but my favorite is releasing the trauma of childhood abuse. It’s a tragedy that so many people walk around for years suffering the lingering effects of abuse.

PS: Trauma release—that sounds fascinating. Tell me more about it?

KB: Well, of course there are different types of trauma. For example, being in a horrible car accident as an adult is different from abuse during childhood. I’ll tell you about childhood trauma.

One of the things I see regularly is that the client often won’t tell me about it in the intake session but waits a few sessions and then sort of casually mentions it at the end of a session. My feeling is that she’s been waiting to see if she can trust me. My response is usually, “I’m so sorry to hear about that. But I have a process that I think could help you. We’ll talk about it at the next session.”

PS: And then what happens?

KB: Then I go into detail at the next session. By then, she’s had a few sessions with me and has become familiar with what being in hypnosis is all about and is also familiar with EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique). She’s not only familiar with them on an intellectual level, but in those few early sessions she’s actually experienced the relief that they can bring.

When I tell her about the trauma release process I explain to her one of the reasons she’s been suffering long into adulthood with the aftereffects of what happened in childhood is because part of her is pushing away from the feelings those memories evoke—it’s natural to want to avoid distressing feelings. But with trauma release, part of the process is actually letting those feelings emerge.

But not to worry, for several reasons. First of all, we’ll be letting those feelings emerge so we can release them once and for all. Secondly, it won’t be like she’ll become a child again. She’s an adult this time and she’s in control and I’m there to be in control with her. And third of all, even though we want the old painful feelings to emerge, at the same time she’ll know she’s in the reality of being in a recliner in her hypnotherapist’s office.

PS: So, you’ve prepared her for the process. What is the actual process like?

KB: Yes, preparing her for the process is super crucial. At the next session, we use hypnosis to help her access the old feelings and then, when she’s experiencing the feelings, we use EFT to dissolve them.

EFT is an incredible technique. Those practitioners who have used it know what I’m talking about. I was very slow to integrate it into my practice because it just hardly seemed real. I think of it (and explain it to my clients) as the antibiotic of emotional work. Before antibiotics were discovered and employed, the number one cause of medical death throughout history was infection and then boom, antibiotics changed everything.

After we go through the feelings and dissolve them, I’ll repeat the whole process to make sure the feelings really are dissolved. The memories remain, but like scenes in a movie. The feelings are dissolved, released.

Often in just a handful of sessions the process lets people finally feel free. A satisfying resolution for us both.

To learn more about Kathy Braun visit the Ann Arbor Hypnotherapy website at annarborhypnotherapy.com or email her at kathy@annarborhypnotherapy.com.