Many clients new to hypnotherapy are surprised to find that entering a hypnotic state is a skill. Some clients find it challenging to allow themselves to “drift” into the altered state. Entering a guided trance requires clients to trust both themselves and the hypnotherapist; And building that trust can take time. It is also usually necessary for the hypnotherapist to educate the client on the myths and misconceptions of hypnosis, so that once the client is engaged in the trance experience, they will have an educated basis for determining whether they have reached a state. hypnotic. This preparation and education phase may take several sessions and some experimentation with hypnotic techniques and approaches before the client experiences success.
During the twenty-five years that I have trained hypnotherapists and worked with individual clients, I have sought many alternatives to formal hypnotic inductions as a way to help clients work with their subconscious resources for transformation and healing. I live to empower and support clients who have difficulty trusting themselves and their experience (or lack of experience) in the hypnotic state and I commonly suggest alternative approaches to working in trance states early in therapy. One approach that proves to be evocative, playful, highly creative, and completely self-guided by the client is Sandplay Therapy. Originally developed by Margaret Lowenfeld in the 1930s for use with children in play therapy, sand play therapy is currently used with adults, families, corporations, and communities. Sand play therapy is empowering, self-directed, and gentle, yet deeply driven as a vehicle for transformation.
In the traditional form of sand play therapy, the therapist provides a waterproof tray approximately 18 “wide x 28” long x 3 “deep painted blue on the bottom and sides. The tray is half full. with high quality fine sand and the therapy room is equipped with shelves containing a wide variety of quality and aesthetic miniature figures. Small trees, plants and people of all races, cultures and periods of the world are included in a collection. history; prehistoric, wild, and domesticated animals from around the world; materials from nature such as rocks, moss, shells, crystals, wood, driftwood, and pine cones; and marbles, beads, and ornaments. A collection also includes toy cars, trains, ships, planes, wagons and other travel vehicles; intercultural archetypal and spiritual figures, symbols and icons, as well as miniature figures and objects of everyday life. All historical periods and cultures, bridges, fences, towers and caves are represented in the collection, as well as in the car. toon and fantasy figures that are common in our culture. For the most part, the figures are to scale relative to the size of each and the litter tray.
In the traditional sand play process the client creates a series of scenes or worlds in the sand by sculpting the dry or wet sand and placing the chosen objects from the shelves on the tray. The role of the therapist is to provide, as Dora Kalff emphasizes in her book Sandplay, a “free and protected space” and to help the client deal with any content or emotion evoked by sand play. In the traditional approach, the therapist has little or no interaction during the session and does not provide tray interpretation, but waits until the full series of trays is completed. Later, the therapist shows the client slides or videos of the trays in sequence as a map of the client’s healing, integration, and individualization process.
Sand play approaches have evolved over the years to be used as an interactive process similar to hypnotherapy. In this more active approach, sand play can be used for inner child work, part therapy, dream work, past life therapy, problem solving, anchoring, learning, and improvement. of the memory. The organization of the figures on the tray by a client is a metaphor for the reorganization of consciousness. Clients can move figures to tell a narrative story or use voice dialogue in psychodrama as figures tell their personal stories. However, in contrast to the private inner experience of hypnotherapy, the symbolic work is created outside of the client in plain sight.
When the client is a child, sand play therapy is especially appropriate. A child relates to the world mainly through his body and sand play gives him the opportunity to participate in the therapeutic process in an active kinesthetic way. You can “show” rather than “tell” and allow subconscious feelings and experiences to emerge spontaneously through play. “Hypnosis” occurs in front of the child in the sand, rather than just within the child, giving both the client and the therapist access to what was previously information or content that was likely inexpressible to the child. It is the process of participating in creative play that heals. Expressing through symbols, personal maps of experience, metaphors or stories allows the client to become a witness to himself and to give him a concrete and direct experience that he is the creator of his own world or experience. Simply observing the process itself in the litter box can be tremendously liberating and liberating, giving the client the perspective and experience of not being the problem, but witnessing the problem.
As in hypnosis, the sand game uses the power of suggestion. If a customer creates an experience of a possible solution to a problem in the arena, the solution prints as a future positive response for the customer in their daily life. The memory of the tray or a photo of the creation becomes a post-hypnotic anchor or clue not only for the possible solution to a problem, but also gives the client a way to have an emotionally new and positive relationship with him. trouble.
Furthermore, sand play, like hypnotherapy, induces the client into an altered state of consciousness in which the subconscious mind becomes an active actor and resource in therapeutic dance. The self-directed ritual of preparing the sand, choosing the objects, and concentrating on creating the scene in the sand works much like a hypnotic induction and deepening process where the subconscious is more accessible. As in non-directive hypnotherapy, when creating the litter tray, the client can choose to focus on a specific problem or concern or allow the subconscious to spontaneously guide the focus of the session and the focus of the tray. Often times, a customer will not be aware of what they are creating until they sit down to view their scene on the tray.
The most important thing is that the sand game is very creative, even for people who think they are not creative and it is deliciously fun. Creating litter trays brings issues that need transformation to the fore and helps the client access the source of healing from within.