I am a big time supporter of the ideas of practice groups or workshops intended for folks who’ve had some training at whatever level and share ideas and then get down and dirty and practice practice practice. So many folks go through a training and they feel they haven’t quite gotten enough skill levels to go out and meet real people outside of the classroom. Some trainings do well at getting a lot of hands on experience while others are full of talk about the subject but not quite enough doing it . . . and, of course, the folks who are "learning on their own" could always use a group of eager friendly folks to play with in a non-critical setting.

Before I setup the Taipei Experimental Hypnosis Workshop I found the only way to meet hypnotists locally was through the internet, which is one of the reasons I started the TranceTraining discussion list which is now HypnoAsia as we have really outgrown our original charter.  This is also one of the reasons I started and still moderate the very active and very large Hypnosis Technique Exchange email discussion list for which I periodically run webinars (web-based seminars on hypnosis topics) that allows folks in an international community to interact and share ideas and experiences as well as techniques with one another.

When I first setup my own practice group in Taipei, I was inspired by a similar group in Tokyo that met regularly to practice NLP. The idea was informal, non-commercial, and skill set sharing and practice. While I have prepared most of the materials for my group as I also treat it as my experimental fun time workshop where I can introduce ideas or techniques that interest me, the Tokyo group would select a book on the subject and then they would go through the thing chapter by chapter session by session. My particular group is an English-language forum – no brainer as I started it – but a few folks here have started similar groups working in Chinese for those folks in the community who don’t speak English (obviously, a much larger segment of the hypnosis community). A few just simply meet every couple weeks and have someone bring in a concept or idea or skill and introduce it and then everyone runs the process with everyone else both as operator and as subject. There really doesn’t have to be a formal agenda or syllabus, just a bunch of like-minded folks reviewing or learning skills and then practice practice practice in an informal and playful setting.

If you want to find a group near you, just post a query to a likely email list or BBS related to hypnosis or psychology or influence . . . if there’s no group in your area, you may find others who would be interested in joining such a group and you can begin a group right then.

Folks can very easily start their own group . . . even in a small community with very few "hypnotists" there will be at least a handful of folks with an interest in giving it a go and a handful is ALL you need . . . heck, if you and a friend are all the folks you have, then you have a practice group but if you post on a local BBS or the like you will find that eventually it will grow to a handful and then a double handful and then you may have to either stop letting new folks join or begin looking for alternative venues rather than someone’s crampled apartment living room (although I do LOVE my living room) . . . the various Somnambulistic Sleepwalkers groups have developed into a fairly active community and there are a few other groups out there now following similar approaches, albeit perhaps not on such a grand scale.

If you’re in Taipei (and can handle an English-based environment) and would like to join our practice group at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/HypnoTaipeiExperimentalWorkshop (any skill level or previous experience or lack of experience is perfectly fine) feel free to drop me an email at phillips@nccu.edu.tw . . . we have folks ranging from complete novice to experienced and well-known trainers in the group. Most of our members are in Taipei as that’s where we meet (in a private residence in Mucha, my home) but a few come up from Taichung or as far away as Kaohsiung. If you are in Taichung or Kaohsiung or Tokyo or Hong Kong or Singapore or elsewhere and wish to start a group, post an anouncement here if you like (remember this forum is for English announcements so specify if the group’s intent is for speakers of English, Chinese, or other) and include a contact email. I know of a few folks who are able to be members of more than one practice group so as long as they’re not personality-related and are unaffiliated or not directly competing for some reason, the more the merrier . . . albeit some smaller groups may consider combining to pool resources and increase practice opportunities . . . for our last session, we had another group come and join us for a very interesting experience and it looks like another group would like to have a co-meeting in the future.

I love the idea of community and of mentoring as well as the idea that folks of different levels can learn from one another. I like to watch how other folks do the same process and see if there’s a nuance here or there that might work for me . . . just as I have videos of around fifteen different trainers teaching the Elman with their own quirks and styles and idiosynchratic beahviors (albeit, I’ve also seen a few folks teach it so horribly their videos make great examples of what NOT to do – just saw one of those last week and it really blew me away at just how awful this guy is). With a practice group, we develop both community and skill levels. We also get a feeling for stengths and weaknesses . . . as well as a sense of who we can turn to for pointers or who we might wish to refer certain types of cases to.

I have found that by making the practice group neutral in respect to trainer-affiliation and non-commercial then folks with experience who are also trainers are more likely to join. A few groups get caught into the guru trap where they focus on one person as the single expert, this is particularly true for groups that center on the students of one particular trainer as the guru is always on stage and other trainers feel less welcome as they certainly don’t want to appear to be the other fellow’s "students" in the eyes of their community for marketing or ego reasons. Endeavor to avoid having your group become personality-based. However, if a number of skilled individuals or trainers participate in a non-commercial and non-competitive fashion then folks can let their hair down and kick off their shoes. Don’t get me wrong, it’s certainly okay to have an organizer who also happens to also be a trainer or the like or not, but the context of the workshop or practice group needs to stick with an open freely expressive environment rather than a teacher-centered or sensei one. This is my own opinion. However, for a professional workshop or seminar, the sifu who teaches, demonstrates, then guides the practice is very much a useful model. I just tend to distinguish between practice group and teaching group.

The idea of competence based training seems a no-brainer to me and folks who go through good trainings should come out with at least a competent level in the bare minimum skill sets . . . unfortunately, some trainings don’t instill quite the same levels of competence as others so practice groups are quite helpful in allowing folks who wish to have more practice get up to speed . . . however, even the folks who have gone through good solid training or who really know their stuff can use participation in a practice group as the really skilled hypnotists, the masters of the craft, also know that they can continue to learn from their peers just through participation . . . we never stop learning new tricks, regardless of just how old us dogs are.

For those of you looking for a practice group, if you can’t find one in your area . . . start one. All you need is one other person, although the more the merrier. Don’t sit around waiting until you have a large enough group, two IS a large enough group . . . get started and keep posting and eventually it will grow. However, even with two, you can do a lot. With three, you can use triads with operator-subject-observer followed by feedback discussion then rotate roles and do the process again and again.

Besides . . . practice groups are a LOT of fun. Really. 🙂

All the best,
Brian