The BBC carries a bit on sports hypnosis in the news . . . Hypnotism spells results for team . . .

A Devon football club is thanking a hypnotist for its run of good results. Torquay United held Premiership club Birmingham City to a draw in the FA Cup last weekend and has been turning in good results in League Two. And it could all be thanks to the winning ways of supporters’ club chairman and hypnotist Chris Fleet. Mr Fleet has been putting the players under his spell since December last year and since then the Gulls have lost only two matches. When they go out to play now they go out to win. They have no fear. Chris Fleet. He said: “I had a long chat with the players, came back two days later and nine of them were up for it and it has gone on from there.” Now he sees the players a few days before each game. “When they go out to play now they go out to win,” said Mr Fleet. “They have no fear.” Torquay held Birmingham City to a draw in the FA Cup. He does not use trances, but instead uses his own confidence-enhancing techniques. He said: “If they are trying too hard and not performing to the best of their ability I help calm them down and get them back to their best performance.” He said the run of good results was also down to manager Leroy Rosenior. “I just help as best I can. They certainly hammered Birmingham who won’t fancy the return at all.” Mr Rosenior said: “Players needs all the help they can get, especially when things haven’t been going well and hypnotherapy certainly has helped them believe in themselves.” Midfielder Kevin Hill, who has been attending the sessions, said: “It certainly seems to be working. Since I started I’ve moved up front and started scoring goals.” Mr Fleet’s work went to waste on Saturday when they lost 3-2 to Bury.

Went to waste? I don’t think so. Even the best of teams will meet difficulties but through trance and hypnosis techniques one can indeed accellerate improvements and deal with blocks to success. However, hypnosis is not magic, you still have to pratice at the skills and you still have to gain basic and further competence on the field . . . albeit, the hypnosis accellerates the progress and improvement. The article’s last line places the entire focus away from the benefits of the entire program and seems to try to deflate it with one line . . . one loss does not offset the numerous wins or gains.

In the article, it states that Fleet does not use trance but that he uses confidence techniques of his own . . . personally, I use experiential hypnosis, modelling, and a number of non-hypnotic techniques together to help athletes improve their skills and training as well as their confidence and self-esteem. Confidence is worthwhile and it alone can improve performance for some people but I have found that if you work on confidence and the like as a supplement to the skills work, improvements are much more valuable and much more longterm and much less context dependant but more rounded.

If you’re in Taipei and would like to use hypnosis for skill improvement, feel free to check out my webpages and contact me for an appointment.

All the best,
Brian