Canton Zug, 31.01.2025

Is hypnotherapy purely esoteric stuff

Hypnotherapy is becoming increasingly popular, and the demand for such services is also increasing in the canton of Zug. Research shows what can happen when you get to grips with your own subconscious.

Hypnosis is nowadays no longer ridiculed as esoteric hocus-pocus. Fabienne Lang is a certified psychosocial counsellor, but has found her real passion in hypnosis. She used to have a severe fear of heights, but this was permanently resolved in just one session. Shortly afterwards, in 2021, she also completed her training as a hypnotherapist.

She has noticed that this form of therapy is becoming increasingly popular. If you visit her website, (https://www.fabiennelang.ch/  only in German), you’ll see that she is no longer offering initial hypnosis appointments for adults until further notice, due to capacity constraints. She is now specialising in hypnosis work with children and adolescents.

She has never regretted this decision, she says. “Children have a fertile imagination and can transform their feelings into images incredibly quickly. This ability is helpful in many hypnosis techniques.

Working at the level of the subconscious
This form of therapy works at the level of the subconscious. This could be imagined as a huge hard drive on which all your memories, experiences and feelings are stored. “It has an enormous storage capacity, equivalent to that needed to watch TV without interruption for thirty years,” she says. In addition, the subconscious mind works much faster than the conscious mind. It is estimated that the subconscious can process millions of pieces of information per second, while the conscious mind can only perceive a limited amount of information.

In a hypnotherapy session, the origin of a problem, such as a deeply rooted fear, is sought out and “neutralised and resolved” at its source. In order to achieve this, the person being treated must be completely relaxed. Hypnosis is nothing else but that: a natural state of deep relaxation: “Because of stories like ‘The Jungle Book’ with the hypnotizing snake Kaa, or because of TV shows, some people think that you controlled and manipulable when under hypnosis. That is a misconception.” says Fabienne Lang. Success can only be achieved when the hypnotherapist and the client work together.


The increase in interest has been particularly noticeable since corona
Claudia Müller doesn't come from the “esoteric corner”, as she soon makes clear. She has been running her own practice in Baar since 2004, and points out that the positive effects of hypnosis are not far-fetched fantasies, but are scientifically proven and are extremely effective. This is probably the reason why many psychologists are critical of hypnosis.

She has received significantly more requests for therapy for some years now, but especially since corona. She believes that this increase is due to people being more anxious since the pandemic. But people also sometimes have to wait a very long time for an appointment with a psychotherapist or psychiatrist. Claudia Müller is clearly aware of the limits of hypnotherapy, however: if an acutely self-endangered person came to her practice, for example, she would immediately refer them to a psychological specialist. “Anything else would be negligent,” she says.

The origin often lies in one's childhood
Before she starts the actual hypnosis, she conducts a preliminary consultation. This can often last longer than an hour, and is a major part of a successful treatment. The hypnotherapist wants to know exactly what the person wants to work on, and asks them about their previous life. The possibilities and procedures of hypnotherapy are also carefully explained.

Claudia Müller has been using hypnosis to treat people in her practice in Baar since 2004
The preliminary consultation plays an important role in the success of the hypnotherapy      
Photos: Matthias Jurt
Hypnotherapist Priska Obrist.        Photo: zvg

The origins of fears, doubts and insecurities usually lie in childhood, says Claudia Müller. “Because the first six years of life are the most formative.” During these years, people often learn to believe things that will stay with them later in life. For example, if a child is repeatedly told that they are stupid, in most cases they will continue to believe this later on as an adult. ‘That doesn't mean you have to live with it,’ she adds. Because false beliefs can be treated.

Claudia Müller describes herself as a tour guide into the subconscious. And she also emphasises: ‘You are in control of your own situation at all times.’ If it doesn't suit you, you can get up and leave. The 63-year-old laughs and adds: ‘But nobody has dared to do that yet.’

Less stress and better concentration
Hypnosis has also become a popular tool in competitive sport. In 2016, the then EVZ ice hockey player Josh Holden announced that he was able to significantly reduce his time in the penalty box (sin-bin) through hypnosis, among other things. In 2021, Adir Cohen, then a handball player for Pfadi Winterthur, continued to play with a broken hand after a so-called flash hypnosis, and thereby helped his team to victory. Swiss track and field athlete Simon Ehammer also uses hypnosis to prepare for competitions.

Timon Fellmann from Steinhaus has also had good experiences with hypnotherapy. The 24-year-old plays American football for the Lucerne Lions, and underwent a one-off hypnotherapy session last spring - in the midst of exam stress. The therapy enabled him to concentrate much better on the games again, he says. It also gave him the impetus to learn meditation techniques, which helped him to reduce his own stress levels during training and matches.

But this form of therapy is not only used in the field of sport. Hypnosis techniques are also used in the care sector. For example, in the emergency ward of Zug Cantonal Hospital. Thw author know this from personal experience.

Supplementing conventional medicine, not replacing it
Priska Obrist
worked as a nurse on various emergency wards for around thirty years. She is now self-employed, and supports the nursing staff on the subject of hypnosis. She believes that hypnotherapy should be seen as a complement to conventional medicine. It can’t cure an acute illness or fix a broken bone, of course, but: ‘With the help of hypnosis, healing processes can be improved and thereby accelerated.’ Hypnosis techniques can be used, for example, to reduce the need for painkillers or anaesthetics.

Priska Obrist believes that there is currently a lack of openness towards new methods, particularly in German-speaking Switzerland. The use of hypnotherapy in hospitals is already common practice in western Switzerland, but not so much on the other side of the ‘Röstigraben’. ‘There’s still a lot of scepticism here,’ she says. She attributes this, on the one hand, to a lack of knowledge. On the other hand, current healthcare policy does not seem to be interested in the use of complementary measures in everyday hospital life: there is a lack of willingness to learn on the part of all the players in the healthcare system. And that is precisely where the problem lies.

Priska Obrist believes that a rethink is needed. And hospitals in particular can provide a breeding ground for a paradigm shift. Because people come there who are extremely receptive to any method that can help them in their difficult situation.
(Website, in German: https://priskaobrist.ch/hypnosetherapie/hypnosetherapie/)

 

The article author, Kristina Gysi, experiences this current trend for herself:
At some point I emerge again. I have no idea how much I no longer consciously perceived of what was said. Is it just a few words? Or several sentences? I'm back by the sea, with the sunset on the horizon, the stone in my hand. Then I notice the twitch in my arm, as it does just before I fall asleep. And I drift off again.

The journey goes back to my childhood. I’m a girl of about five years old and infinitely sad. Julian, my closest kindergarten friend, with whom I have played almost every day for a year now, is moving away. He and his two sisters. We thought we were inseparable. And yet we're not.

I breathe. More consciously than I usually do. I inhale deeply through my nose nine times and exhale audibly through my mouth nine times. I don't realise it at first, but with each breath, a little more of the sadness I had just felt escapes. It evaporates into the space that I can only guess at behind my closed eyelids. In the end, there is nothing left but the feeling of a deep embrace that I give myself.

I feel different. Lighter somehow. Even days later, even more so. The anxiety has given way to a different feeling. Not indifference, but serenity. Will it last? We'll see. The feeling is nice, I want it to stay. And that's exactly why it probably will.

 

For more information, here are some local hypnotherapy sites in English:  
https://hypno-art.ch/en-home/
https://www.innerflow-hypnosis.ch/english/