When a Client Says Hypnosis Didn’t Work

They opened their eyes. That’s all you actually know.

Years ago, when I was still relatively new to hypnosis, I thought I had to make hypnosis seem impressive. After all, this was hypnosis. Surely people should feel something remarkable. They should “go under”, whatever the heck that means. Once there, they should lose track of everything around them, hear my voice coming from some distant dimension, and eventually awaken with a look of astonishment and no idea what had just happened.

The problem is, that’s a pretty good description of what people think hypnosis should be like. But it’s an inaccurate description of what hypnosis actually IS like, and that distinction can cause all kinds of problems for hypnotists.

“I Don’t Think I Was Hypnotized”

A client can have an excellent hypnotic experience, respond beautifully to suggestions, and even begin making the changes they came to see you about. Then they open their eyes and say, “I don’t think I was hypnotized.” This is where inexperienced hypnotists sometimes make things worse. They start defending hypnosis, explaining trance depth, or desperately pointing out all the signs that proved the client was hypnotized.

And occasionally they panic right in the middle of the session. Imagine you’ve hypnotized someone and everything seems to be going nicely, and then suddenly they open their eyes. Yikes! They’ve come out of hypnosis! Except they haven’t. They opened their eyes. That’s all you actually know.

They might be checking whether they can open them. They might have heard something in the room. They might simply be someone who habitually checks their surroundings, or they might still be completely absorbed in the experience. Your response is hugely important because if you suddenly look concerned and say, “Are you okay? Is something wrong?” you’ve just told them something happened that shouldn’t have happened. Now they may start wondering if the hypnosis failed too.

Instead, you can calmly say something like, “That’s fine. Just close them again whenever you’re ready,” and continue. The hypnotist’s reaction teaches the client how to interpret what just happened, and this is one of the reasons I believe a good preframe is so important.

Why I Keep the Preframe Short

It doesn’t need to be a 20-minute lecture on the history and theory of hypnosis. In fact, excessively long pre-talks can create problems of their own because you start giving people things to worry about that they hadn’t even considered. A minute or two can be plenty. I want clients to know that hypnosis is focused attention, not unconsciousness. They’ll probably hear me throughout the session. They may hear cars outside or people in another room. They can move, swallow, scratch an itch, think thoughts, remember what happened, and yes, even open their eyes.

Most importantly, I want them to understand that hypnosis can feel surprisingly ordinary, because if I don’t tell them that, Hollywood has already told them something else. Popular culture has spent decades teaching people that hypnosis means “going under”. The hypnotist does something mysterious and powerful, the subject becomes essentially unconscious, and later wakes up wondering where the last hour went.

So a client sits in your chair, closes her eyes, listens to you for 40 minutes, hears everything you say, notices a truck driving past outside, remembers most of the session, and thinks, “Well, that didn’t work.” Not because trance didn’t happen, but because what happened didn’t match their model of hypnosis. That’s a completely different problem, and arguing with the client is not the solution.

Ask a Better Question

Instead, I’d become curious and ask, “What did you expect hypnosis to feel like?” Now we have something useful to discuss. The same principle applies when someone contacts you after a hypnotherapy session and says, “It didn’t work.” Don’t immediately defend yourself, launch into an explanation of why hypnosis works, or offer another session for free.

Ask a better question: “What did you expect to be different?” That question can uncover an enormous amount of information. Maybe the client expected a craving to completely vanish, but instead discovered they walked past the thing they normally crave three times this week without buying it. Maybe they expected to wake up overflowing with confidence, but instead they quietly did something on Tuesday that they had been avoiding for six months. Maybe they expected an unpleasant feeling to disappear instantly, when the first actual change was in their behaviour.

Something did change. They just weren’t measuring it.

Of course, sometimes nothing has changed, and that’s useful information too. Sometimes you discover that the presenting problem isn’t the real problem at all. There may be a secondary gain involved, or some other psychological purpose the problem is serving. Milton Erickson famously said, “The problem is the solution.” In other words, what looks dysfunctional may actually be doing something useful within the person’s current psychological system. The first session may not have failed at all. It may have shown you what actually needs to be worked on.

Preframe How They Interpret It

All of this points to something I think hypnotists should be doing before the induction. Find out what the client expects hypnosis to be like, and find out what they expect to be different afterward. Those are two different questions, and both matter.

If someone believes hypnosis only “worked” if they became unconscious, you need to fix that measuring stick before you begin. And if someone believes their problem will only be solved if they wake up feeling completely different, you need to know that too. Otherwise you can do excellent work and have the client dismiss the entire thing because they were looking for the wrong evidence.

So don’t merely preframe what you want your client to do during hypnosis. Preframe how you want them to interpret what happens. Tell them that hypnosis can feel ordinary, that they can hear everything, that they can think, move, remember what happened, and experience the whole thing without feeling as though they’ve been transported to another dimension.

And if they suddenly open their eyes in the middle of the session, don’t panic. Just utilize it and keep going.

- Mike Mandel