Dan Jones
Dan Jones is a Solution Focused Ericksonian Hypnotherapist from Chichester, United Kingdom.
How long have you been practicing?
I have studied hypnosis since 1993 when I was 14 and have been practising hypnotherapy for the last 14 years since 2001 when I set up the Sussex Hypnotherapy Centre.
Do you see clients from home or in a clinic?
I currently see clients at my home and for some problems I am happy to do therapy via Skype, and I also do home/workplace visits. I used to use a clinic, unfortunately the clinic closed down, so I am in the process of finding a new venue to work from in Chichester.
What problems/issues do you treat most frequently?
The main area I focus on is helping people with personal development & performance enhancement. I have also found myself working a lot with family/parenting issues including teen to parent domestic abuse, and I have had many clients coming to see me for phobia treatments and anxiety problems.
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Having to spend so much time on social media (YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn) marketing myself and keeping my name out there when I would rather be getting on with the therapy and hypnosis I enjoy, including teaching it and giving talks, and would rather have someone else dealing with the marketing and promotion side for me.
What do you find hardest about your daily work?
I don’t really find anything specifically hard about the hypnotherapy work, apart from all the time I spend marketing myself.
What I find most challenging are clients that expect the therapist to do all the work, and that they will be passive receivers of the therapy, and that they don’t have to do anything or make any changes because I will be doing it to them, rather than therapy being a journey where I am walking alongside them to support them as they make the necessary changes, and that we both have a different role to play in the therapeutic process.
Do you find your professional body supportive and helpful? Do they help you create connections with fellow therapists?
I belong to the General Hypnotherapy Register (GHR) and find that they are supportive and friendly. They regularly share what is going on in different locations, like practice groups and supervision groups, and I can connect with fellow therapists. GHR is very good at supplying a monthly list of training courses, as well as a monthly newsletter of updates around hypnotherapy news.
How do you balance work and life? Stress management/avoiding burnout…
I keep my work varied. I used to mainly just see clients, but as time went on I recognised I wanted more variety. I make self hypnosis downloads, videos, training courses, write books, blog posts and articles, run hypnosis and therapy training courses and give talks. This keep what I am doing very varied.
To balance work out I make sure I have times when I turn off the computer, and get out of an office and spend as much time as possible outside in nature and with my wife.
What frustrates you most about the way mental health is dealt with in your country?
With the way NHS services are set up everything is about the money before the care. NHS staff I meet care greatly, but often people that need support don’t hit thresholds for the support that is being funded, and even when they do, they don’t when it comes to a transition time.
For example; people transitioning from Child & Adolescent Mental Health Services to Adult Mental Health Services. Due to funding there is often a lack of available suitable services, and patients often end up prescribed medication rather than receiving psychotherapy, and my experience of when psychotherapy has been offered it is either a 6-12 week CBT group or short term counselling focusing on childhood and psycho-dynamic concepts rather than solution focused, strengths-based therapy.
Can you tell us about your most uplifting experience treating a recent client? (anonymously, of course!)
Whenever I am asked that question there is one client that always pops up in my mind, so it isn’t a recent client now, but it was an elderly woman that had agoraphobia for about 20 years and hadn’t left her house in all that time, and her son was in hospital so she needed to overcome the phobia to go and see him. After 30 minutes we were sitting on the beach eating ice-cream discussing what a difference being able to go out and about will make.
A recent case was a neighbour realising I’m a hypnotherapist and so asking if I would help him and his wife. He said he had bad arthritis and only strong medication would get rid of his pain, and that was only temporary and had side-effects, and his wife suffered with insomnia and nothing could get her to sleep, she slept just a couple of hours per night.
I said I would pop round for free and they can check out my work, I explained I would visit for just two hours, and would do an hour with the man first and then an hour session with his wife. After an hour the man said he was pain-free, and after the second hour I left informing the man that his wife was sleeping soundly in the other room.
A few days later I received a handwritten letter saying I have transformed their lives, and they still talk about it when I see them now a couple of months later.
Read more about Dan’s work here
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About Mark Tyrrell
Psychology is my passion. I've been a psychotherapist trainer since 1998, specializing in brief, solution focused approaches. I now teach practitioners all over the world via our online courses.
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