Milton Hyland Erickson (5 December 1901 – 25 March 1980) was an American psychiatrist specializing in medical hypnosis and family therapy. He was founding president of the American Society for Clinical Hypnosis and a fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, the American Psychological Association, and the American Psychopathological Association. He is noted for his approach to the unconscious mind as creative and solution-generating. He is also noted for influencing brief therapy, strategic family therapy, family systems therapy, solution focused brief therapy, and neuro-linguistic programming.
This is a fascinating book by Dr. Erickson with comments and questions from Dr. Ernest Rossi This is kind of a compilation of Dr. Erickson's Teaching seminars and embedded hypnosis talks. The Beautiful thing about Dr. Erickson he focuses on Strategic Therapy first, then Hypnosis embedded. There are many different ways we can induce and guide people into benevolent type trances. Your personality determines the best fit...not some mindless droning on cookie-cutter approach. Rehearsal and Observation are crucial.....Taking your attention and movement off of many things to a laser beam focus.....Too much conscious interference or intellectual analysis trips up the process.
An extremely interesting look at hypnosis from what seems to be an expert on the subject, Erickson. He delves into great details from many case studies. This is primarily an academic book, but also for anyone interested in learning more about hypnosis. I wish I had started from volume 1, I didn't realize that this was volume 4 until later in the book, when Erickson makes many references to previous volumes. Great read.