Parties, Crushes, Girls and Boys, Exams, School, Bullies, Teachers, Parents, Movies, Fun and Games are usually just a few of the things that occupies the mind of an average teenage kid, well I am Leo Gopal and I am a not so average teenage kid…

I have always been interested in that which was not of the ordinary and was always ‘different’ from most of my peers, as their role models consisted of people Chris brown, J’Lo, Snoop Dogg, Tu Pac and the Likes do to their bodies, and singing or swearing talents, which is only natural in today’s world.

My Role Models Consisted of Marxists like Che Guevara, Revolutionaries like Fedel Castro, Anti-Authoritarianists like Wilhelm Riech, philosophers like Socrates, Archimedes, Sophocles, Rene de Cartes, Great Minds Like Albert Einstein and Leonardo Da Vinci, are just a few of the men that I truly admired and whom I wanted to be like, and one thing that all of these great men have in common is they all have an “Incredible Mind”.

In my quest to find the ’secret’ of the mind which many of my fellow teenagers saw as insane, and many still do, I stumbled upon the fine art of hypnosis and realized that I wasn’t THAT insane after all…

Hypnosis has brought into my life so much wonder, fascination and substance… The Ability to Accomplish many incredible things, something I always endeavored to do, from taking away people’s pain, stress, anxiety, troubles and problems, to giving them instant happiness and relief, stopping addictions and accomplishing just about anything which includes the human mind is now possible for me as a young teenage hypnotist!

How does a Teenager Become a Hypnotist?

Simple, you just need to WANT to be a hypnotist, have the PASSION and INTENT to LEARN and PRACTICE and you WILL be a hypnotist… NOW!

It really truly is THAT SIMPLE, take it from a 17 year old… can’t get simpler than that! In fact you can basically accomplish anything now if you think with the above in mind. But on a more serious note, I learnt hypnosis from reading and reading and reading, watching youtube videos and reading and reading and reading for almost a complete month until I came into contact with some very wonderful hypnotists, Nathan Thomas, John Cerbone, Richard Nongard, Josh Houghton and Many, many others.

If there is anything I learnt the most important would be that theory is great, reading a lot is great, and also watching videos also helps a lot, BUT if do not go out there and DO IT NOW, you really haven’t learnt anything at all.

My biggest fear at the beginning was the induction, how do I go about hypnotizing somebody without looking like a fool if it fails? This fear was almost crippling and totally pointless, I heard a song one day and the lyrics said: “You either win some or learn some” and that was a changing moment for me, because I realized that the failure is not in trying and not succeeding (because you learn from your mistakes so it’s a win) but true failure comes from not trying at all!

So I began my hypnosis journeys by first copying the greats, watching the great hypnotists on youtube seeing what works, seeing what I feel most comfortable with and doing what they did, this really helped as a starting point for, instant inductions, speed trance, and more…

At first I was so concerned about timing, posture, scripts, voice and tiny insignificant things like that… what angle should my hand be when I do the 8 word arm drop, how long should I wait before I let go, when do I shout sleep, what deepeners should I use, what do I say during the hand shake induction, how fast do I do it, what happens if they laugh, or don’t go into hypnosis?!?!?!

Those were my most frequently asked questions, and feedback is really a very effective way to learn…

But as you advance into hypnosis you begin to realize certain things for yourself that e-books and most videos will never tell you. For example, To the subject there’s no such thing as failure, YOU are the hypnotist and if something doesn’t work, STOP, get feedback and do something else, the subject always thinks everything is going as planned if you tell them so.

An Induction is simply a wonderful ritual performed by the hypnotist who helps guide and sends the subject into the wonderful hypnotic state, anything can be an induction, everything is an induction waiting to happen, once you see what works, and why it works you can really begin inventing your own and really begin to learn much more…

As soon as the Subject begins following your suggestions they are already in a state of hypnosis and the trance is sometimes just a formality, that’s because hypnosis is just a wonderful state of hyper suggestibility, I learnt this very recently after I realized I couldn’t really do much formal inductions and hypnosis at school due to liability and lack of knowledge about this great art.

I realized that ANYONE can send someone into a state of hypnosis but its only a true hypnotist who can take full advantage of this wonderful state, and what better to do than to change a persons day, improve their life, and basically make them happier than before totally loving their hypnotic experience. Having become a Hypnosis-Junkie in less than a month I have never let anything stop me from having fun and giving people wonderful experiences, especially during school time, when most of the people are already in walking trances by midday.

Since I am not allowed by Principals orders to not induct anyone on school premises I turned to conversational hypnosis, waking hypnosis and NLP, of course I am no expert having had no live training but I still would never let anything stop me from trying, from doing!

I started sticking my friends feet to the ground, eye lids shut, jaws together, hands stuck, and basically I liked getting them into very sticky situations, but unlike the trance state I found it difficult to give HAPPY suggestions in the waking state of hypnosis, but no problem, that was another obstacle I managed to get over with the simple use of anchors, I simply created a “Happy anchor” somewhere often and usually touched their shoulder, then a “sad anchor” on their wrist, and every time I wanted them to be happy a simple touch on the shoulder would send them into eternal smiles…

Another challenge occurred, if I only had a few minutes and wanted to change a person’s life now and fast only using waking hypnosis, how would I do it? And after speaking to many hypnotists especially a fellow teenage hypnotist Nathan Thomas, he showed me that you don’t necessarily have to bind or associate experiences as always good, you can take a an utilize a bad experience your events and problems too.

I became fairly good at doing sticky phenomena with just about anyone at any time, and then tried a very fruitful experiment which after accomplishing a feet stick to the ground with a friend before class I had the following patter:

“Now, just as your feet are stuck completely to the ground weighing a ton that you can not possibly move, we also tend to experience in life that problems tend to weigh down on our lives and render us almost immobile that just like your feet, the more we try to set our selves free from the problems of life, the stress the anxiety, the sadness, the more it stops us from progressing and moving forward as if we are just stuck, on one thing, on one aspect not able to move because of the humongous weight of these troubles, BUT then you begin to realize NOW that these problems that have stopped you from moving forward in life are really very insignificant and you are much more stronger and bigger than your problems NOW, and as soon as you have realized this now, you know that nothing can hold you back anymore, all your troubles are gone, you are stronger and can finally MOVE NOW and progress in life”

That was just a simple example of taking something very simple and transforming it into a really wonderful experience.

Hope to here from you all and I do hope that I have been able to enlighten you a bit more on this wonderful art we call hypnosis and do hope to meet you all soon.
Eternal Smiles,
Leo’ Gopal

Leo Gopal is a talented upcoming Hypnotist from Durban, South Africa and has quickly made a name for himself in the hypnosis world.  Within just a few short months Leo has shown a incredible natural ability for all things Hypnotic and has even been featured on Richard Nongard’s popular Teen Hypnotists page. Leo Gopal is the creator of the popular Hypnosis Community The Incredible Mind

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