This week I continued my education by starting in class in Ericksonian hypnosis techniques at HCH Institute. I found out right away that it’s a bit different than I thought, and it takes a lot more skill and practice than I realized. Frankly, I don’t think a four week seminar is going to teach me anywhere near enough to use it well. I expect that I’ll end up with a good idea of what I need to practice and some resources to explore further.
What’s really tricky about the Ericksonian technique is that you don’t have any direct feedback from the client. I always had the impression that the Ericksonian practitioner was pretty much, ‘flying blind’, but that’s not it at all. What the practitioner is really doing is constantly modifying his script, based on subtle physical queues from the client, and intuition too, I suppose. The trick, of course, is learning to read those queues and also having a ready supply of things to say, at your fingertips. That may be my biggest challenge.
At the break, I got to connect with two friends from previous courses. That was very cool cause I feel very close to them. It would be nice to see them more often, but I’m getting that would not be the best idea right now. Which leads me to thinking about relationships again.
I’m beginning to wonder if I’ll ever really ‘get’ relationships, especially with women. I suppose that I don’t worry about my relationships with men because it’s easy to take ‘em or leave ‘em. It would be nice to have friends to hang out with, but I know if I know what that means. What do these thinks look like from the inside? I don’t know. I do know it feels really awkward to ask anyone to hang out or get a beer or something. “Hanging” always ends up feeling awkward, unless there are other people there, or there’s some definite purpose for the meeting. The whole idea of “dating” just feels weird. I think my issue comes from the fact that, when I was younger, dates were all about sex, and now that has be pushed way to the background I have no idea what to replace it with.
I think my problem revolves around not being any good about having friends. I’ve spent most of my life getting people to like me. Now that I don’t really care about that any more, what else is there? I expect that I will, eventually, meet the right people with the right personalities and enough common interests that we have things to do together. I have spent so much of my life being the significant other, the plus one, the friend, the hanger on in somebody else’s group, that I never found, or built, a place for myself. A place where I was me, not somebody’s attachment. Finding those groups and building those relationships takes time, especially at my age. On of the blessing of my age is that time passes quickly. Days, weeks, and almost months, go by before I notice them. So, waiting isn’t really all that hard.
My life is so much more positive now and good things keep coming my way, so I have high hopes that “this too shall pass.” That the present difficulties and awkwardnesses will work themselves out. I’m only focusing on those few things I have to do, like work, taxes and finding a place to live, and letting everything else be a game. I psychic told be recently that I need to stop worrying so much about making the “right” decisions, decisions that will last me another 20 years. I can kick back, relax, cruz, have fun and take my time. It’s still hard to completely let go of that feeling that I need to fix and solve everything right now, but it’s important that I do. “Marry in hast, repent in leisure,” applies not just to marriage.
I’ve spent a lot of time “trying on” different kinds of relationships in my meditations. I find that everything I imagine doesn’t work very well when placed in the context of my real life. I think that’s telling me that my fantasies are a bunch of crap, and reality, when it shows up, will be something very different. So I don’t know what to expect and that’s a good thing. Life would be a lot less fun if I knew everything ahead of time, good and bad, so let’s raise a cold one to the unexpected. My it keep us on our toes and nimble of mind and heart.
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