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So you finally pluck up the courage to do an instant hypnosis induction in front of a group of onlookers.
With everyone's eyes on you, you nervously perform the technique, and it fails.

This is one of the most common fears new hypnotists seem to have about hypnosis, and it is one of the most common questions I get asked. By the end of this article the only question you will be asking is 'what shall I do with the people I hypnotize WHEN they are in hypnosis."

The very first time I demonstrated hypnosis in front of a crowd a very long time ago I was extremely nervous. I did not have the training, confidence or experience I have now, and I did not think it would work.

I did the technique, and my subject stared up at me and started laughing.
Thinking on my feet I said 'that's right, and you can't stop laughing, and the more you try to stop yourself the harder you laugh, and the more you laugh the more you go into hypnosis, that's right, keep laughing now as you close your eyes down now and Sleep!." And we went on to do a brief but successful hypnosis demonstration. Suddenly the laughter was a product of my suggestion, and we went on to have a successful hypnosis session, and out of the many people there I was the only one who had the slightest idea that things nearly went very wrong!

You see, an instant induction is in itself a very simply process, inductions such as the hand drop induction (have them press down on your hand, palm to palm. Press up slightly on theirs to encourage them to press down harder, move your hand away and as their arm drops instruct Sleep" and the arm pull (take a hold of their hand in yours, and give a gentle but sharp tug on their arm then command Sleep) are mechanically very simple, it is what goes on behind the techniques that is key/

There are three key things that are crucial for instant induction success:

1. Confidence. You need to appear confident in your own ability. If you don't yet have that confidence just pretend, and act like you do.
2. Utilisation, people will not always respond by the text book, so you need to be able to think on your feet and direct any response (or lack of response) they give you towards your hypnotic goal.
3. Flexibility. Be creative, experiment and try out new things. You will find it hard to grow and develop as a hypnotist if you stick to the same text book method, be flexible and creative and enjoy experimenting.

Deepeners are also useful, and help to stabilize and intensify the brief trance state created by your instant induction. As long as deepeners are said with confidence, make the subject feel good, assure them that they are doing fine, and put their minds at ease, you can say anything really, from as simple as '5, 4, 3, 2, 1, deeper, deeper deeper, feeling good, doing wonderful, and going down' to 'and as you continue to feel yourself relaxing notice how easily you can allow your mind to open up to the entrancing possibilities of deepest hypnosis that you can find now as you slip deeper down, relaxing, calm, peaceful and receptive to these new ideas, feeling great and going down' or anything else. Like all hypnotic processes deepeners are most effective when done when you yourself are in a hypnotic state of mind, and when you sound confident and relaxed.

Now, the fact is sometimes despite your best efforts it may not work, it has certainly happened to me, but it does not matter. Failure is a brilliant way to learn, and the fact is no one watching who is worth bothering with will hold it against you. Sometimes you will be able to go right into another instant induction, acting like everything is going fine (just maintain your composure, and keep going fast, tie up the conscious mind and hypnotize them again quickly),or move rapidly into another hypnotic technique or method directly from the failure.

Just because one technique didn't work does not mean you cannot hypnotize them, so keep at it, change your tact, style and method, and see what you can do.

Other times though when nothing seems to work use this as an opportunity to learn. Ask your subjects questions and find out what was going on, and enjoy the opportunity to deepen your hypnosis skills. As a matter of ethics I never ever blame the subject or tell them that they are unhypnotizable, I would simply find out what I can and if I cannot immediately identify and fix the problem I'd possibly say 'perhaps we'll try again another time.' This may happen not too infrequently when you first begin, but as you gain confidence and experience you'll find total failure becomes rarer and rarer.

So in summary, get out there and do it, be creative and trust your unconscious mind to provide you with the right words to say and things to do. Project relaxation and confidence from within yourself, and recognize that hypnosis is far more than a collection of techniques, but is a wonderful and unlimited process which you can create in any way you choose, provided you are flexible, utilize what you get, and are confident.