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Showing way to self-help

By June 13, 2013April 29th, 2019No Comments

When quizzed on what they want to be when they grow up, children often cite fantastic and unusual careers that involve working with animals or travelling to outer space. Few actually grow up to do such work. But there are some for whom those out-of-the-ordinary dreams do materialise into rewarding sometimes odd and unusual work. Jobs that not only make fascinating party conversations, but which also become the kind of careers where the rewards often transend the raised eyebrows and quizzical looks they get when the person explains what they do for a living.

Take Jonathan Conway for example. Currently he works as a hypnotherapist and runs his practice. As a kid growing up in Brighton his primary fascination was with grown-ups. He would walk along the pier observing the behaviour of his elders, wondering what made them different from each other.

“Part of me always felt on the outside, like I was observing from the fringes. I was fascinated by the way people acted. I always wanted to know what made them tick.” Jonathan’s teenage years were fraught with difficulties as he struggled academically  because of dyslexia. “I was teased a lot by other kids. Then I was sent to an education psychologist and a string of other specialists. In desperations I even started to look around myself for other specialists.”

Eventually he did the out-of-the-ordinary and visited a hypnotherapist. The experience had a profound impact on him and ultimately shaped his choice of career. Jonathan decided to become a hypnotherapist himself, but it still took years of commitment and discipline to finish his studies. In  between times he went to Israel and taught English to underprivileged African children. “I knew from my own experience that hypnosis was an effective way of helping people in a very short time*. That was it’s real appeal.”

In 1992, at the age of 27, Jonathan graduated with a BSc in Sociology and Social Administration from the Roehampton Institute, part of Surrey University. It took him two more years to qualify with a post-graduate Research Group 1994. The certificate cuts through any “mumbo jumbo” surrounding hypnotherapy and its the official and recognised route into the practice.

“I attempt to give people another perspective. Finding out about their background helps me look at exactly what changes they are willing to make. Hypnosis is a way to help people with the resources they have inside themselves by bringing the conscious and unconscious minds together*.”