Fyodor Dostoyevsky said, “If people around you will not hear
you, fall down before them and beg their forgiveness, for in truth,
you are to blame.”
Erickson was a genius. And what he learned about writing ap-
plies to every writer. You may not be writing for children, and you
may not be writing comic books, but you must always remind
yourself that there is a child in every reader. Speak to that child,
and you will succeed in communicating to your reader.
More than that, when you speak to the child in your reader,
you speak directly to hisunconscious mind. Few people can resist
what their inner child likes. Speak to the child and you will hold
his attention.
Erickson himself said in a 1966 lecture, “... the unconscious mind
is decidedly simple, unaffected, straightforward and honest....It is
rather simple, rather childish.”
Your assignment: Read a comic book!HYPNOTIC WRITINGccc_hypnotic_112-114_ch27.qxd 11/3/06 3:03 PM Page 114