Who do you think you are?

Are You Here To Be A Speaker? 95

Who do think you are?

Who I am is defined by goals as well as passions, and the roles that I play
are varied. I’m chairman of an organization. I’m a participant of
communities of various sizes. I’m a father and a husband. When you
really get back to the concept of purpose, I stand to testify to the genius
in you, assisting you in reclaiming that genius capacity and healing the
wounded learner in you. So the work that I do flows out of that. It’s
helping people reclaim the natural brilliance that they are and the genius
capacity within them.

What event or series of events led to your discovery?

While I was at the University of Minnesota as a student in biological
sciences, I had an opportunity to be trained as a professional hypnotist.
At the age of nineteen I began to do individual consultations using
hypnosis out of a clinic in the Twin Cities. Two years later I took over
that practice, and it was the oldest established hypnosis practice in the
Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul.
During that time I had the opportunity to present a demonstration
of hypnosis for a church youth group. I had about ten of the kids in the
deep trance state, and I was demonstrating the power of hypnotic
suggestion. I told one of the kids, “Your foot is glued to the floor, you
can try to move it but you cannot, it’s glued to the floor!” and he couldn’t
move his foot. Since it was early in my career, and I had just learned
these techniques, I was kind of surprised and was thinking, “Wow, this
works; I’ll try something even more powerful!” Then I said, “You’ve
forgotten your name, you can try to tell me your name, but you can’t do
it. You’ve forgotten it. Try to tell me your name.” As I watched this
kid struggle - completely unable to say his own name - I realized that’s
what we’re doing to ourselves all the time. We’re taking perfectly
reasonable resources of mind and body and we’re essentially throwing
them out because we accept the suggestion of “I cannot.” So, at about 20
years old, I realized my job wasn’t about putting people into trances,
they’re already there. They’re in self-limiting, self-defeating trances,
accepting a belief in what they’re incapable of doing. I realized that my
job was to be a de-hypnotist to awaken people from negative, self-limiting
trances that they have accepted in life, and to help them reclaim the
magnificence of who they are.