First of all: Merry Christmas to one and all

I've currently been devouring (reading rather than eating) quite a lot of hypnotherapy books to try and broaden my knowledge of hypnosis in general. Training Trances and Transformations have been particularly interesting and have made me think seriously about getting training in hypnotherapy. As a budding magician I have found the entertainment of hypnosis interesting and read a number of books on the subject as well as attended a live training session. I have had varied success with hypnosis mainly due to the time restrictions I have with attempting to juggle a full time job with my hypnosis ventures. I do feel, however, that I'd like some form of hypnotherapy training, preferably 1 - on - 1, that will give me the opportunity to be a part-time hypnotherapist. I genuinely enjoy my day job (superhero) and cannot imagine doing hypnotherapy full time but would consider trying to make it part time. Two things worry me though, firstly who should I train with in the UK and is there much of a market for a part time hypnotherapist?

Thanks in advance.

Hi Muzz. Having trained & worked as a hypnotist in the therapeutic field in the UK myself. Those making the money in so called hypnotherapy are in the main, the trainers, not the practitioners.
Take a look at the adverts for so the called hypnotherapists & you will find most feel that the hypnosis they have been trained to use is of little use as they also say they use NLP or some other so called therapy as well. They also mainly claim qualifications that when researched are of no more value than those emails claiming lottery wins.
Hypnosis can offer the client a therapeutic outcome, but it is not of it's self therapeutic, it's the way that the client changes that's therapeutic, not the hypnosis or the person using it. So the term hypnotherapist is incorrect. You will also find that hypnosis taught for therapeutic type use is little more than a foundation for magic type use as the approaches are very different.
I am currently thinking that things like past life regression, psychic development with hypnosis & mentalist type approach is the way to go for me.
To be perfectly honest if you can learn from a good hypnosis practitioner, then the most valuable lesson you will lean is that most of what hypnotists achieves is down to the way you present the act, not the hypnosis used in the act. And that's a valuable lesson to learn, because a good act hung on something that the client believes works gives a very good success rate.
But I'm not sure about who in the UK teaches hypnosis to a good standard. As I learnt from someone I knew & worked with people I knew who all had similar foundations in hypnosis.

Although some here favor one-on-one training, I would respectfully suggest that at this time training in a class might be better. The challenge most people have when learning hypnotherapy is not studying the concepts or memorizing dates, it's gaining experience. When you're training 1-on-1, who do you practice with? When you're in a class, you have a group of people so you can gain experience with all types of persons and personalities. I'm not discounting 1-on-1, only suggesting that training in a group, especially for someone who is relatively new, is less expensive and more effective.

Muzz,

my father has been a full time hypnotherapist for 15 years. I have been for 10. He has had over 25,000 clients. I have had over 5000. Yes four times a year we teach small groups hypnotherapy. One aspect of that is business. The reason being is that to stay in business, like any other, you need to wear a few hats - marketing being one. It is possible to earn a living as a hypnotherapist. It is as tough as any other business and it is tough when times are tough. But it can be done. That said the vast majority of hypnotherapists in my area (there are 18 in the phone book) are part-time and there is no shame in that. Depending on how you manage your calls, no client ever needs to know that you have another source of income.

My advice is choose

1)a course based on the style of hypnosis/hypnotherapy you wish to do. Do you want to do this brief, solution focussed, something akin to hypno-counselling, hypno-analysis, Hypno-CBT?
2) choose a course where the trainers are experienced working therapists, rather than master trainer trainers.
3) do not choose a course based on the association or body it is linked to. There are 98 in the UK, it is meaningless.
4) expect to invest between 1500 and 2500 pounds whether it is 5 days or 16 weekends or 3 years of training.

All the best

Anthony