Milton H. Erickson

Milton H. Erickson, M.D., of Phoenix, Arizona: hypnotist and psychiatrist. His amazing results in treating his patients using hypnosis were studied by Richard Bandler and John Grinder and formed a very important part of the foundation of neurolinguistic programming, or NLP. These observations were summarized in the books "Patterns of the Hypnotic Techniques of Milton H, Erickson, M.D", Volume 1 & 2.

Milton H. Erickson of Phoenix, Arizona was a master hypnotist and psychiatrist. John Grinder and Richard Bandler developed much of Neurolinguistic Programming (NLP) as a model of Erickson's work. He his highly regarded my many psychologists as one of the best hypnotherapists of all time, and his work has contributed greatly to the field of psychology, particular his founding of the American Society for Clinical Hypnosis and the Milton Erickson Institutes.

He had polio as a child and almost didn't survive. He spent most of his life in a wheelchair. His illness gave him the opportunity to observe people and through his observations he developed a deep understanding of them that was invaluable in his hypnosis research, as was his innovative ideas. One of the things he did was to gain rapport with his clients by pacing their ongoing reality, making extensive use of calibration.

If you read some of his case studies, you can see the power he had as a hypnotherapist. Many of his techniques are outlined in Patterns of the Hypnotic Techniques of Milton H. Erickson, M.D. Volumes I and II by Grinder and Bandler, et al.

Milton H. Erickson is truly one of the great hypnotists: all psychology or hypnosis students should study him.