Identification

• A hypnotherapist uses hypnosis or a trancelike state in order to effect change in her client's behavior. The hypnotherapist taps into the subject's unconscious in order to do so. People use hypnotherapy to overcome issues like smoking or being overweight. With cognitive hypnotherapy training, the process goes one step further than just general hypnosis, which commonly uses scripts and other pre-set solutions for all similar problems. However, cognitive hypnotherapy recognizes that what makes each person smoke is unique, according to the Quest Institute wesbsite.
  
  

Considerations

• Hypnosis addresses the subconscious mind's directive to protect the person. Because there are so many different stimuli bombarding a person each day, the subconscious mind acts as a filter to determine which stimuli can be ignored and which must be addressed in order to keep a person safe---the fight or flight response. While this was an effective coping mechanism in ancient times when man battled the saber toothed tiger, for example, but it sometimes works counterproductively in the modern world.
  
  For example, the job interview situation is seen as a threat, and so the body responds by moving the blood from the brain to another part of the body so that the interviewee can escape. The difficulty in this case is that the person interviewing for the job needs the blood supply to his brain in order to think. This causes a struggle between the conscious mind---which wants to perform well in the job interview---and the subconscious---which wants to remove the person from danger.
  
  

Word Weaving

• According to the Quest Institute website, one of the drawbacks of traditional hypnotherapy has to do with the generic treatment of the patient---similar hypnotic scripts for everyone who has the same problem. In cognitive hypnotherapy,the hypnotherapist uses the client's own words to create suggestions tailored specifically to her. This works to focus the client's thoughts so that the suggestions are readily accepted by her subconscious mind.
  
  

Neuro-Linguistic Programming

• The person training to be a cognitive hypnotherapist learns how to bridge the gap between the conscious and the subconscious mind in part by learning how to utilize neuro-linguistic programming (NLP). NLP presupposes that if a person successfully does something once, he can do it again if he repeats the exact steps that he followed before. It also teaches that every person experiences the world through one of his primary senses---visual, auditory or kinesthetic. Training in NLP teaches a person not only about these modalities, but how to use them in a therapeutic way to help a person change his behavior. The cognitive hypnotherapist uses NLP in conjunction with word weaving to create a unique therapy for her client.
  
  

Access

• While many schools of hypnotherapy exist, not all teach cognitive hypnotherapy techniques. In order for the would-be cognitive hypnotherapist to learn these specific techniques, including word weaving and NLP, she may have to take training via correspondence or via an online educational program.