Frequently Asked Questions

No. And this is probably the most widespread misconception.

Because you don't fall asleep. You don't lose consciousness. You don't "wake up" at the end.

It's more like those moments when your attention is completely captured by something, a film, a game, a task you're absorbed in.
You're so engrossed that you just want to stay there, in that feeling. And if someone speaks to you, you hear them without really listening.

Take a moment to re-read that and fully grasp what I mean ;)

So you're not asleep, you're elsewhere. Your attention has focused on something, and everything else has moved to the background.

That is the state. A state of inner focus, perfectly natural, that you already experience several times a day without realising it.
In a session, we use it intentionally, because that's the state in which things can shift.

The fear is legitimate. And I'm going to address it directly, because this is exactly where the misconceptions hide.

Yes, a hypnotherapist manipulates. I'd rather say it plainly than hide behind reassuring vocabulary. In a session, I choose my words, my silences, my images, my metaphors, to bring your attention to where something can transform. That is a form of manipulation, in the original sense of the word: acting on someone's representations.

The question isn't whether there is influence. It's: in which direction, and in whose service?

Manipulation exists everywhere, and it's often beneficial.

A parent who tells their child a story to help them overcome their fear of the dark is manipulating. A sports coach manipulates when they have an athlete revisit a lost match to approach the next one differently. A friend who, over coffee, reframes a scene you've been replaying for three days so you can see it from another angle is manipulating.
We could go on for a long time. Every human relationship involves some degree of influence. What we usually call "manipulation" in a negative sense is when that influence is used against the person's interests, without their knowledge, for the manipulator's benefit. Therapeutic accompaniment does the opposite: it puts those exact same levers (words, images, framework, rhythm) at the service of the goal you came to work on, with your active participation.

What a hypnotist cannot do

There is one thing that no hypnotic technique, however advanced, can achieve: make you think, say, or act against your deepest will.
This isn't wishful thinking, it's a research finding. The work of Kirsch and Braffman (1999, 2001) showed that even in deep trance, a subject refuses suggestions that conflict with their values. They don't execute them, don't register them, they simply let them drop. Hypnosis doesn't short-circuit your judgement, your ethics, or your sense of what is good for you.

And here's the counterintuitive part: the trance state is not a state of docility. It's a state of heightened inner vigilance. Neuroscience shows that trance increases lucidity, creativity, and the selectivity of attention. You are more, not less, capable of filtering what suits you from what doesn't. A suggestion that displeases you is rejected, often without you even needing to think about it consciously. Your brain does the sorting, and it does it very well.

Then how do you explain stage hypnosis?

The question naturally comes up. If hypnosis forces nothing, how do we see people on television dancing like chickens or forgetting their own name?

The answer is illuminating: what happens on stage doesn't rely on a mysterious "power" of the hypnotist. It relies on four cumulative ingredients, all perfectly documented by social psychology.

First, a drastic selection process. The hypnotist runs pre-tests (holding hands together, for example) to keep only the most suggestible and most extroverted people from the audience on stage.

Then, the social pressure of the theatrical setting. Under the spotlight, in front of an audience that expects something, the volunteers feel an enormous desire to play along.

Next, implicit permission. The show provides the socially acceptable excuse to release inhibitions you wouldn't normally release: daring to dance, daring to look foolish, daring to become a character.

Finally, an element of conscious complicity. Many participants know perfectly well what they're doing and play along willingly because it's fun.

In other words, stage hypnosis is not a hypnosis that compels. It's a performance that uses suggestion as a theatrical premise. Even there, even under the spotlights, no stage hypnotist has ever managed to make a volunteer commit an act they genuinely disapproved of.

What protects you in a session

Three safeguards remain in place throughout, from start to finish.

Your consciousness never leaves you. You hear everything, you can speak, open your eyes, stop at any moment.

The framework is explicit. Before the session, we talk about what you want to work on. You set the goal. My role is not to add my own.

And finally, a rule that applies to any therapist: if your instinct tells you during a first exchange that something doesn't feel right, listen to it. Regardless of the technique, regardless of the credentials. Trust isn't negotiated, it's felt. And it's the first ingredient in any serious work.

Yes, and increasingly so.

Hypnosis is no longer a parlour curiosity. It has become an active field of research in neuroscience. Neuroimaging shows very real changes in brain activity during a hypnotic state. The regions associated with attention, perception, and emotional regulation function differently.

We also know that hypnosis acts on well-documented mechanisms. Memory reconsolidation, for example: the fact that our brain slightly rewrites a memory each time it revisits it. That is what makes it possible, in a session, to alter the emotional charge attached to a past experience.

Has science understood everything about hypnosis? No. But it understands enough to know that it is neither a placebo, nor naive suggestion, nor magic. It is a modified state of consciousness, measurable, reproducible, and usable within a therapeutic framework.

For the more curious, I invite you to explore the PRHYSME research centre website and Kévin Finel's Hypnologie videos on YouTube.

Simply put: hypnosis changes the way your brain processes information.

In a hypnotic state, attention becomes focused. The "critical filter", that part of you that permanently analyses, judges, and rationalises, steps back. Not because we deactivate it. Because your attention is engaged elsewhere, more deeply.

And it is in that state that the brain becomes particularly receptive to change. Neuroscience shows that connections between certain brain regions reorganise during hypnosis, particularly those linking emotions with behavioural automatisms.

In concrete terms: a painful memory can lose its emotional charge. A reaction pattern that used to trigger mechanically can soften. A belief that seemed carved in stone can start to move. Not because you've been argued out of it. Because your brain has literally rewritten the link between the experience and the reaction.

Because it speaks the language of the problem.

When something is blocking you, an anxiety, an automatism, an irrational fear. It isn't a problem of logic. You already know that. You've already tried reasoning your way through it. If arguments were enough, it would have been resolved long ago.

These blocks live in a layer of the brain that operates through images, sensations, and emotions. Not words. Hypnosis works through that same channel. It doesn't try to convince you that your fear is irrational or that your habit is harmful. It goes directly to where the pattern is encoded, and allows it to transform from within.

That is why people who have spent years intellectually understanding their problem can experience a shift in just a few sessions. Understanding and feeling are not the same thing. Hypnosis works on the feeling.

No. It's a common fear, but it's a myth, fed by cinema and stage hypnosis.

Hypnosis is not a place you enter and might not be able to leave. It is a perfectly natural state, as natural as daydreaming. You come out of it the way you come out of any absorbed moment: spontaneously.

If I were to stop speaking mid-session, nothing dramatic would happen. You would remain in that state for a moment and then your attention would naturally drift elsewhere.

That's all. No one, in the entire history of hypnosis, has ever been "stuck." You can let that worry go.

This is, in my view, the number one fear. And it's perfectly understandable, especially if your image of hypnosis comes from television, where you see people doing absurd things on stage.

But therapeutic hypnosis has nothing to do with that.

You remain conscious from beginning to end. You hear my voice, your own thoughts, the sounds around you. You can speak, move, open your eyes at any moment. If something doesn't suit you, you say so. Or you simply open your eyes. It's that simple.

Hypnosis doesn't take away your control. It gives you access to a layer of yourself that, ordinarily, escapes your control. Which is very different. We go where the automatisms live, precisely so that you can take the reins back over them.

No. And I'd be the first to be amazed if it were true. I'd tour the world showing off my superpower!!

I don't read your thoughts. I don't see your memories. I have no privileged access to your inner world. Everything you experience in the session belongs entirely to you. You choose what you share and what you keep to yourself.

My role is to guide you with words, images, and questions. You are the one doing the exploring. I'm there to hold the lamp, not to look on your behalf.

Yes, in the vast majority of cases. You are not asleep, you are not unconscious: you are in a modified state of consciousness, not a state of unawareness.

Most people remember everything that happened. Some have slightly hazier memories at certain moments, a bit like remembering a dream. The overall picture is there; some details fade. But you don't "lose" the session.

And often, elements continue to surface in the hours or days that follow. A detail, an image, a feeling. Like a memory that keeps unfolding afterwards.

Yes. Because everyone already enters it, several times a day.

Every time you're so absorbed in a film that you forget you're sitting on your sofa. Every time you drive a familiar route and arrive without remembering the journey. Every time you mentally drift away from a conversation to follow your own train of thought. That is spontaneous hypnosis.

In a session, we simply use that natural capacity in an intentional and guided way. Some people get there faster than others, some go deeper. But everyone can access it.

No. Which is fortunate, because many people arrive at a session with healthy scepticism. That doesn't stop them at all from experiencing something profound.

Hypnosis isn't a matter of faith. Your brain enters a state of inner focus whether you "believe" in it or not, in the same way you jump at a horror film even though you know it isn't real.

What does help, however, is curiosity. Being open to the experience and letting whatever comes, come. That does make a difference. But "believing"? No. Your brain will do the work regardless of your opinions on the subject.

No. And it's often the people who say "I can never relax" who are most surprised by what they experience in a session.

Hypnosis is not relaxation. Relaxation may be part of it, but it isn't the goal. I sometimes work with people who remain tense throughout the whole experience, and who live something powerful nonetheless.

What matters is not being relaxed. It's being present. Present, even with your tension, even with your racing mind. We work with what you bring, not with an ideal version of yourself.

No. Far from it.

I regularly meet people who have had one or two sessions elsewhere without results, and who wonder if they're somehow "immune" to hypnosis. In most cases, that's not it. Simply nothing touched the right layer.

Two possible explanations. The first: the angle chosen wasn't the right one. A symptom can have several roots, and when you're working on the wrong track, nothing moves. The second: the relationship wasn't there. And without that connection, there's no letting go. Without letting go, there's no deep work.

If hypnosis didn't work for you the first time, it doesn't mean hypnosis doesn't work. It means that on that day, with that person, on that question, something wasn't aligned. A new attempt, in a different context, often yields a very different result.

Many things. And no two sessions are alike.

Some people see images, scenes, colours. Others feel sensations in their body: warmth, lightness, tingling. Others hear words or see memories emerge. Others describe a deep calm, as if the volume of the world had been turned down.

There is no "correct" experience. What emerges depends on what you bring, on what you need that day, on how your unconscious chooses to work.

If you're curious to learn more about the different forms it can take, I've written a full page about it:

Yes. And it's essential.

Not because hypnosis requires you to "open up" (you remain in control of what you share). But because to let go, you need to feel safe. And safety in a session comes largely from the relationship between you and the person accompanying you.

That is why the first part of every session is a conversation. We talk. You ask your questions. You sense whether there's a connection. If something doesn't feel right, you say so. There's no obligation to continue.

Good therapeutic work is first and foremost a matter of relationship, not technique. If you feel that trust isn't there, with any therapist, whatever the approach, listen to that. Your instinct is protecting you, and it's right.

Yes, and that's how I work.

All my sessions take place by video call. I've found that people experience equally deep sessions online as they would in person. Often even more so, because they're at home, in their own space, already at ease before we begin.

Hypnosis works through the voice, and the voice travels perfectly through headphones or earbuds. You close your eyes, and the screen ceases to exist. All that remains is my voice, your sensations, and what emerges.

If you're curious about the practical details, I've written a dedicated page:

The answer: it depends.

Some people experience a shift in one or two sessions. Others need more time, three, four, sometimes five sessions before something deep starts to move. There is no magic number, because every person and every situation is different.

What I can tell you is this: hypnosis is not a process that stretches out over years. It isn't a long-term commitment either. We move session by session, and we take stock each time. You decide whether to continue. Not me.

If one session is enough, wonderful. If it takes three, ten, a hundred, then we do three, ten, or a hundred. But the idea is that you regain your autonomy, not that you become dependent on a therapeutic relationship.

No. And I'd rather tell you that clearly than sell you a promise of guaranteed results.

Hypnosis is a powerful tool. Not a magic wand. It works with the vast majority of people I accompany. But it doesn't work "always," because the outcome depends on your own reality and life journey.

Sometimes the change is spectacular and immediate. Sometimes it's more subtle: a reaction that no longer fires, a weight that lifts, a small space of freedom that opens where there was none before. Sometimes it takes more than one session for things to truly get moving.

And sometimes hypnosis isn't the right tool for that moment. If I sense it isn't the right lever for your situation, I'll tell you, and I'll point you towards someone better suited if needed.

A hypnosis session works through voice. It is its primary instrument.

This realisation led me to a question I couldn't let go of: what if an AI could accompany part of the journey, autonomously, at moments when an online session with me isn't possible?

I'm not talking about replacing human accompaniment. I'm talking about a practice companion. A space you can open when you need it, that asks the right questions, guides an experience, and then lets things settle.

That surprised me too, at first. What triggers a hypnotic state doesn't depend on who is speaking. It depends on how they speak, the rhythm, the silences, the images offered, and the coherence of the whole. I spent several months training MOTUS to speak the way one speaks in a session.

I built MOTUS originally to help people quit smoking. To hold that ambition, I designed a 9-stage journey unfolding over a maximum of 12 sessions.

Through testing, I realised these 9 stages worked for many other goals too. It is the grammar of exiting an addiction in the broad sense. So I chose not to restrict MOTUS to smoking cessation.

If you want to continue, you start again from session 1. You can go through the programme as many times as you like. The programme is a cycle, not a straight line.

MOTUS does not replace human accompaniment. MOTUS has no nervous system. It has words, calculated silences, and a great deal of method. It is powerful for many things. It is not enough for everything.

MOTUS is not a diagnostic tool. If something calls for a professional view (medical, psychological), MOTUS will direct you to a human. Without hesitation.

MOTUS has no memory from one session to the next. Every session starts from a blank slate. At first this may seem like a limitation. Looked at more closely, it is the opposite.

Many people find they allow themselves to tell MOTUS things they have never told anyone. And this absence of memory means that in each session, you must say what matters today. The memory of your work belongs to you.

No. But I recommend reading two or three pages of my site before your first session.

Access is free during the launch phase, because MOTUS still has bugs to resolve. It is an honest way to invite you to test something that is still maturing.

MOTUS may suit especially well people comfortable with the idea of speaking to an AI, those more reserved with a human they don't know, those who find fitting sessions into a diary difficult, and those for whom the cost of classic accompaniment is a real obstacle.

MOTUS will not suit everyone. For many people, being accompanied by an AI is simply unthinkable.

• A place where you are alone and undisturbed. An hour without interruptions.
• Clear audio and a working microphone. Earphones are the simplest option.
• Notifications off, and the page left alone. Do not refresh the page once a session has started, you will lose the conversation.
• A clear objective, or at least an intention.
• The mental availability to be fully present. Give yourself the full hour.