The Collected Works of Milton H. Erickson: Volume 03 - Hardcover: Opening the Mind: Innovative Psychotherapy

The collected papers of the first section all demonstrate Erickson's utilization approach to a variety of psychological problems. Utilization theory emphasizes that every individual's abilities and inner resources must be accessed in order to determine how they may be evoked and utilized for therapeutic purposes. The next part illustrates a variety of Erickson's indirect approaches to symptom resolution. This is followed by papers on sexually related problems illustrative of the extremely wide range of approaches the hypnotherapist has available. The last section illustrates the facilitation and utilization of the patient’s own inner resources for solving personal problems. In a number of these illustrations, Erickson did not even know the nature of the problem that the patients solved within the privacy of their own trance experience.

Table of Contents

1. Problem Solving with Therapeutic Hypnosis
   • An Introduction to Unorthodox Therapy
   • Special Techniques of Brief Hypnotherapy
   • Pediatric Hypnotherapy
   • The Utilization of Patient Behavior in the Hypnotherapy of Obesity
   • Hypnosis and Examination Panics
   • Experiential Knowledge of Hypnotic Phenomena Employed for Hypnotherapy
   • The Burden of Responsibility in Effective Psychotherapy
   • Hypnosis in Obstetrics: Utilizing Experimental Learnings
   • A Therapeutic Double Bind Utilizing Resistance
   • Utilizing the Patient’s Own Personality and Ideas: “Doing it his own way”
2. Symptom Resolution with Therapeutic Hypnosis
   • A Clinical Note on Indirect Hypnotic Therapy
   • The Use of Symptoms as an Integral Part of Hypnotherapy
   • The Hypnotic and Hypnotherapeutic Investigation and Determination of Symptom-Function: Milton H. Erickson and Harold Rosen
   • Experimental Hypnotherapy in Tourette’s Disease
   • Hypnotherapy: The Patient’s Right to Both Success and Failure
   • Successful Hypnotherapy That Failed
   • Visual Hallucination as Rehearsal for Symptom Resolution”: Milton H. Erickson and Ernest L. Rossi
3. Reorientations to Sexual Satisfaction with Therapeutic Hypnosis
   • Posthypnotic Suggestion for Ejaculatio Praecox
   • Psychotherapy Achieved by a Reversal of the Neurotic Processes in a Case of Ejaculatio Praecox
   • Modesty: An Authoritarian Approach Permitting Reconditioning via Fantasy
   • Sterility: A therapeutic Reorientation to Sexual Satisfaction Issue
   • The Abortion Issue: Facilitating Unconscious Permitting Real Choice
   • Impotence: Facilitating Unconscious Reconditioning
   • Latent Homosexuality: Identity Exploration in Hypnosis
   • Vasectomy: A Detailed Illustration of a Therapeutic Reorientation
4. Self-Exploration in Therapeutic Hypnosis
   • Pseudo-Orientation in Time as a Hypnotherapeutic Procedure
   • Facilitating Objective Thinking and New Frames of Reference with Pseudo-Orientation in Time
   • Self-Exploration in the Hypnotic State
   • Self-Exploration in Trance Following a Surprise Handshake Induction
   • The Reorganization of Unconscious Thinking without Conscious Awareness
   • Novel Activity-Dependent Approaches to Therapeutic Hypnosis and Psychotherapy: Ernest L. Rossi and Kathryn L. Rossi