I’ve dabbled in hypnotism for years now…
By that I mean, I’ve mostly just studied it.
I don’t know that I’ve overtly ever sat someone down and induced a trance like you see in the movies or on TV.
But the principles and lessons of hypnotism can be used in lots of interesting ways.
Have you ever imagined being able to talk to random strangers, and have them excited to help you?
Can you see yourself talking to someone, and hang on your every word?
Have you ever considered that knowing some hypnosis might make you more persuasive in your marketing and selling?
Did you realize these questions were using principles of hypnosis WITHOUT actually trying to induce a trance?
Maybe it’s a little too on-the-nose, but there’s a lot you can learn from hypnosis, even if you never “hypnotize” someone.
One of the biggest secrets of hypnosis is…
Getting consent and building rapport BEFORE you ever try to hypnotize someone.
Here’s the WRONG way to do it. Imagine you’re trying to hypnotize someone. But instead of talking to them like a normal human being, and establishing some connection… You simply jump up, start talking funny, and wave a watch in front of their face.
It might work in the movies, but in real life you’re bound to be met with a wall of resistance. And you’ll never achieve trance.
Great hypnotists, on the other hand, know the power of a pre-talk. This is where you speak with your subject. You establish that you’re going to do hypnosis or trance work. You establish that you know what you’re doing and they can trust you. You set expectations, and dispel any dangerous myths. And you start to form even a quick connection so they feel positive toward you.
This sets a frame for hypnosis, and makes it much faster and easier to get someone into trance.
And yet, there’s a more powerful secret…
BE THE HYPNOTIST…
It’s one thing to have to go through that every time. And with every person.
But what about the stage performer who is able to get people on the stage within a few minutes of beginning their show, barely talk to them directly, and suddenly having them dropped into a deep sleep-like trance? And then performing acts on stage that the subject would perform nowhere else?
It’s all about WHO the performer is, and what the entire experience conveys about their identity.
People go to a hypnosis show EXPECTING the guy or gal on stage to be THE HYPNOTIST.
The identity is established before they even step on stage.
There are props, costume, lighting, show promotion, and more that support the identity.
Not only that, the people who go to the show self-select as being interested in hypnosis on some level, and so even if they claim to be skeptics they’re open to being hypnosis subjects.
The entire frame of the situation and identities of the players in it are determined by the hypnotist having the identity.
This isn’t always obvious or easy for beginners to grasp…
And here we start to pivot toward your lesson of the day.
When someone gets started in hypnosis, they focus on the tactics and techniques.
They look into pendulums and swinging watches, and hypnotic visuals. They look to scripts and inductions and secret methods of the world’s greatest hypnotists.
And they can go through those motions, but never quite get the results they want.
Hypnosis is harder, and less consistent.
And then, someone points it out.
“You’re a person trying to do hypnotism,” they explain, “But you’re not being a hypnotist.”
It sounds like woo-woo from a mystical guru. But for those who get it, it’s a profound shift.
When you fully assume the identity of THE HYPNOTIST and walk into the room to be yourself, any subject willing to participate will be hypnotized.
It’s your identity. When you know it on a deep level, your subjects know it, too.
You can speak it, but it doesn’t have to be spoken.
You can simply show up and get the results that are consistent with your identity.
How this applies to copywriting…
The first few times I went to AWAI’s Bootcamp, I kept hearing this. People had just spent a couple thousand dollars to be there, and ONE CHANGE above all others seemed to be the launching point for their future careers.
They went from studying copywriting before the Bootcamp…
To seeing a bunch of people who were THE COPYWRITER, and suddenly they realized they could start thinking of themselves as THE COPYWRITER too.
Again, the difference seems small. Far more trivial, for example, than the 20-point copywriting outline I got from Clayton Makepeace at my first Bootcamp, that helped me write my first few million-dollar sales letters.
But for many, that was the one thing that changed it all from them.
They went from being someone who’s studying copywriting, to being THE COPYWRITER. And they were able to launch their careers based on that.
This can be even more powerful…
I was talking to another copywriter who has had a banner first year as a freelancer. Starting basically from nothing, he hit almost six-figures in his first year, and the reality is he should easily clear the six-figure mark in the next 12 months.
But he wasn’t satisfied.
Because he realized he’s only making money when he’s writing copy.
And he wants to make money based on more than that. He wants to make money based on the results.
And so I told him he needed to shift his identity. From THE COPYWRITER to THE PARTNER.
This doesn’t mean getting a legal partnership in a company. But rather, shifting his identity so he’s a partner in his client’s success. At the very least, at the level of an individual project.
I told him about another marketer I met recently, who has adopted this same attitude. And I explained this marketer’s billing model.
Most of what they do is buy online advertising for clients, as well as provide strategy on that front. They start out at a flat rate to launch with a client. And then they have tiered pricing that works out to about 10% of the client’s monthly ad spend.
They are a PARTNER in the client’s success. The client won’t spend more until it’s worth it. And this marketer will make sure of that. But then as it becomes worth spending more and more, this marketer gets a bigger and bigger monthly payment from the client.
Do you think it’s that much more work to direct $50,000 or $100,000 in ad spend versus $10,000 in a month? Nope. In fact, it may even be less work. And yet, this marketer gets paid more, because they’ve established themselves as THE PARTNER in the client’s success.
The questions is — who do YOU want to be?
What identity makes the most sense for you? What is the title or identity, that if it were true of you, would lead you to your goals faster and easier than ever?
I was in the car with two of my kids the other day, and we were listening to a song called Nothing is Impossible by the Story Pirates.
It’s a crazy song-story about a horse named Glitter that wanted to play guitar, and who finally achieves it with the help of a magic rhino. (Story Pirates is a nonprofit project from some incredible entertainers who turn kids’ stories into songs.)
Anyway, my middle kid says in response to the refrain, “That’s not true! It says ‘nothing is impossible’ but if I want to be a billionaire the next minute, it won’t happen.”
And he’s right.
If you want to be THE BILLIONAIRE, you can’t expect that it will happen magically and instantaneously, with no work.
Just like if you want to be THE HYPNOTIST or THE COPYWRITER or THE PARTNER, you will have to do some work and skills development to make those things real.
And yet at the same time, consider this…
If you put in all the work and skills development and practice but you never really believe you could become, much less ARE, those things — what do you think that will get you?
I wannabe THE HYPNOTIST.
I wannabe THE COPYWRITER.
I wannabe THE PARTNER.
I wannabe THE MILLIONAIRE.
I wannabe THE BILLIONAIRE.
If you’re not willing to take on the identity alongside the work required to get there, you’ll be a WANNABE.
But if you do the work it takes to think of yourself as THE __________ with total integrity, it’s often this shift in identity that finally opens the floodgates to your success.
Yours for bigger breakthroughs,
Roy Furr
