I’m very excited! I’ve been asked to take part in a live “hypnosis conversation” with two of the most interesting – and controversial – figures in the world of personal change, James Tripp and Jorgen Rasmussen.

I think it’s going to be great fun to do – and should be absolutely fascinating for those listening in on 31 January.

It’s no wonder that there’s a bit of a buzz about the event online this week.

One of the things that both James and Jorgen have in common is that they work with their clients using conversation and physical activities, in a frame that I’d label “NLP”. But both use the label “hypnosis” to market themselves.

James’s work is labelled “Hypnosis Without Trance”, Jorgen’s “Provocative Hypnosis”.

There’s probably a very pragmatic reason for that: last month 2,240,000 people googled “hypnosis” and only 823,000 “NLP”!

But it got me thinking about the relationship between NLP and hypnosis. To what extent are they simply different labels for the same kind of thing? Are there really significant differences? Is trance important? What is trance anyway?

Are NLP and hypnosis “humpty-dumpty” words, like “coach” vs “mentor”, that can mean what you choose them to mean?

And closer to home, is the work I do, Clean Language, really just a form of hypnosis? At least one person I know of will only teach David Grove’s techniques to trained hypnotists. A much larger proportion of Clean Language facilitators go wide-eyed with horror if you describe Clean language as a form of hypnosis.

What do you think is the relationship between NLP and hypnosis, hypnosis and Clean Language? Please comment below.