Ntrance Hypnotherapy Blenheim

24/10/2025

I write every month about one of my many encounters with remarkable people who are seeking help, whether for weight control, or smoking, anxiety, stress, phobias, depression and fears to name just a few.
This month I’m going to write a little about myself, and how I came to be a hypnotherapist. I was born and brought up in Berlin, by my father, a British diplomat and my mother, a beautiful and lively French woman. I met my husband, who was in the British army, in Berlin and moved to the UK when I was 20.
We went to university, but what to do after? I had been an English language teacher in Berlin, so we decided, without having a clue, to start an English language school in York, first taking a postgrad degree at London University.
It was in York that I gave up smoking. I was a heavy smoker and I saw an ad which persuaded me that I could indeed quit. So I went to see a hypnotherapist. I had no idea what she was doing - suffice to say I have never wanted a cigarette since that day.
After ten years, enough was enough. York was becoming too crowded for us, so we came to Blenheim with our three young children. We immediately loved it. Again, without a clue, I started a riding-stables, just brilliant for the kids, It was a wonderful way to integrate into the community.
Hugh, my husband, partnered with a French company to start a company making essential oils and then fruit brandy and liqueurs. Our French partner almost immediately went into receivership leaving us with huge financial problems. I joined Hugh three years later in the business. It was not an easy ride. Yet again, we had to call on our mental reserves as we lurched from crisis to crisis.
Eventually, Hugh became very ill, and we sold the company to our partner. But now what?
I had always had in the back of my mind the idea of hypnotherapy. I put in months of research, became qualified as an advanced clinical hypnotherapist, and set up my clinic.
The point of this article is to illustrate that, despite awful financial and emotional set-backs, we somehow managed to find a second… then a third.. then a tenth new wind, and, changing direction, started again. There are times when I reached the depths of darkness, but somehow found the strength to pull myself up. I have felt at first hand that horrible sinking feeling of anxiety, the misery of failure and inadequacy, and the fear of losing everything we had ever worked for.
But I am lucky. Things have turned out well in the end. And that is how I seek to help my clients – by instilling in their sub-conscious mind the realisation that there really is light at the end of every tunnel.

I write every month about one of my many encounters with remarkable people who are seeking help, whether for weight control, or smoking, anxiety, stress, phobias, depression and fears to name just a few. This month I’m going to write a little about myself, and how I came to be a hypnotherapist. I ...

20/09/2025

Who knows? You might win lotto….

Being half French, I often heard the story of Jeanne Calment, the world’s oldest person.

She died aged 122 in France, having been a smoker for most of her life. When she was 70 years old, she ‘sold’ her house to a solicitor, the understanding being that she could live in there until she died, free of charge, but that the solicitor would take over the house upon her death. It was a gamble both ways.

The solicitor, pretty sure that Madame Calment would die fairly shortly, particularly as she was a smoker, felt he was in for a bargain. But Madame Calment had no intention of passing on. In fact, she lived for a further 52 years, well outliving the solicitor and his successors.

So yes, she won lotto!. However, if you are a smoker, or you know of a smoker, here are some facts. With every cigarette smoked, approximately three thousand different chemicals are inhaled. Nine hundred of those are toxic. Some will stain teeth and fingers, some will give the smoker a whole variety of cancers.

I don’t need to go on any further, the graphic illustrations on a packet of ci******es do this. But, why does this demonstrable fear of death, disease and progressive ill health not dissuade people? Smokers fear that they are so addicted to ni****ne that if they give up, they will become grumpy, put on weight and find it excruciatingly difficult. This is true whether they smoke five, or sixty a day.

So ni****ne replacements have now been available for nearly thirty years. And long term, study after study shows they are effective for less than 5% who try it. Not great, especially when the science suggests 6% of people quit smoking without any intervention!

Why is this? Sticking a plaster on your arm does not deal with the reason why you smoked, and it doesn’t deal with the thought either.

But it is possible to give up painlessly without withdrawal symptoms, without putting on weight. According to the University of Washington School of Medicine in 2001 (amongst many other scientific articles), they found a 90.6% long term success rate for quitting smoking using hypnosis.

Using willpower, or ni****ne replacement, does not address the core issue. When trying to quit, smokers normally suffer and find it difficult. However, through hypnotherapy, you will walk out the door as a non-smoker and do it easily and effortlessly: smoking is just a question of habit, not of addiction and habits can be broken. But of course, the smoker must really want to give up. Hypnotherapy is not a magic wand. The hypnotherapist is not a magician, but a facilitator, whose job it is to make the use of your own will-power that much easier.

So when you next sit out on your deck enjoying a lovely glass of your favourite tipple with friends and family, and someone offers you a cigarette, imagine your pride and sense of achievement when you say with a smile “No thanks, I am a non-smoker”!

16/08/2025

Have you ever been in a situation where you were paralysed with fear? Maybe you heard unusual noises in the house late at night, or you saw a mouse or a spider. What about finding yourself at the top of a very high building or approached by a dog who didn’t even show any signs of aggression? Or a fear of needles, chickens, clowns, wasps: the list of these fears is endless. And if you weren’t actually paralysed with fear, maybe you were just very frightened. I even have a friend who won’t enter a swimming pool as she is terrified of sharks.

So I was not at all surprised when a few months ago a lovely lady, Janice, walked into my hypno room, having called me to see whether I could help her with anxiety. She was suffering acute fear of enclosed spaces which spread into every aspect of her life. A high flying professional, she was unable to attend board meetings, as she felt hemmed in by all the colleagues around the table. Flying was a nightmare. She could no longer go the cinema or theatre, activities she used to love. Even playing netball held terrors for her. And now she had been asked to give a presentation on a subject very dear to her, but it involved a flight to the North Island. She thought of taking the ferry, but the very idea of walking up the ramp with hundreds of others made her terrified.

The first thing I asked her was “What is your goal by coming to see me?” Of course, it was obvious. She wanted to feel ‘normal’, to be able to work in a small space, to be able to fly without taking so much medication that she felt like a zombie for 2 or 3 days after.

And the funny thing is, she knew that logically her fear and anxiety were utterly irrational and unnecessary. But however many times she told herself this, and spoke firmly to herself, the fear never went away. In fact, as the years went on, she became worse and worse. She knew she had to do something, it had gone too far. She had recently even had to ask a Sounds Air plane to stop at the end of the runway; she was in such a state of panic and fear. This incident involved a large fine.

So why was this happening to her? She had no idea, she only knew that unless she got to grips with this fear, it would carry on growing, and where would it stop? Irrational fears tend to snowball until they take over completely.

When people come to me with these fears, often the origin of the irrational fear is a belief that doesn’t even stem from them. They might be a parent’s belief, or a teacher’s or a partner’s. The chances are that unless it is something obvious, like having been attacked by a dog, the person has no idea. But irrational and unnecessary beliefs and fears are just like soap bubbles, they can be popped.

So by taking Janice into a deeply relaxed state, she discovered in herself a strength she never knew she had. Like the vast majority of people, Janice had within herself all the resources and understanding to solve her problems; all I had to do was point her in the right direction.

As she left my room, she said she felt as though she was floating, and felt more relaxed than she had for many years. Never again will Janice suffer from fear of enclosed spaces and flying. And in fact, I recently spoke to her and, in her words: Conquering fear ”Thank you, Chris, you have changed my life”.

24/06/2025

Hypnotherapy and a Family Get-together.
This is the uplifting story of one Blenheim family’s journey thanks to a mother’s virtual gastric banding, weight-loss programme.
Sally, a very attractive mother of two teenage boys, was worried about her appearance, feeling (probably wrongly) that her boys were ashamed of her weight. The family were about to go on holiday, where walking on the beach and swimming were the main attraction. And that meant, wearing togs.
As always, during the first session of four, I spend some time finding out more about Sally, and her goals, what she wanted to achieve (not only weight-wise, but how she really wanted to feel.)
Clearly concerned about body image, she admitted that she often felt tired, frumpy, didn’t sleep well, and often felt ‘down’. When we talked about her eating habits, and I asked her where she normally ate, in common with, astoundingly, 98% of my clients, she said the whole family sat in arm chairs, watching TV, or playing with electronic gadgets while they ate.
So picture the scene: everyone mindlessly shovelling food into their mouth, quite literally hypnotised by the telly. So, do you talk about your day with your family? No. Do you find out what’s going on at school, or with friends? No. Do you notice what you’re eating? (be honest here!) No. Do you know when you’ve had enough to eat? No. I could go on in this vein, but I’m sure you get the idea. Sally certainly did. I asked her to start eating at table, with no electronic distractions.
By the fourth hypnotherapy session, Sally greeted me with a large and beautiful bunch of flowers. “Chris,” she beamed, “You have changed our family life. Though very reluctant at first, my husband and boys joined me at table. No telly, no phone, just us. But a strange thing happened. After four days, the boys were setting the table without even being asked. The next day, a friend of theirs was invited and, surprised, was shown his seat at table. Mindlessly, he took out his phone, upon which the boys gently frowned at him, and asked him to put it away.”
Sally continued “We now TALK as a family. We’re finding out so much more about each other, and what goes on in our lives. We eat slowly, we savour our food and I’m now aware of how much I eat and when I feel satisfied. The family now even join me on my evening walks. I have lost four kilos, but, more important, I feel so much better. I have more energy, no more indigestion, and I can’t wait to stroll down that beach in togs, feeling incredible!

https://ntrance.co.nz/hypnotherapy-and…ily-get-together/

10/05/2025

https://ntrance.co.nz/hypnotherapy-not-entertainment/

Hypnotherapy not entertainment! Last week, a client came to see me. She was so nervous, it was painful to see – admittedly, she had come for anxiety. She had a great fear that I was ‘going to take control’ of her mind, and make her pretend she was a chicken or some such foolishness. Nothing…

12/04/2025

https://ntrance.co.nz/fred-has-a-fear-of-spiders/

[caption id="attachment_2518" align="alignleft" width="300"] One sight of the eight legged creatures and Fred is out the door - fast.[/caption] But Fred - a 24 year old landscape gardener - didn't want his fear of spiders to hold him back in life. So he confronted his fear face-on by... er... ...hav...

16/03/2025

Can Hypnosis Help With Anxiety?
I get this question asked on a regular basis but more often recently as things like job security, price inflation and geopolitics seem to be getting more and more real. They are intruding into our comfort zones and exposing us to levels of stress that we are perhaps not used to or that we haven't got all the tools needed to cope with.

My answer though is "Yes, hypnosis can help with anxiety." I want to stress here that hypnosis is not a magical cure-all for what ails you. There are times when I flat out tell potential clients that they are not going to get the results that they are looking for with me and that I'm not willing to take their money.

So "can hypnosis help me with my situation?" is perhaps a better question. When I get asked that question I usually respond with "Are you willing to change?" Let me explain. At it's heart, hypnotherapy is about accepting and adopting change, it’s not about moving mountains; it's about climbing them for the view. It's not about changing the course of rivers but instead finding a place to settle beside them. It’s about finding a path forward and sometimes, that path is surprising.

Hypnosis will not solve your problems, but it will often allow you to find a way to solve them for yourself. It doesn't 'manifest' solutions or give you the answers. So "are you willing to change?" is the real question that matters.

As an example, I had a lady come to me because her in-laws had lost their business and had to move in with her. This was extremely stressful for her because she felt the house wasn't really big enough for everyone and because she felt that her partner always took his mother’s side.

Now obviously, because I'm not a magician I couldn't make her in-laws move on. I couldn't make her house bigger either. The only thing I could offer was to help her to change for herself and luckily, she was willing to do so. There were some barriers in front of her. She had held a grudge ever since her wedding when she felt that they disapproved of her. She had been upset that they had to put remodeling plans for the house on hold. She resented her mother-in-law always trying to 'help ‘ in the kitchen.

She was willing to change, though and that was what she needed. Under hypnosis, she had a long hard look at herself and decided that something had to be done. There were a number of different options in front of her that she hadn't been willing to see. They ranged from leaving her partner to finding a new house and more.

I didn't tell her what to do, I just gave her the distance to reflect on her situation and find her own path. She surprised me with the solution that she found.

She discovered empathy for her in-laws when she realised how scared they were with their own uncertain situation. She realised what a bind her partner was in, feeling trapped between the two most important women in his life. She discovered that she actually quite liked her father-in-law. Most importantly for her, she came to realize just how much power she had over the situation.

She decided that she could set aside her grievances, she felt that they were petty for someone who held all the cards and she didn't want to be that person. She left that first session with a newfound sense of purpose and focus.

When I saw her again a few weeks later, she was like a new person. She told me that she had called a family meeting and held fast when the conversation threatened to derail a few times. She laid out her concerns without getting angry or upset. She came to accept that here and her mother-in-law were never going to be best friends but they had a shared love of her partner. She found out that their clashes in the kitchen were just an attempt to be useful, created by a fear of being kicked out. Apparently a lot of bad feelings were aired and resolved.

Anyway, two weeks later her father-in-law was fixing their bathroom, apparently, he was a bit of a handyman..Her mother-in-law and she had a roster for cooking which meant that she had started date nights with her partner again while they looked after their youngest child. Their house had never looked cleaner and they were finally in a place where they could look to move forward again.

Hypnosis isn't magic and a solution was always there, right in front of her. She couldn't see it but she was willing to change and, in the end, that was what was needed.

16/02/2025

When you 're pedalling uphill and feel as though you are getting nowhere.

It's a situation that most of us have been in, you feel like you have given a situation your all and just haven't got anywhere. This could be in your personal life, it could be attempting to save money, or lose weight, or establish a better, healthier relationship with someone. Maybe it's working to tame the garden or get a promotion.

So I thought it might be interesting to talk about incremental gains, or moving forwards step by step. Many of my clients might already know where I am going with this. They are familiar with the array of ideas, advice, rules or even audio tracks that I might give out, and they understood why I do that. It’s all about building positive habits. A bunch of tiny changes eventually add up to big results.

I think that a perfect example is the British Cycling team. Between 1908 and 2003 they were famous for their mediocrity. During an entire century they won a single gold at the Olympics and never won a Tour de France. In fact, when they approached a top bike manufacturer for team bikes they were turned down for fear that they would damage the company’s brand.

Then one day they hired Dave Brailsford as the new performance director. As a coach he did one thing differently, and that one thing was lots of different little things. "the aggregation of marginal gains," looking for a tiny improvement in everything rather than any single sweeping change. The idea was that if you broke down every single part of bike riding and made a 1% improvement it would add up.

Dave's team redesigned their bike seats to be a tiny bit more comfortable. They rubbed alcohol on the tyres for a slightly better grip. They gave their riders heated shorts to maintain slightly better blood flow in their legs. They used sensors to work out how each rider responded to the parts of their workouts. They hired a surgeon to teach them how to wash their hands to reduce catching colds. They tested pillows and mattresses for each individual rider to get a slightly better night's sleep. They painted the inside of the team truck white so they could see dust that might affect the bike performance.

Within five years British Cycling dominated road and track events at the 2008 Beijing Olympics where they won 60% of the Gold medals! Four years later when the 2012 Olympics came to London they set nine Olympic records and seven world records. That same year Bradley Wiggens became the first Brit to ever win the Tour de France. Over the next five years his teammate Chris Froome won four more times.

The key thing is that they didn't do anything that was particularly special. They just looked at how they could improve little things and there is an obvious life lesson here. If you do a bit of work each day to make your day a tiny bit more effective or pleasant then over time those results are going to snowball.

Little habits can make all the difference. By contrast it's worth noting that the opposite is also true. When you allow little bad habits to start holding you back, no matter how small they are they can add up too.

10/01/2025

Why hypnosis? Why does it work so well?
https://ntrance.co.nz/why-hypnosis-why-does-it-work-so-well/

07/12/2024

Are New Year’s Resolutions a Complete Waste of Time?
Turning the page on 2024 many of us are already thinking about the year ahead and how it’s going to be different! How we are going to leave the baggage of yesteryear behind, and the New Year will be full of new opportunities and changes.

Of course, the traditional way to mark those changes is with the New Year’s Resolutions. Maybe we even write down how we are going to change, the things we are going to do. How ‘this year’ things are going to be different!

Even those of us who are too jaded, or feel too run down to make such grand plans for the future, find a little bit of allure in the promise that we can change just like that. From one day to the next we can suddenly become a slightly wiser, or sexier or more successful person.

If it were that easy though, surely every year the entire planet would become a better place? Everyone would become slimmer, more caring and wealthier. They would read more books too. But this isn’t happening. So what is going on? Surely all these dreams and wishes aren’t just being thrown out straight away?

The reality is that we find it very difficult to normally change habits whether they are good or bad. Gyms and fitness centres rely on that. They love January as people sign up for long term memberships but never follow though. Very few gyms could cope with their members if they all came every week. Try for something you can actually get excited for.

Here is my suggestion for you. Make any resolutions that you may come up with something that genuinely speaks to you. Something you can picture yourself doing with a smile on your face. Something that you can set aside the time and money to do. Ideally something that replaces some part of your life that you are unhappy with rather than just a new obligation on top of everything else that you are already doing.

I saw a guy trying out a new kite-surfing kit on Boxing Day last year in Wellington. It was no doubt a Christmas Present. You could see the pleasure on his face as he tried to figure out what he was doing and set off on what looked like a one way trip across the harbour. I’m pretty sure that if I went back next week-end he would be out there again. It’s a new activity for him but it’s obviously attainable and fun for him giving him something new to do on Sunday afternoons. That’s an example of something that might make a good resolution.

If you want to make eating healthy your New Year’s resolution, then I suggest changing it because that is not particularly fun or easy which means you wouldn’t still be doing it in 6 months time. A variation that might be more fun is “I want to be a better cook, I have nothing on in the evening three times a week so I’m going to explore new ingredients and recipes then.” Maybe start using one of the food box companies as they provide instructions and ingredients that maybe you could imagine getting excited about. If your goals are to be more successful, instead make your resolution “I’m going to update my CV and put it out there to another organisation once a week and see what bites!”


Don’t allow yourself to settle for the same resolution that you made last year that didn’t work then either. Go for something that gives you the tingles but won’t just stack extra obligations on or drain your energy. As always though, if you would like a little help working up that motivation, well… I’m still here.