Ep 32 - How Hypnosis Rewires the Subconscious Mind with Penny Chiasson

Have you ever wondered why you keep repeating the same patterns, habits, or emotional reactions even when you consciously want something different?

In this fascinating conversation, I sit down with board-certified hypnotist, bestselling author, and subconscious transformation expert Penny Chiasson to explore the powerful role the subconscious mind plays in shaping our beliefs, behaviors, relationships, health, and identity.

Penny shares her deeply personal journey from nurse anesthetist to hypnotist, including the life-changing experience that led her to leave a successful healthcare career and fully embrace the work she believes she was called to do.

Together, we discuss:

• What hypnosis actually is (and what it is not)
• The difference between hypnosis and meditation
• How subconscious beliefs are formed
• Why emotions often drive our behaviors
• The connection between identity and transformation
• How unresolved emotions can impact our physical and emotional well-being
• Why lasting change requires more than willpower

Whether you're curious about hypnosis, personal growth, healing, or simply understanding yourself on a deeper level, this conversation offers powerful insights into how true transformation happens from the inside out.

About Penny Chiasson

Penny Chiasson is a board-certified hypnotist, bestselling author of the #1 international bestseller Breaking the Fibro Code, and founder of Elite Hypno Pro™, a premier training for professionals ready to master subconscious transformation without fluff, false promises, or years of training.

Her work blends science and soul, drawing from more than 25 years in healthcare and years of experience helping top coaches, CEOs, and industry leaders in 24 countries overcome the inner critic, release control, and step into their most authentic, aligned selves.

Through her private practice, training programs, and podcast, Penny helps people understand the hidden forces driving their lives so they can create lasting change at the subconscious level.

Connect with Penny:
Instagram: @pennychiasson

Penny is hosting a special 2-Day live workshop, Hypnosis Secrets Unlocked, on June 6-7.

In this immersive experience, you'll learn how the subconscious mind shapes beliefs, habits, emotions, and identity. You'll discover the science behind hypnosis, experience guided hypnosis firsthand, and even have the opportunity to practice hypnotizing a partner in a safe, supportive environment.

Whether you're curious about personal transformation, emotional healing, or simply want a deeper understanding of how your mind works, this workshop offers a fascinating behind-the-scenes look into the world of hypnosis.

Learn more and reserve your spot here:

https://pennychiasson.ontralink.com/t?orid=1583&opid=9

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Soul School: A curriculum for midlife women who are ready to remember their wisdom, protect their energy, project their power and come back into alignment. You don’t need fixing. You need to remember. Open for enrollment NOW.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Welcome back to Midlife Audacity. I'm your host, Celeste Dona, teacher, writer, speaker, and guide for women who are ready to rise into their next chapter boldly, soulfully, and unapologetically. In today's episode, I'm sitting down with my guest, Penny Chison, a board-certified hypnotist, best-selling author, former nurse, anesthesiist, and founder of Elite HypnoPro. After spending more than 25 years in healthcare, Penny found herself on a journey that would completely transform the direction of her life and the lives of thousands of people she now serves around the world. You guys, in this episode, we pull back the curtain on hypnosis and separate fact from fiction. Penny explains what hypnosis actually is, how the subconscious mind shapes our beliefs, behaviors, and identity, and why so many of the challenges we struggle with on the surface are often symptoms of something deeper. We also explore grief, emotional suppression, identity shifts, forgiveness, healing, meditation versus hypnosis, and why true transformation begins when we become willing to look beneath the surface. So whether you're curious about hypnosis, interested in personal growth, or simply trying to understand yourself at a deeper level, this conversation will leave you with a new perspective on what's possible. Let's dive in. Welcome, Penny. I'm so excited for you to be here with me today because we are going to be talking all about hypnosis, the power of hypnosis, and how it can really benefit people in their everyday life. But before we get into some of the tactical things behind the world of hypnosis, I really would love to hear a little bit more about your background and how you shifted from anesthesia nurse to the world of hypnosis.

SPEAKER_01 2:23

Hey Celeste, thanks so much for having me. I mean, we know each other outside of this space that we're in right now. And um, you know, as we were just chatting, that this is something that I'm passionate about, hypnosis. And if you had come to me 20 years ago and said, you know, in 20 years, you're gonna be running a full-time business in hypnosis. You are going to be just completely immersed in a world where you're helping people live true to who not only they really are, but who they want to be. I would have laughed at you because I loved anesthesia. And I think it's very important to preface it that way. I was in a career that I loved, it checked all my boxes, it was an art form. I got to really use my mind to figure things out. You know, it's science and it's instant gratification. So yeah, I guess it's a little of the neurodivergent part of me that loves that instant gratification. But I did a seminar for nurses on pain management. And I was looking at what can nurses do when the patient has had narcotic pain medication and they're too sleepy to get more narcotic pain medication, but they're still having pain. And when I went down that side quest, I found a body of research that exists that I was never taught in my nursing or my anesthesia training. And that is the body of research that completely supports hypnosis for acute and chronic pain. And there was a doctor in the 1800s by the name of James Easdale. He performed almost 800 surgeries using hypnosis as the analgesic and the anesthetic. Most of them were minor surgeries, but I mean it's still surgery. It doesn't, you know, it's it's painful. So it's stuck in the back of my mind. And the way that, you know, God, spirit, the universe, whatever you want to call our creator, the way that it works is, you know, things will keep bubbling up in front of you, like, here's the breadcrumb, follow it. And I just didn't didn't pay any attention to it. But probably 2011, it was happening often enough. I'm like, let me just look into this more. And it took me a while to find a training that I wanted to attend that I felt would satisfy my scientific curiosity as a nurse andesthetist because I wasn't into, you know, just going to learn hypnosis for the sake of learning hypnosis. I wanted to learn about this piece with pain in the brain. So I found a training that was uh led by Ron Esslinger. He's transitioned, bless his soul. But he was a retired captain of the Navy. He was a nurse anesthetist. And I could get anesthesia credits for attending. I'm like, when win. I get to go learn more about hypnosis and I get credits. The point being, I never planned to be a hypnotist. So I go into this training, and on the fifth day, I get voluntold to come to the front of the class. And it was the day that he was demonstrating glove analgesia. Now, glove analgesia is where you guide someone into hypnosis, and through the power of words and suggestion alone, you assist them in blocking all sensation of pain from their perception. Wow. I had seen the video on his website, and I so I started to get into my head a little bit, and I'm like, no, no, trust him. He knows what he's doing. Just follow his instructions and trust. And I want everyone to really hear that. Because when it comes to hypnosis, you have to follow instructions. If you don't follow instructions, it's not gonna happen. So I did so, and he guided me in. Um, I have something here, it's called an Alice clamp for anybody watching the video. This little thing has teeth on it. He took that and he clamped it shut on the back of my hand so tightly that it left a mark on my skin for two and a half hours, and I didn't feel a thing. I get out of class, I call my husband and said, Um, when I come home, I'm opening a hypnosis practice. And he's like, Well, wait, what? And what I found was that I had found what I was put here on this planet to do. Everything up until this point was preparing me so that when it presented itself, I I could receive it and I could see exactly what I could do to help people in their life. So I started a side practice. I worked with patients that the doctors referred me for smoking and weight loss and IBS and different things like that. I had had clients that were dealing with pain. And I I just fell in love with it. I I mean it was just unbelievable to be able to help someone to actually change their life instead of just make a symptom feel better.

SPEAKER_02 8:01

Yeah. And it just it seems, you know, now looking back, right? It seems so aligned that, like you said, God, universe, spirit, however you view the higher power, had this plan all along. But it wasn't until you opened your eyes and said, I'm gonna trust that my curiosity is leading me somewhere powerful. I don't know where it's gonna lead me, but it's gonna lead me somewhere powerful. And I'm just gonna take that leap of faith and go. And that's where you are now, right?

SPEAKER_01 8:40

So, how long have you been doing hypnosis? So I've got my initial certification in April of 2013. So third 13 years. Now, from May of 2015 until January of 2018, I didn't practice. Um, my father and his wife had passed away. My husband and I chose to move halfway across the country and had the story in my head that no one in Mississippi would want hypnosis. So I didn't even attempt to reopen a hypnosis practice. I went back full-time in anesthesia, which I had never completely left. It was half and half. But doing that, it made me angry. I'm gonna be honest, made me angry to close my practice down because I had found what was just so amazing and just it felt like breathing. That's the only way I know to explain it. It feels like breathing to do this work. But it only made sense to come here. Um, just from a financial perspective, it it really just didn't make sense to stay in Connecticut when I had a home and land that was paid for here. So we came. And I found myself very, very frustrated in healthcare down here. Healthcare had been gradually changing. The values of the system were not the values of the system when I became a nurse. I can totally relate as a teacher. And I I remember even before I left Connecticut, I would look at my friend Lorraine sometimes and I would say, I have to get out of here. I have got, even before I trained in hypnosis, I would say, I've got to get out of here. Like I knew it was starting to stifle me, but I didn't know what that was. And I think that contributed to me following that curiosity. But I was working full-time, very misaligned in values, and the more misaligned it became, the more internal friction. And I was unaware. I did the good girl thing. I spiritually gaslit myself the entire time that my stepmom and my dad were both declining in health and they both passed away. And what I mean by spiritual gaslighting, or you could say gratitude bypassing, is that you know, I would tell myself I should be grateful that I was in a position to support them in the way that I could, and that I had the opportunities and the knowledge to help them in the way that I could, instead of allowing myself to feel the feelings of grief. Because all my life I heard people say things like you would hear these platitudes, well, just be grateful that this, just be grateful that that. And so when I would feel mad, and I I would do that to myself. So one day I just I hit the wall, paramenopause, transitioned into menopause, you know, like uh what is it, heat miser showing up at the North Pole. Sure isn't that a perfect metaphor? Yeah. Like that wasn't intentional at all. So um I ended up in this place where you know, internally things were just falling apart, and I didn't understand why. I was so unhappy, and I kept thinking to myself, what is wrong with you? Like, you have all this money coming in, like you have a great job, you only work three days a week. Why aren't you happy? Like, what's the matter with you? So I was even beating myself up because I wasn't satisfied, and I had that dissatisfaction. And what I didn't realize is that grief and that anger, it was running static underneath the surface and not being aligned with what I'm here to do. That was piling on top of it because I knew I wasn't doing what I was here to do, and then I was beating myself up on top of it, and then one day out of the blue, uh it was a typical normal, everyday conversation, but you know, it was one of those moments where you hear something you don't want to hear, and it was like somebody popped cork on a champagne bottle. Except all of that fizz, it was it was pure rage. I've never in my life. Um, it it scared me. And within a very short span of just a few hours, I actually became suicidal. Whoa. And I was driving, I mean, I went from holding it together and being okay, and I was getting ready for work, and I thought, well, when I get to work, I'll get in the OR, I'll be busy, and I'll be fine, I'll be okay. But it was an hour and 20-minute drive where there was nobody there but me, and this part of me that was in pain in my head, and they were doing battle. Yep. And by the time I pulled into the parking garage at the hospital, I tried to call three different people. Everybody was busy, you know, got voicemail, and I was trying to hold myself together so that I could get into the hospital and I could get busy and distract away from what I was feeling. And as I'm sitting there, I thought to myself, who are you kidding? You're gonna walk into that OR, you're gonna go to the D bold, and you're gonna get fentanyl and propofol. And by the time anybody finds you, it'll be done. And that was after having suicidal thoughts, driving all the way in. And that right there scared me. Yeah. Um, that scared me deeply because that's that's not painful. And so I walked into the hospital, managed to get into the break room, and I locked myself. We had little uh locker cubbies, like break cubbies. I locked myself in that room and I called my nurse practitioner, and she happened to be friends with my boss. So, I mean, I had to get immediate help. I didn't trust myself to drive home that day, but that was where I realized I was carrying this pressure cooker. And so, to make the rest of a long story very short, I did the therapy, I did the medication, and I felt like James Tiberius Kirk, the teenage kid holding on to the edge of the Grand Canyon when the T bird went sailing over the edge. That's that's how much of a grip I felt I had on reality. So I said to my therapist, I said, one of my mentors was ABD, his PhD in therapy, uh, when he quit to do hypnosis full-time. He's taught me all the advanced techniques that I use. I want to work with him because I know he can go in and together, he and I can locate the seed of the anger and we can unplant it. And I had four meetings with him in two weeks. And after the third meeting, it was like somebody had taken a very cluttered whiteboard and they had washed it clean. And my life has been completely different ever since. That was the moment where I realized this is the new trajectory of my career. Yes, I can still work with the other things, but if I can keep one person from ever traveling so far down the path of ignoring their thoughts, beliefs, and emotions that they get to where I got, then everything else is worth it. And I reopened the practice in January 2018 and October 2019. I left anesthesia and went full time. I'd replaced my anesthesia salary, and it was just getting clear that this is who I am, this is what I'm here to do. And if I trust, the way will be provided. So I had to learn to let go of control. That was a mouthful.

unknown 16:52

Sorry.

SPEAKER_02 16:53

No, that was quite a story, quite a story, uh, much of which I've never heard before. So thank you so much for sharing all of that vulnerability that actually led to this decision for yourself. And when you made that decision, because at that point it was like a no-turning back moment. Like you mentioned, once the champagne bottle cork went off, you're not getting that back on. So you had you had a choice to make, you know, you took this this way. Thank God you had some support systems in place that you could use to help you to get back, right? Get back on track and get the clarity that you needed. And so now you're doing this, you're able to provide this amazing gift to other people. I've been a beneficiary of your work. I love your hypnosis meditations. I love sitting with your voice and just the I feel like my whole body transcends into another place, but I'm not, I'm still conscious, which is what I'd like you to talk about. Because I think there's probably a lot of preconceived notions about what hypnosis even is. And I'm not sure my audience has a very clear picture, even of what it is. Probably from the minute you started, they already started having some kind of judgment back talk going on. What is this? What is she talking about? Like, wait a minute, did we go all the way in woo-woo, right? Like, I'm sure there are people listening that are like, okay, let's let's get grounded a little bit into like what actually is hypnosis? Because they might have that Hollywood impression of like, you're on stage, someone gives a command, you're doing a weird motion or you're talking in a weird voice, right? Right. And that's, I think, what I even had when I first started working with you. I was like, okay, what's this gonna be about? Do I even treat myself to be hypnotized because that seems scary as someone who's a type A likes to have control? I was a little bit intimidated by the whole process. So can you share with us a little bit about like some of the basics?

SPEAKER_01 19:20

Yeah. The first thing I would like to start off with is just stage hypnosis right off the bat. Yeah. Are there people who use hypnosis for entertainment? Yes. Do people get up and do wild, wacky, weird things? Yes. But here's the caveat to stage hypnosis. These people are consenting, they're volunteering, they're consenting to get up on stage knowing that they're going to do wild, crazy, extroverted stuff. Right. Okay. Because they're completely aware of what they're doing. They're choosing to follow the hypnotic suggestion. So think about what I said about being voluntold to come up for that demonstration. I had to tell myself, just relax. He knows what he's doing, follow the instructions. I gave myself permission to follow the instructions. So that's key. Um, a lot of people will say that hypnosis is relaxation, which then creates the situation where people believe they can't be hypnotized because they can't relax. Hypnosis is not relaxation, but you might become very deeply relaxed in hypnosis. Hypnosis is nothing more than a state of focused attention. So if you've ever had a conversation with someone, and when you're having that conversation with the person, they're talking to you, and your mind is like a herd of cats, and you're having to constantly brain your rein your attention in to be able to pay attention, that's not hypnosis.

SPEAKER_02 20:59

Right.

SPEAKER_01 21:00

You're you're in beta state, your brain is in problem-solving mode. Hypnosis is a state of focused attention where you really you really hone in on what the person is saying, and you're in what we call a state of contention. You're hanging on every word. There are certain people in history who have this natural ability. Bill Clinton was one, John F. Kennedy was one, Barack Obama could do it, uh, Ronald Reagan to a certain extent could do it. Some people are just natural at this ability. Uh, preachers, some preachers are really good at it. So when you're in that moment and you're literally hanging on every word, you're in a light state of light state of hypnosis in that moment. Now, there are times where we're listening to learn, and that's not the that's not the same thing because we're attempting to. Understand the context of what we're hearing. But when you're just hanging on the words, that's what it is. Now, a lot of people will confuse what's called neuropersuasion and psychological manipulation techniques with hypnosis. Those things are independent of hypnosis. But there are certain words and phrases that can be used in a positively intended way in hypnosis to help people achieve change, but people can use those things without hypnosis to manipulate to manipulate people. So they're two completely separate things. When you're working with a professional hypnotist, they're going to work with you to achieve what you came in for. You know the change that you want, and you're consenting subconsciously, you're consenting to experience that shift and that change.

SPEAKER_02 23:01

So let's say go ahead. Go ahead. I was just curious. So, like, let's say someone comes in because they have sleep issues and they say to you, I'm having trouble sleeping. I've always had trouble sleeping. I really feel like I have to break this cycle. It's it's impacting my health and my life. So they're coming to you with this problem. They're consenting with you because they want it to be solved. And so is that what you mean by like they're coming and they're saying, yes, please help me to relieve this issue. Weight loss, smoking, sleep, these are just things that are coming off the top of my head that might be triggered.

SPEAKER_01 23:44

Exactly. I I had a client once that she um she came in because she wanted to lose weight. Uh, this is back when I did face-to-face work, and it became very clear that she had a strong emotional trigger to um her overeating uh episodes. And she and I talked about it and she agreed. And she's like, absolutely, you know, my dad used to work 24-hour shifts as a firefighter, and he would bake me a pan of cookies, you know, when he would have to, you know, be off that 24 hours, a pan of brownies, a pan of cookies, whatever. And so ever since I was really young, I would eat to feel better. I would say, well, we're whatever the feeling is that's connected between the food and the relief, that's the source. And we started doing the work, and she was okay to a point. And then when she realized that, like, oh, we're we're actually really gonna talk about my feelings, you're not just gonna say something sweet to me and I'm gonna magically feel better. She was like, I don't want to do that. So I said, okay, I said, well, this is what you need. Like, if you want to achieve this, this is the path forward. Well, I don't want to do it like that. I just want to do it like this because the only way my husband will pay for my bypass surgery is if I tried hypnosis first because he doesn't want me to have surgery. So after that, there was no hypnosis happening after that because she didn't even want the change herself. But when the thought of feeling her feelings came up, she did not want to do that. And her protective mechanism in her mind was not going to let that happen. And sometimes with my clients, the feelings have to be addressed. I the majority of my clients come to me because we're working to address the emotions that are driving the things they don't want to experience anymore. Right. So, for example, not sleeping well. Some people might just need to train the brain to transition from a busy day to a quiet night. It might be teaching some self-hypnosis, but other people, when they lay down, they might be solving all their problems from the day. There might be fear, there might be worry, there might be scarcity. So then that means that the not sleeping is a symptom. Yeah. It's not the problem. And as a hypnotist, you have a responsibility to lay the groundwork to help an individual understand that. And Tina and I, she's on my team, we work with people to help them understand the approach so that if someone's not open to looking at that side of themselves, they can just say, you know what, this is not for me.

SPEAKER_02 26:48

Yeah. Because they have to be a willing participant, or else the mind, the mind will constantly protect them, right? Because that's what the mind's job is always going to do to keep us safe. So if we're not open enough to uncovering some of the stuff that might be underneath the initial, what we thought was maybe the problem, right? Because a lot of times we come to these conclusions like, oh, it's the sleep or it's the weight, or it's the, it's the um, you know, the smoking, but underneath that there is more emotional work.

SPEAKER_00 27:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:28

And if they're not ready to do that, then it kind of ceases, right? Yeah. Can I tell you about one of my favorite transformations? This will blow people's minds. Yes. This lady came to me in 2018, fall of 2018, maybe fall of 2019. No, it was 2018. It was before I left. She had done therapy. She had gone to her pastoral counselor, done all the things. She wasn't feeling as motivated as she would like to be as a mother. She's like, I just I kind of feel like I don't have a purpose. I feel like I'm just kind of out here. I just want to be more motivated because I notice it's impacting my daughter. Her daughter was 12 at the time. And I I write about her, I nicknamed her Stormy. Um, I write about her in my book. But not only was she dealing with this motivation that she called it this lack of motivation, she had bilateral bone-on-bone arthritis in her knees, for which she used walking sticks and was on disability. Okay, it's pretty, pretty intense stuff. She did not have a relationship with her mother anymore. And if I had to guess, um, she was probably 5'5 and weighed something close to like 260, 250, 260. After we did the third session where we did some really good forgiveness work, she came in for the next session. And I'm looking at her, she nicknamed her walking sticks her pity sticks. And I'm looking at her, I'm like, Where are the pity sticks? She goes, I don't know what you did to me. I don't need them. I'm not having any pain in my knees. She was able to stand on her own two feet. I want you to hear the metaphor there. Yes, I did. She was able to stand on her own two feet. She said, and I've lost some weight. I'm like out walking and I'm drinking water. By the time we finished six sessions together, she had completely reframed her relationship with her mother. And she was thinking about going back to college to finish her degree andor going to Texas to, you know, resume her relationship with her mother because she was able to see now that her mother was operating out of her own stress, her own situation where she was doing her best and was using all the resources available to her, but there just weren't a lot of resources available to her at that time. I mean, a a black woman in the 70s didn't have a lot of resources. Right. So it completely shifted that that dynamic for her. And it's one of my favorite stories. She actually reached out to me a few years ago, and I think she lost something close to 100 pounds. And we never worked on weight loss. It was the emotional weight that had created everything else.

SPEAKER_02 30:39

Right. All of those other things were byproducts of her not being able to feel and that's in the body, that's trapped in the body. Right. So it manifests in so many different ways. The weight gain, the sleepless nights, the the arthritis in the knee, like all of these things, our body keeps score and tells us exactly what's you know going on and and what needs to be healed.

SPEAKER_01 31:05

It it it it does. And not everything requires getting into emotions and stuff, but that tends to be the people who seek me out.

SPEAKER_02 31:15

I love that though. That's such a that's such a transformative story. I mean, and what a gift that you were able to give her in that journey. And in and it seems like such a short period of time. What's the what's the average time span that you feel like people working with you or other hypnotists would see some sort of results happening?

SPEAKER_01 31:41

It's gonna depend on a few things. That there's a lot of nuance in my world. Yeah. I've had people that I've worked with that in one session using a conversational style, we have just gotten really big results. Other people, there are layers to peel back. Sometimes people will specifically have some anger that they're carrying, knowing what anger did to me. I don't leave anger to chance. I'm gonna take you through my process, which, if you're dealing with a single issue, it's four to six sessions to work through the step so that you can really do a good job of clearing and releasing that anger. And I call it forgiveness, but it's not forgiveness in the traditional sense that people think. You know, people think forgiveness is going to the person saying, I forgive you, I don't hold a grudge anymore. Let's let by goings be by goings. It a better word for it is acceptance, moving into a place where you have acceptance that this thing happened and you've used your free will and choice to no longer allow it to impact you. Um, but I also have people who come to me with a laundry list of things, and I call that my identity shifting work. And for those people, we're usually working together eight to 10 weeks, and it's anywhere from eight to 12 sessions over that eight to 10 weeks, and they just really want to do a complete realignment, a complete recalibration of their identity, how things are impacting their money, their relationships, the whole nine yards. The thing about hypnosis is now I'm biased. I think my techniques are the best. I love my identity matrix method because we find that common thread and we pull it to line everything up. The most important thing for hypnosis to work is number one, you have to decide that you're ready for the change. You can't want to try, you can't wish or want, well, it would be nice if it happened. No, you have to decide. Hypnosis is a dance, it's a partnership. And a hypnotist, you know, not everybody believes in the spiritual aspects, but I believe a hypnotist doesn't do the healing. A hypnotist is a facilitator and we hold a frequency of what the healed state looks like. And when the person comes in, if they have decided, yes, this is what I want, and they can meet that frequency, then that healing will happen. It's like Jesus said, you know, when the blind woman touched the hem of his garment, said, It's your faith that has healed you. I love that. So it's our belief as to whether or not we can be healed or not healed.

unknown 34:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:44

That lets things shift. And I I almost hate to use the word healed these days because that implies there's something broken that needs to be fixed.

SPEAKER_02 34:54

Yes. Yes. And sometimes there's there's layers to that, right? Like so it's not just one specific healing. There are several things that that build. And then it's like breaking those things down. And and I I think it's like relief almost as opposed to healing. It's like a relief that you're getting each time you work deeper and deeper into your subconscious. So tell us a little bit about like the difference between the analytical mind and the subconscious mind and why hypnosis taps into that. And then is there a difference between that and meditation?

SPEAKER_01 35:44

Okay, so that's I'll start with two questions there. I'll start with meditation first. That's the best answer. With hypnosis and with meditation, you quiet the analytical mind that's going to question everything. And you can observe your thoughts. Like meditation doesn't necessarily mean that you are without thought. Sometimes you're observing thoughts as they come up. In meditation and hypnosis, where they have done neuroscience research, they show that people tend to have a dominance or alpha or theta wave, so they have that in common. The difference with him hypnosis is the intention. With hypnosis, your intention is to rewire the subconscious mind. And the power of intention in that context is important. Because if you're listening to a guided meditation, and your intention is simply to enter the meditative state and to enjoy the guided visualization, that's all you're doing. But if your intention is to rewire how relaxed and calm you can be, it takes on a different meaning. So that's that's one piece. As far as the analytical mind goes, the analytical mind is the reasoning mind, and it takes everything we've ever experienced, and it's a comparing mechanism. Does this fit my reality? Doesn't it fit my reality? The subconscious mind, you could almost think of it as like a record of events that have happened, and a record of the emotional responses and the nervous system imprints associated with that. That subconscious mind is how we learn who to be in the world. When a child is born, up until around age seven or eight, when they have an analytical mind that has come online, they're sponges. We were sponges, our children were sponges. That's so that they can learn quickly to adapt to their environment for survival. Now, sometimes the things that we think would be important to the subconscious mind, the subconscious mind didn't think it was very important. It can take something minuscule, it can, you know, take a molehill and make a mountain out of it. You know how the sayings go. Yeah. The subconscious mind in the moment, wherever it is emotionally, the way that it's perceiving its sense of safety, that's the meaning it's going to put on it in the subconscious mind. This is why you can see some people who had traumatic experiences, but they didn't actually experience a trauma. And it's just because their model of reality in the subconscious mind was such that they were able to resiliently go through that. And then somebody else could have a much less what we as an adult would call a perceived traumatic experience. And it have a significant impact on their life. That's why I just shake my head. I've done thousands and thousands of sessions. I didn't read this in a book. I figured it out on my own, but now that I read a little bit more into psychology, um it backs it up. Uh, we we don't get to decide what is or is not a trauma. It's in the moment, whatever the mind's capacity it is, to handle a situation, big or small. So when I see people comparing trauma, oh well, that happened to you. Well, this thing over here happened to me, it has nothing to do with it. And I'm just like, ugh, not the same. But the subconscious mind becomes uh think of a roadmap or an atlas. I I'm still from the day where you know we used to have to pull out maps and drive halfway across the country. Me, me too, Benny. But you can think of it as your GPS, right? The same thing. It's it takes the history and the subconscious mind is what makes your decisions for you. Um, I know we're pushing along. Can I just drop one little nugget? Yes, please. When you think you're making a decision consciously, you're not making that decision consciously. The Max Planck Institute did a study where they showed volunteers who were in a functional MRI machine, they would show them a pair of images and they could click A or B, and the subconscious mind made the decision and sent the signal before the prefrontal cortex became aware of the decision. Seven seconds. Really? And then that got repeated in Australia. I cannot remember the name of the institute in Australia, but every good study has results that are reproducible. The results were reproduced in Australia and they found 11 seconds. So when you're given an A-B decision, a set of binary choices, seven to eleven seconds beforehand, your subconscious mind has made the decision before it comes into your conscious awareness.

SPEAKER_02 41:38

Before you even realize that you're making that decision.

SPEAKER_01 41:40

Yeah. And the best example is what do you want for dinner? Or you're going to your favorite restaurant. It's like, hmm, I might have something different tonight. And you're going back and forth. How do you actually decide? Your brain is going to decide based on the emotional experience it wants to have. Uh-huh. It does it feel like being daring today, or does it want to go with what's comfortable and known? So just think about that.

SPEAKER_02 42:05

That's that's fascinating. I never thought, I never thought of it that way, that that's actually happening. And it's so quickly. Yeah. So quickly. So tell us a little bit. I I appreciate everything that you shared. I think that this is so um interesting, and I and I'm sure my audience is fascinated by all of the things that you talked about today in terms of hypnosis, the the power of it, the the way that it works, the difference between that and meditation. And what you said about intention. So I've been working with your hypnosis for the last year. About once a month, Penny comes into a group that I'm a part of and she walks us through a guided hypnosis session. And what you said about intention got me thinking that every month she has a topic that she works around. And so what I've been doing, and I don't know if this is the right way to be doing it, but you tell me, what I've been doing is I've been listening to that meditation for the month on that topic. And every time I sit down to do the meditation in the morning, the hypnosis in the morning, I'm thinking of that intention. So let's say it's on, you know, freedom, or you've done one on money, you've done one on fun, and you've done up so many. Um I'm like setting the intention that that's the limiting belief that I'm addressing. Is that what I should be doing? Talk me through that a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 43:50

So I wouldn't necessarily assume that you have a limiting belief. We have a lot of habits, and some habits are just learned. Really, not even beliefs. We just pick things up from the world around us. I would just set my intention. If you're gonna do the one with joy, yeah, I I would set my intention. I'm gonna align and recalibrate to this frequency of joy. Joy. I I'm setting my intention to uh align and recalibrate with this frequency of freedom. I'm setting my intention to allow myself to feel safe receiving money. Okay. I love that. Whatever the case may be. It's always important that we set our intention on what we do want and not on the absence of the thing that we don't want. Right. It's like don't think of a pink elephant. You gotta think of the pink elephant in order to not think about it because I introduced it to you. Exactly. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 44:51

And I found that through the course of these last, you know, 12 months or so, that because I've listened to them over and over again, I find that when let's say I'm not doing one of your hypnosis, but I'm in like a relaxed state of meditation, I'm quieting the mind, and I can easily go in to some of your hypnosis. Like the one where you had us go down into the workshop. That's my favorite. It's it's one of my favorites. And I sometimes like I'll take myself down that walk just organically, not even not even planning on doing that, but like through my meditation, because I've listened to that one so much, I'm like in the control room.

SPEAKER_01 45:44

Yeah, and it truly only takes you 20 to 30 seconds to do that. Because the mind only needs a split second to take a concept, attach an emotional meaning to it. So in under two to three minutes, I mean, you could do that every hour on the hour. Right. Um, I that's one that I use for myself. I'll use it multiple times. If I wake up in the middle of the night, I'll use it. I'm at the top of the stairs, I'm walking down the stairs, I see my intention, I I have my thermostats for certain things. Yeah, yeah. I'll mix my cocktail. You mix your cocktail. I love it. The thing is, you have to be consistent on repeat. If you change it every time you go in, the mind gets confused. It takes repetition, repetition, repetition. But um, you know, it's a really good one for people who want to who want to heal their bodies as well. I used a variation of that after I was hospitalized with COVID in 2020. Started using it in the hospital, and I used it for several months after, and I didn't have lung COVID. They told me I was gonna be a pulmonary cripple because my lungs were so scarred on x-ray. I I hiked a mountain in Sedona eight months later. It's like show me something. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So anyway.

SPEAKER_02 47:11

Yeah, so that was one of the questions I did want to ask you because I've I've found myself doing that. I found myself slipping into some of your hypnosises and and um because I've listened to them. So, what would be the best way to practice this if you're working with a professional? What's the work that they that you tell your clients to do on their own? So they have a session with you, and then is there work that they're doing on their own until their next session with you?

SPEAKER_01 47:44

That's a good question. It depends on the style of work that you're doing with a hypnotist. With my clients in particular, because we're doing intentional, precise, identity shifting work, we are literally going in and in the state of hypnosis, the client is able to have the insight, which insight is beautiful. But in that moment of insight, where there's this space that opens, a person becomes hyper-suggestible. And we take that moment and we lay down the brand new belief that they want right on top of it. And we really reinforce that. So, in terms of needing to listen to an audio on repeat, I don't have my people do that. However, we can have collateral beliefs that were supporting the old belief that we just removed, and we want the mind to be able to clear that out. So I teach them a very specific mind-body-spirit self-hypnosis that does a clearing and a rewiring, and it actually speeds up the work that we do and it amplifies how far we get in a period of time. And once they've learned a certain amount of that, then there's a visualization piece that we tackle into the end of that. But when we're working together, I tell them, let me help you do the heavy lifting. I just want you to go do this mind, body, spirit self-hypnosis in between each time.

SPEAKER_02 49:18

Got it. Yeah, that makes sense. And I know you're offering um a two-day intensive, which sounds super exciting. So tell us a little bit about that because that's happening next weekend, the beginning of June, right?

SPEAKER_01 49:34

June 6th and 7th. It's called Hypnosis Secrets Unlocked. And it's really going behind the scenes of how the subconscious mind creates our beliefs, our perceptions, our habits, and essentially our identity, how our emotions drive our behaviors. We're gonna talk about your own identity and let you take a look at where you are and where you would like to be. And then I guide everyone through some hypnosis on the second day. Now considering the context, you've heard the conversation here, you're like, oh, well, I think I got it. I think I understand this is two full days. Yeah. It's two full days, and it's information that is actually taught in my hypnosis training. So if you've ever really wanted to see legitimately what someone's learning in hypnosis and how the mind works, you can come in, you can experience all of that, and before the weekend's over, you can actually hypnotize a practice partner. Just go through the experience of leading a hypnotic induction with confirmation that the person actually entered hypnosis and emerging them. We're not going to be doing any change work with each other, but it really helps to dispel the myth. People can see and experience for themselves, no, I wasn't using mind control techniques. No, I didn't need a hypnotic voice. There was nothing really weird or funky going on here. I just followed the directions, they followed my instructions and they went into hypnosis.

SPEAKER_02 51:19

Yep. They were open to receive it.

SPEAKER_01 51:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 51:23

Beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 51:24

So I love that. It it's only $97 for the two days. It it really should be. Um I was just gonna say more than that. But I want to make it, I want to make it as available to people as I can. The intention is for people who might be interested in learning hypnosis to come in. But you know what? If you're listening to this, you're like, well, I want to know about emotions and I want to know about identity. I'm not really interested in becoming a hypnotist. Come anyway, because if you have children, if you work with other people, if you're in a public-facing role doing anything, I promise you it will change how you see people and even why you yourself are the way that you are. It's a very eye-opening experience. I love it every time I do it.

SPEAKER_02 52:16

I can, I can totally see that. I think it would be, I think it's gonna be great. So I'm so excited that you were able to share that timely with my audience so that they can click the link in the show notes and get access to that. For only $97, you guys, two full days is crazy. You're gonna have Penny and you're going to learn all about the inner workings of your subconscious mind, which I think is there's no price tag on that, to be honest with you. Um, so Penny, thank you so much for sharing all of this amazingness with everybody. How can people find you? I know you offer a lot of different workshops. I know you have a podcast. How what's the best place for them to locate you?

SPEAKER_01 53:01

Yeah, probably the best place is to go to Instagram at penny.chason on Instagram. And there's a links page there that can just take you to some of the most most prominent uh things because I do one-on-one work, I do group work, and uh my passion is teaching others so that as well.

SPEAKER_02 53:25

I love it. I love it, and I'm so blessed to have you in my life. Thank you so much for coming on and sharing with everyone. Thank you for having me. Bye-bye. I hope you enjoyed this conversation with Penny. Like you, I did not know a whole lot about hypnosis or hypnotherapy, and I was really excited to dive in with Penny and find out more about it. And I hope you were able to walk away with some new insight, some new perspective about what it really is. Here are the five takeaways. Number one, most problems are symptoms, not root causes. So the sleepless nights, the emotional eating, the lack of motivation, procrastination, anxiety, these are often not the real issues. Penny explains that these behaviors are frequently symptoms of unresolved emotions, beliefs, or experiences that have been stored in the subconscious mind. Number two, hypnosis is not mind control. Contrary to what many people believe, hypnosis is simply a state of focused attention. You remain aware, conscious, and in control. Real hypnosis is a collaborative process that helps people access deeper levels of awareness and create meaningful change. Number three, the subconscious mind is running more than you think. Research discussed in this episode suggests that many decisions are made by the subconscious mind before we consciously even become aware of them. Understanding this helps explain why changing habits through willpower alone is often so difficult. Number four, emotional suppression comes at a cost. Penny shared her own powerful story of grief, anger, burnout, and emotional suppression that ultimately led to a breaking point. Her experience serves as a reminder that emotions don't disappear when ignored. They often surface through stress, illness, anxiety, physical symptoms, and life dissatisfaction. And number five, identity transformation happens from the inside out. Lasting change isn't about fixing yourself, it's about becoming aware of the subconscious beliefs and emotional patterns that no longer serve you. When those patterns shift, behaviors, relationships, confidence, health, even opportunities begin to shift as well. So if you really enjoyed this episode with Penny and you want to learn a little bit more about the subconscious mind, how it works, and really learn a little bit more about hypnosis, then I encourage you to join Penny's Two Days of Hypnosis Secrets Unlocked. I will include the link in the show notes below. Bye bye.