"Choosing to start a new career path, especially one as fulfilling as this, is really exciting & empowering for me"

This is legitimately the longest part of my certification journey. Sharing my story & feedback. Once again… it’s long, but I hope you read it. (Success stories near the end)

I have to start by saying how proud I am of myself for completing this course & becoming a Certified Hypnotherapist by Mindvalley & Paul McKenna. Not only did I complete the course early; I went above & beyond to practice these skills by guiding friends & family through full sessions depending on their needs. I didn’t just say, “Let me practice the technique I learned this week.” I asked them, “What are you going through? What do you want?” & then of course asked if they would allow me to help them.

I joined this course to learn tools to help myself & others & to kickstart my career in the personal growth/self-empowerment industry. I’ve experienced PROFOUND changes in my life when I first learned NLP in 2015. Learning to use my words effectively changed my world & I didn’t know back then that I would have such a drive to help others now. Helping people release old limiting beliefs & behaviors has been nourishing to my soul in ways that enliven my life & brighten my days. To see someone experience freedom from something that was previously holding them back, brings SO much joy to my heart. I love watching their face, breath, & physiology change as they step into a future that they’re genuinely excited about. Then to bring them back to the present moment & see that their emotional state & their outlook on life has changed for the better. I love this work. I feel in alignment with my purpose.

I could have made so many excuses to not go through with the course, but the way that Mindvalley sets up the lessons in bite-sized portions made it easier (& fun) to complete. Finishing each lesson was very satisfying & because they’re shorter in length I was motivated to continue onto more lessons. The educational content is gold. I love learning & am a total geek when it comes to this subject.

I appreciate all the little details. Getting through a lesson & then clicking on the checkmark, seeing a celebration emoji & watching confetti fly around the screen IS SO SATISFYING. These fun additions to the course reminded me to celebrate myself. It’s true that every step we take in the direction of our goal is a win. More people would be happier if they celebrated their small daily wins. It sure added more fun & celebration to my life.

About Mindvalley: I really like the Mindvalley Platform. I joined Mindvalley years ago & it’s really great to see how much the platform has been enhanced & continues to become more & more user-friendly overtime. I would LOVE to attend Mindvalley live & the University someday. One thing that I think would make the system EVEN MORE user-friendly is if the questions in the Q&A’s were marked so that we could easily click to the specific questions.
 Whoever did the marketing for the course did a fantastic job. All the wording was very enticing & obviously inspired me to take action & join. I am fully dedicated to being the best hypnotherapist/NLP practitioner I could possibly be & fully immerse in the learnings to continue helping myself & others.
 Choosing to start a new career path, especially one as fulfilling as this, is really exciting & empowering for me. There’s a part of me that wishes I chose this as a profession WAY earlier so I’d already be more established in the field, but I am immensely grateful that this is available to me as an option AT ALL! Gaining all of this knowledge AND becoming a certified hypnotherapist ONLINE?!?! Learning directly from immensely talented therapists LIVE??? Count me in. So grateful!

Challenge: The current challenge for me is the possibility that I might not actually be able to legally practice hypnotherapy where I live because of the licensing requirements. (I’m in Hawaii) Is becoming certified through Mindvalley & Paul McKenna actually legit & accredited? I’ll need to find ways to make it possible for me to make this my career & actually get paid. Maybe I have to choose a different title for my occupation? It would be amazing if someone at Mindvalley could help us through this next phase after completing the course. So many of us have questions regarding this topic of getting out there & legally offering it as a service. Can we also see examples of intake forms, waivers, etc? Client paperwork.

Most helpful: Demonstrations of the techniques, Q&A, getting questions answered through email, the Telegram group interactions, our separate practice groups, Tina & Steve answering Telegram questions. The Q&A & lab recordings were essential to my learning & participation in the course. Being a full-time mom & living in Hawaii (Q&A at 5AM) made it more of a challenge to attend live. So yes, thanks for the recordings!

Most grateful: All the times I practiced. The Mindvalley practice labs, our separate practice group with other students, all of my one-on-one sessions with friends, family & other students I’ve connected more with. Practice, Practice, Practice makes better! Absolutely valuable. I’m one of those people who get VERY involved when it comes to school & work so when it comes to practicing, I schedule as many sessions as I can & work with all my family & friends who are open to it. I am over the required number of hours needed to graduate. Putting in the work to learn these skills & then actually using these skills in the real world IS THE ONLY WAY TO BE GREAT. I am dedicated to being a PHENOMENAL hypnotherapist & NLP Practitioner.

What I’m about to say might upset/offend some people, but it bothered me a handful of times. I know that we are all learning & everyone learns at their own pace & has their own background & past experiences… some people REALLY REALLY REALLY need to practice more. When feedback is given in the labs I often see people being polite & saying nice/positive things, but not including constructive feedback. Constructive feedback is SO VALUABLE (to me, anyway).

OK! Now some success stories:

I did a self-hypnosis to eliminate a rash/hive response that I had for 7 years. My skin used to flare up when emotionally stressed or if I had any kind of sugar, including fruit. I now have ZERO hive/rash response when experiencing emotional stress. I did this self-hypnosis 2 months ago & I’ve only had 1 incident where my skin had a MINOR hive & rash response, but that’s because I ate more sugar than what my unconscious mind agreed to let me eat.
 I was excited to be my own test subject. I didn’t know if it would actually work, but I approached it with an open mind & tried it. So happy I did! The power of the mind!

Here’s what I did:
 1. Set the intention to heal my skin & reset immune response
 2. Systematic relaxation
 3. Reframe/parts negotiation (my unconscious was protecting me against consuming too much sugar, but was firing off way too intensely. I asked if it was ok for me to have fruit so I could benefit from the nutrients & because it tastes good. The protector agreed to allow me to have fruit occasionally, but said that if I ate too much it would send the rash response to prevent possibility of diseases associated with consuming too much sugar)
 4. Visual squash (trusted that my unconscious mind would find creative ways to make it possible even though consciously had skepticism)

Before sharing this next success story, I’ll start by saying I’m glad I followed Tina’s advice. I asked in the main Telegram group what techniques would be most effective to help someone who experienced childhood sexual abuse from age 2 to 10.

She replied, “Be aware that when dealing with this kind of trauma you need to ensure that they are disassociated. We never take people back to a traumatic event without putting safeguards in place. Phobias are completely different from trauma.”

Because of my NLP training, I felt confident in my abilities to keep this person disassociated & also to navigate where she is mentally & emotionally through conversation before doing any changework.

Here are the steps I took to help:

1. I asked her how she was doing. I kept the conversation very casual & just let her share whatever she felt compelled to share. As she felt more comfortable, she talked about how 10 years later (now) certain memories have been causing her to feel feelings she didn’t feel before like anger. Those feelings were suppressed before, but now felt “out of control”. I reassured her that it’s all phases we naturally go through & the fact that she’s releasing feelings now means her unconscious mind feels that she’s ready to face those feelings & LET GO of them. She has grown & matured & can now handle those events. FEEL ALL THE FEELINGS TIL THEY NO LONGER REQUIRE TO BE FELT. She said it’s comforting to know that feeling those emotions are natural & actually a good sign of being able to release them.

2. Disassociated from multiple images that were causing her to feel anger. Went through them one by one. (This is before I learned about cleaning up the past through timeline work.) Pulled herself out of the picture, black & white, silly voice for any voice then muted the sounds, sent the picture far away & I gave her the option to DESTROY the picture. Each image was destroyed in a different way & she was having fun getting creative with how they were destroyed. (Burn up in flames, flush down the toilet, etc) 

After disassociating from the images that brought her anger, she felt sad. I asked if she had an image of “sad.” She said that when she spoke to therapists (& other people) before about being sad, it was the same image that kept coming up. She said it’s actually a happy image, but she feels sad looking at it.

3. Pre-framed Havening. Then Havened “sad” (3 walks - beach 20, garden 10, hike 20) - the initial sad image was no longer recognizable & the feeling of HER being sad was completely eliminated. She’s able to think of sad things happening in the world, but she no longer feels sadness toward herself. Havening completely RECODED the image & the meaning behind it. Started at a 5 then went to 0.
 When asked what other feelings have been coming up for her, she said that she wasn’t feeling them at the moment, but when certain memories come up she’ll feel them.

So I asked her if a memory comes up in the future, what would she like to feel instead? She said STRONG. “Able to move on. Move forward.”

4. She chose her strong role model who’s able to “STAND HER GROUND.” Guided through systematic relaxation then New Behavior Generator to acquire STRONG from her role model. (Notice how I specifically used the word STRONG & not “strength.” To her, the words have different meanings so I specifically used HER words.

Gave her an auditory anchor. She chose a song that represents STRONG.

Her kinesthetic anchors were her posture & her breathing.

*** She was so smiley & lighthearted afterward. She said she really likes how positive the processes are.

Tina’s attitude of “Anything is possible” really resonates with me & I’m glad I went with my gut & followed through with helping this person. Grateful for the tools learned in this program & also for all my previous NLP training.

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In my opinion, having additional NLP training is a MUST in this line of changework. We are dealing with people’s lives. Being able to navigate interactions by using our words EFFECTIVELY is KEY.

I’ve had experiences where I’ve heard some therapists speak… I can hear them mind-reading, projecting their map onto the client, unconsciously installing negative/unhelpful/counter-productive suggestions, etc. Clients are going to them for help so I feel it is VITAL to have mastery over our LANGUAGE.

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Wrapping it up!

I’m currently full-time mom to an awesome 14-month old & part-time massage therapist. My past careers have included singing/dancing/acting in theater/TV/film, voiceover & audiobook narration. After 13 years in the business, I had an awakening & realized I was not adding value to people’s lives in the ways that felt fulfilling so I left & attended as many personal growth events as I possibly could. I learned from some of the best in the world. Being a student then led to working in the personal growth industry where I assisted transformational coaches & also became a licensed massage therapist.

I had my first taste of NLP back in 2015 & have found NLP & hypnosis to be the quickest & most effective modalities to create deeply profound & lasting results.

My intention for joining this certification program was to continue improving my life in all aspects & add to my skill set to be of EVEN MORE service to others. It feels so good to have accomplished this goal! It’s just the beginning of even more PHENOMENAL things to come!

I’m very much looking forward to collaborating with friends & colleagues to create EPIC transformational experiences by all sharing our skills & passions! I am going to take this moment to celebrate myself & acknowledge my accomplishment in completing this course & putting so much time & energy into this work. I am proving to myself that I can be an awesome mama AND have a fulfilling career that I love!

I know that there is more to come & I am SO excited to embark on this enlightening & empowering journey with you all at Mindvalley, Paul McKenna’s team, & beyond!

Much Love!

Angelica