What makes the Office Building so interesting is its versatility.  It can be used as an induction, as a deepener, or as change work for quieting a busy mind.

I’m an open source kind of guy, so feel free to take this and use it with your own clients.  All I ask is that if you publish it somewhere, give me credit as the original author.

Office Building

by Michael Raugh, BCH, CI

A metaphor for promoting sound sleep. Can be used as an induction, as a deepener, or as an exercise for clients who need to learn to quiet their minds for sleep.

If you are using this as the induction, have the client close their eyes and take a couple of relaxing deep breaths before you begin.

Just relax now, and allow your imagination to take charge of your thinking for a few minutes. You have a powerful and creative mind, and it’s often said that there is no wrong way to imagine, so whatever images, sounds, or feelings your imagine may produce or not produce are all perfectly okay for you in this time and place. You may even be a little surprised at where your mind can take you when you simply allow whatever happens to happen. And if you happen to find your mind drifting, or wandering a little, you can allow that to happen too.

I wonder how well you can imagine an office building. It may be a massive skyscraper hundreds of feet tall, or perhaps something with a wide stance or an unusual shape; maybe a building you know well, or one that your imagination can create. Whatever its shape or size or height, imagine that office building in your mind.

An interesting thing about an office building is that, like your body and mind, an office building has a sort of circadian rhythm to it. Early in the morning, the building wakes up from sleep, a little slowly at first. The daytime security guards arrive, and the cleaning crew, and the support staff, getting things ready for the day’s activities. The workers arrive, a few early ones first and then the rest, and as they come in and get to work everything wakes up. Lights come on, machinery kicks back into active mode, phones ring, printers whir into action. Climate systems keep the building’s temperature at a comfortable level and security systems watch the entrances and exits.

Now imagine what happens at the end of the day. It starts with the people winding down their work, cleaning off their desks, heading home. Done for the day. As the people file out, it’s easy to imagine that everything begins to slow down. As the day draws to a close it feels quieter and quieter inside, less and less busy, more and more empty. By night time, all of the tasks are done; business is finished.

Now imagine the building shutting down for the night. First the cleaning crew sweeps through, emptying trash cans and sweeping floors and dusting, starting at the top floor and working their way down, cleaning each floor, from the penthouse down to the basement. Imagine the security guards making their rounds, starting at the top floor and working their way down. Even from outside, you may be able to imagine the lights winking out as the guards go through the top floor, checking to make sure doors are locked, turning out the lights, making sure the floor is empty, quiet, and still … and then going down to the next floor, doing the same thing … and down to the next … and the next … and the next.

With each floor, your whole building becomes more and more quiet, empty, and clear. And when the guards finish the lowest floor, they turn off the last of the lights, lock the doors, and go home, leaving the building at rest. Imagine that feeling now, of a building completely at rest … empty … quiet … calm … peaceful. And I wonder what it would feel like to wrap yourself in that feeling, to experience it yourself, as if you were alone in that quiet, calm, empty building, completely secure, but surrounded in silence.

If you are using this as an induction, you can segue now into a deepener or your suggestion work. 

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First, I will be reprising my 2014 presentation Metaphors that Calm the Mind.  This is a one-hour seminar in which I demonstrate a number of useful metaphors that I use for clients who need help with stress or with falling and staying asleep.  The tools I cover are the ones included in my audio CD Metaphors that Calm the Mind.

I will also be presenting an expanded 2-hour workshop on Escaping the Insulin Trap.  This workshop will delve into detail on my protocol for helping clients with Type II diabetes to better manage their condition.  Much of the discussion will be about weight loss, which is a big issue for Type II clients, and about developing good habits for blood sugar control.

In addition to these, I will also be co-presenting a 2-hour workshop with Boris Opancha on helping clients with sleep disorders.

The annual NGH convention is the premier professional development event for hypnotists in the United States, and is open to NGH members and non-members alike.  Registration is open now.

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I created this audio CD as a companion for my 2014 NGH Convention seminar “Metaphors That Calm the Mind.”  It is quite useful as a standalone product as well.

Track 1, “Clear Your Mind and Sleep,” is a complete hypnosis session containing an induction (“From Five to Nine” by Terence Watts), two metaphors for promoting sound sleep, and an ending and is designed to be used at bedtime to help settle the mind and go to sleep.

Track 2, “Stress Management,” is a complete hypnosis session giving you some tools for managing stress.  It is similar in many ways to the free stress management recording that I used to have posted for download from the old site, in that it uses the metaphor of a ‘stress drain’ to relieve tension and put you back in control.

In addition to these two complete sessions, there are parts of sessions as individual tracks.  There are three inductions, five metaphors (3 for sleep, 2 for stress), and two closings (one for going to sleep and one for being awake). By creating a play list with just the parts that you want in the order that you want them, you can create your own customized hypnosis session from the material on the CD.

Metaphors That Calm the Mind is available now for $14.99 from the CreateSpace e-store and Amazon.com.

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When I first gave my presentation on Escaping the Insulin Trap at the 2013 NGH convention, I knew I had to start out addressing the question that would be on everyone’s mind as soon as they saw me:  why would anyone take weight loss advice from a guy who looks like me (top photo)?

The best answer I could think of was to show them a few other photos:

This photo was taken at the end of my professional hypnosis training in 2003 and was used on the first Second Trances website. At this point I hadn’t been to a doctor in years, so I don’t know exactly what I weighed.  About a year before that I’d been weighed at 392 pounds so it had to be at least that and probably higher.

At a hypnosis conference in 2008. Those pants are size 62 (I am 68 inches tall) and are tight around the waist.  I still wasn’t monitoring my weight so I have no idea what it was.

The day I proposed to my wife, Julie, in 2009. Getting romantically involved with Julie had prompted me to start paying attention to my health again.  My weight was down to 385 pounds and my A1c (blood test for measuring blood glucose levels over time) was over 8, which is extremely unhealthy.  I’d been a Type II diabetic since 1994.

Another website update photo, from August 2012. After a couple of years of doing everything the USDA, the ADA, and my endocrinologist said to do, eating lots of grains and avoiding meat and fat, my face was much less puffy-looking but I still weighed in at 375 pounds.  My latest A1c result had reached 9.3 despite being on three separate blood-sugar-lowering medications, which was alarming enough that my doctor wanted to have me start injecting insulin.  Instead, I read Gary Taubes’ book Why We Get Fat: And What to Do About It and started a low-carb diet.

August 2014 The low carb diet has done amazing things for me.  In this photo I weigh 275 pounds and my most recent A1c was 5.6, which is almost within non-diabetic range.  I take only one medication now instead of 3.  My blood pressure, triglycerides, and other key health indicators are also much improved.

Our program for Diabetes Self-Management is based on my experience, along with a healthy dose of motivation and good habit-building.

So … why would you take weight loss advice from a guy like me?  Because I’ve experienced the struggle — I’m still experiencing it — and I know first hand what the emotional and physical toll is like.  I understand that being fat is not indicative of a character flaw.  We can talk about your situation frankly, without judgment, and focus on setting and reaching your goals.

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