Originally a pharmacist, self-taught in all types of hypnosis, Olivier Madelrieux is a mental coach for over 500 high-level athletes. In this third part of our interview, he explains how he works with high-level athletes with whom he performs hypno-programming. He also details how the subconscious mind works and how the method of autosuggestion can be powerful if we know how to use it. Finally, he addresses those who are convinced that they can’t be hypnotized.
MedicalExpo e-mag: With your approach to mental reprogramming, you work with high-level athletes…
Olivier Madelrieux: Yes, I became a mental coach for over 500 high-level athletes, including members of the French national rugby, football and skiing teams. For example, Sandrine Martinet, a French para-judo champion, became an Olympic champion after our sessions and Aleix Espargaró, a Spanish motorcycle racer, went from being ranked 24th in the world to 4th after working with me. And so on…
I conduct sessions with them where I perform hypno-programming: I program their subconscious to behave differently. It’s a bit like when we talk about artificial intelligence or implants that we might one day put into the brain to provide capabilities that humans don’t yet have today. In fact, we can already do this through hypnosis.
“We just need to prepare new programs that we place at deep enough levels for the person to believe that they have always been that way. This helps get rid of any self-esteem issues or incapacities and helps people transform themselves.”
We just need to prepare new programs that we place at deep enough levels for the person to believe that they have always been that way. This helps get rid of any self-esteem issues or incapacities and helps people transform themselves. It only takes four to five two-hour sessions.
In this context, I’d like to mention someone who is talked about too little, Emile Coué, who released a book in 1922 titled “Self-Mastery Through Conscious Autosuggestion.” Shortly afterward, he embarked on a successful tour through the United States, making him the third most famous Frenchman in the USA.
Coué revolutionized hypnosis by stating that we have two things within us: willpower and imagination. In modern terms, we could say that willpower is the path of the mind or the left brain and imagination is the path of the heart or the right brain.
Coué said that when there is a conflict between the two, imagination always wins. That means if I truly want something and am determined to have it, but in my heart, I believe I can’t achieve it, I won’t. Coué also said the goal is to make your imagination work for the mind and when the two work together, we can achieve a lot.
“We have two things within us: willpower and imagination. Emile Coué said that when there is a conflict between the two, imagination always wins.”
Someone with little willpower but a vivid imagination can succeed. It’s quite powerful. A pharmacist, therefore someone highly scientific, stated that imagination is also a form of reality. It’s our second reality, our subjective reality. Unfortunately, 100 years later, people still haven’t grasped this.
MedicalExpo e-mag: If imagination is our second reality or our subjective reality, is it less real than our first reality, our objective reality?
Olivier Madelrieux: No, it’s just invisible compared to objective reality that we can see, observe and touch. But this subjective reality is no less real! I would even say that it’s the subjective that influences the objective because our results stem from the programming in our subconscious.
Emile Coué talked about it and the National Guild of Hypnotists (NGH)1 talks about it too. But it’s something that Ericksonian hypnotherapy schools in France don’t discuss… These schools forget to mention that 101 years ago, a pharmacist asked the following question: Why, when people take medication (i.e. molecules the body needs to heal itself or replenish deficiencies), do some people recover and others don’t?
“Coué understood that people who, when taking medicine, couldn’t imagine themselves getting better and didn’t visualize their recovery, would remain sick.”
Coué realized that there was some factor blocking it and that factor was imagination. He understood that people who, when taking medicine, couldn’t imagine themselves getting better and didn’t visualize their recovery, would remain sick.
He conducted experiments where he gave two people with the same issue either a real medication or a placebo and instructed the person taking the placebo to repeat 42 times a day, morning, noon and night, “Every day, in every way, I’m getting better and better.”
Coué found that the placebo was just as effective. He then tried the same experiment where he didn’t actually give a placebo but only used autosuggestion (repeating 42 times a day, morning, noon and night, “Every day, in every way, I’m getting better and better”), and he noticed that people recovered much faster. Coué understood that suggestion and the mindset in which we do things are crucial.
MedicalExpo e-mag: Why 42 times?
Olivier Madelrieux: He decided that the mind needed to count long enough so that it was distracted and couldn’t resist. It could have been 45 or 50 times, but it needed to be long enough to keep the mind busy. It’s a form of hypnosis. While the mind is busy counting, the subconscious is recording and taking the suggestion as “reality.”
Here’s an example: If you have a project, like starting a business within the next two years, in a session, the first thing I ask is, “When you close your eyes, can you see the company, the clients and the money coming in?”
If the person talks without visualizing, they’re just speaking empty words. If they talk while thinking that their project might not succeed, it won’t succeed. Therefore, the most important aspect, which many people unfortunately don’t understand, is that when they talk about their project, they need to be fully immersed in it, visualizing every detail. It’s imagination, it’s the power of the subconscious, so you must talk about things as if they’re already there and happening!
“The most important aspect, which many people unfortunately don’t understand, is that when they talk about their project, they need to be fully immersed in it, visualizing every detail. It’s imagination, it’s the power of the subconscious, so you must talk about things as if they’re already there and happening!”
And what Neville Goddard (1905-1972), who was Wayne Dyer’s mentor on the power of intention, adds is that “feeling is the secret.” So, you need visualization, yes, but you should also feel good things at the same time. The subconscious remembers the feeling.
If you visualize but don’t feel at the same time, or if you have a negative emotion simultaneously, it won’t work. The emotions that stimulate dopamine are joy and enthusiasm (more yin, feminine emotions) and determination and perseverance (more yang, masculine emotions), especially the certainty that it will work without a trace of doubt. And to eliminate doubt, there’s an extraordinary and highly effective emotion: gratitude.
“So, you need visualization, yes, but you should also feel good things at the same time. The subconscious remembers the feeling.
If you visualize but don’t feel at the same time, or if you have a negative emotion simultaneously, it won’t work.”
MedicalExpo e-mag: So the subconscious mind doesn’t differentiate between objective reality and imagination?
Olivier Madelrieux: No! That’s what’s amazing about it. If you close your eyes and visualize something, your brain doesn’t know whether it’s true or imagined. This is the brain’s weak point, so you should turn it into a strength. The more you dream and feel, the more you make your brain believe it’s real. Sometimes in my workshops, I say, “Hack your brain! Take control of your brain, imagine different stories than the ones your brain tells you if those don’t suit you.”
MedicalExpo e-mag: But are the stories we tell ourselves less true than the ones we’ve already recorded in our brains?
Olivier Madelrieux: Absolutely not. What are the stories we’ve already recorded in our brains exactly? “I can’t do this, I’ll never be able to do that,” etc. Is it necessarily true? No. What is your goal? Does your inner dialogue align with your goal? Because what you desire to see and hear in your external world, you must first see and hear in your inner world. So, you must control your inner dialogue to match your desires. The right and appropriate dialogue is what you’ll have once your desire is fulfilled.
“By feeling and imagining the sensation of a fulfilled desire, a person can modify the future to be in harmony with their imagination. A person becomes the creator of their universe when they align what they desire with what they say to themselves internally.”
By feeling and imagining the sensation of a fulfilled desire, a person can modify the future to be in harmony with their imagination. A person becomes the creator of their universe when they align what they desire with what they say to themselves internally.
Instead of asking, “What should I do? Will I succeed?” I should ask, “Who am I? What is my self-concept? I am what I desire.” We must be and not do. In fact, there’s nothing to do; everything will just happen if you practice this method.
MedicalExpo e-mag: It’s basically the opposite of what society tells us.
Olivier Madelrieux: Exactly. That’s why I created an academy for performance and success so that people can learn to have a different view of themselves and learn how to position themselves. All of this is auto-hypnosis.
MedicalExpo e-mag: One last question. Some people are convinced that they can’t be hypnotized. What would you say to them?
Olivier Madelrieux: I always say this: There are no people who can’t be hypnotized; there are only poorly besieged fortresses. Erickson was interested in cases where people couldn’t be hypnotized. Direct, overly directive, hypnosis didn’t work on these people. That’s why Erickson started using indirect techniques that could last for four, six, or even eight hours.
At the NGH, we learn that an average of 5% of people are refractory (resistant) to hypnosis. However, if these people make an effort and attend at least ten sessions regularly, they can succeed in entering hypnosis. Then there are resistant people, who are not refractory but have trouble entering hypnosis, representing about 10% of the population.
“The more you resist, the more afraid you are. People who resist and don’t want to enter hypnosis are afraid. If they are afraid, it means thats there are things they need to address. I work with these people’s fears and they enter hypnosis even faster.”
Among the remaining 85%, there are six levels: some enter lightly, some slowly, some quickly, some deeply, some go to a completely different place and some even reach hallucinatory or somnambulistic levels. What’s interesting is that as you practice hypnosis more and more, you will go deeper. It’s like developing a muscle. First, you see a therapist and then you practice what you’ve learned on your own: visualization with accompanying feelings, anchoring (associating a specific gesture with an emotional state) and so on.
The more you resist, the more afraid you are. People who resist and don’t want to enter hypnosis are afraid. If they are afraid, it means thats there are things they need to address. I work with these people’s fears and they enter hypnosis even faster.
- Editor’s note: The NGH is the world’s largest and oldest professional organization for hypnotherapists and the only one recognized by the World Health Organization (WHO). Olivier Madelrieux is a member. ↩︎
