What is OMNI hypnosis? The method in plain language
You may have come across the name in a story about an athlete, heard it from a colleague or seen it on a certificate. So what is OMNI hypnosis? In short, it is a structured approach to hypnosis and hypnotherapy that goes back to Dave Elman and Gerald F. Kein and is taught today by OMNI Hypnosis International from Switzerland. This article explains where the method comes from, how it works and what it is not.
Where the OMNI method comes from
Gerald F. Kein founded OMNI in Florida in 1979. He built on the work of Dave Elman, who had taught hypnosis to physicians and dentists and developed a fast, reliable induction. The name soon stood for goal-oriented hypnotherapy: short sessions with concrete outcomes, easy to learn and effective in practice.
From 2012 to 2015, Kein prepared Hansruedi Wipf to take over OMNI. Wipf kept developing the program and set his own priorities, among them the ISO 9001 certification and the HypnoScience® research project with the University of Zurich. Today, over 20,000 people have trained with OMNI. You can read more about this history in our article on Dave Elman hypnosis.
First, the myths
Before looking at the method, it helps to clear up a few misunderstandings. Does hypnosis mean you are asleep? No. Are you left without a will of your own? No again.
Hypnosis is a state of focused attention in which you stay in control. You hear everything, you can speak, and you can end the session whenever you want. A hypnotist cannot make you act against your values. Hypnosis is also not stage magic and has nothing to do with esotericism or the supernatural.
What is OMNI hypnosis in practice?
OMNI hypnosis rests on a few clear building blocks.
The Mind Model. Gerald F. Kein’s Mind Model explains what happens in hypnosis. The critical factor of the conscious mind, a kind of doorman, steps aside, and the subconscious becomes accessible. Our article on how hypnosis works explains the model in detail.
A standardized induction. The OMNI induction, based on Elman and Kein, guides clients into hypnosis step by step and tests the depth along the way. Because it follows a clear structure, students can learn it reliably and use it with confidence.
A defined process. Hypnotherapists trained by OMNI follow a clearly defined therapy process. The OMNI hypnosis training and the OMNI hypnotherapy process have been ISO 9001 certified since 2015, and the process is taught the same way wherever OMNI teaches.
Working at the cause. This is the heart of the approach, explained below.
OMNI sees the hypnotherapists it trains as specialists in emotions: people who help clients with their emotional, mental and physical well-being, working alongside medical care where health is involved.
Regress to cause: the core of the approach
The idea behind Regress to Cause (R2C) and Fix it® is simple: symptoms have a cause. A fear, a habit or a stress reaction usually goes back to an experience where the pattern began. In the OMNI training, this is called the ISE, the initial sensitizing event. Later experiences that reinforce the pattern are called SSEs, subsequent sensitizing events.
In a session, the hypnotherapist guides the client back to the experience where the pattern began. The client can look at it again with the understanding they have today, and the hypnotherapist helps release the emotion connected to it. The memory stays, but it loses its charge. A symptom that has lost its cause has lost its footing.
This is different from working only with suggestions for the present. Suggestions have their place, and OMNI hypnotherapists use them too. But when a problem keeps coming back, it is worth looking at where it started. Our article on hypnotherapy for burnout shows what this looks like with a concrete topic.
What research shows
OMNI supports research into hypnosis like no other institute. In a study by independent scientists at the University of Zurich, approved by the Ethics Committee of the Canton of Zurich, Switzerland (BASEC No. 2018-00550), researchers found that hypnosis is visible and measurable in the brain. The results suggest that at least two distinct states of hypnosis exist: somnambulism and the Esdaile state. The study was published on December 19, 2023, in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience.
The OMNI induction used in the study is the same one you learn in the training. The study describes states of hypnosis in the brain. It does not test any method as a therapy, and it should not be read that way. You can read more in our article on HypnoScience®.
Stories from practice
Hypnosis shows its value in the lives of real people. Athletes have told the press about their work with OMNI hypnotherapists, from Angela Mantel’s breakthrough in triathlon to Kalle Koblet’s newfound passion for racing.
Stories like these are individual experiences, not promises. But they show the range of what people bring to a session: performance, confidence, fear, motivation. And they show what the work is about in the end: helping someone take the next step in their own life.
What OMNI hypnosis is not
OMNI hypnosis is not stage hypnosis, and it is not a party trick. It is also not a replacement for medical or psychotherapeutic treatment. An OMNI hypnotherapist does not diagnose and does not advise for or against medication. Where health is involved, hypnosis complements professional care.
What it offers instead is a clear, learnable way of working with the subconscious, with a defined process and a focus on the cause.
Try it for yourself
To understand the method, it helps to see how it is taught. You do not have to commit to a full training to do that.
Your next step: register for Try before you buy, ten free lessons from Module 1. You learn the key terms of hypnosis and the Mind Model of Gerald F. Kein, on your computer or phone.
