When we work with hypnosis in a clinical or coaching setting, two practical questions often arise:

1. When should we give the most important suggestions?
2. How deep does the trance need to be for those suggestions to really land?

These are simple questions on the surface, yet they touch on some subtle aspects of hypnotic work.

Timing of Suggestions

The timing of suggestions is largely guided by clinical experience and tradition rather than hard research at this point. Over the years, many experienced practitioners have noticed something important:

The suggestions you give towards the end of the trance often seem to have the greatest impact.

On the face of it, this makes intuitive sense. By the end of a hypnotic process:

• The client is usually more settled.
• Their conscious resistance tends to be lower.
• The mind has already begun to accept and explore earlier, lighter suggestions.

You can think of the early part of a session as “preparing the soil” and the later part as the time when you “plant the key seeds.” Early on, you might focus on:

• Relaxation
• Comfort
• Safety
• General openness to learning and change

Later, once the client is more deeply involved in the experience, you introduce:

• The core therapeutic suggestions
• The key re-frames
• The specific behavioural or emotional changes you are aiming to support

So in practice, many clinicians choose to reserve their most important, carefully worded suggestions for the latter part of the trance, when the client is most receptive.

Depth of Trance

There is an ongoing discussion in the field about how important “depth of trance” really is.

Some approaches treat depth as almost irrelevant, arguing that useful change can happen in light trance, or even in what seems like ordinary conversation. Others, particularly many senior clinicians with long practical experience, have consistently observed that deeper trance states often allow for more profound and lasting shifts.

From this more traditional perspective, depth of trance matters in several ways:

• Responsiveness
  In deeper states, clients frequently become more responsive to suggestion. They follow imagery more easily, access emotions more readily, and allow new perspectives to arise with less resistance.
  
• Hypnotic Phenomena
  Certain hypnotic phenomena (e.g., analgesia, time distortion, age regression, or strong dissociation from problem states) typically require more time and a deeper level of trance to emerge reliably.
  
• Stability of Change
  When a client is in a deeper, more absorbed state, the new patterns and suggestions are often experienced as more compelling and “real,” which can help them translate more smoothly into everyday life.
  
  

Some clinicians therefore intentionally spend time deepening the trance before offering major therapeutic instructions. Rather than rushing into “fixing” the problem, they invest in:

• Gradual relaxation and focusing
• Layering of suggestions to build comfort and trust
• Step-by-step deepening procedures to allow the mind to settle fully

Only once that deeper state is clearly established do they introduce the key therapeutic suggestions and processes.

Time and Trance in Practice

One practical implication of this approach is that hypnotic work is not a race. For some clients and some issues, it may be appropriate to:

• Spend an extended period simply cultivating trance.
• Allow the person to become familiar with the state over several sessions.
• Gradually explore more complex or demanding hypnotic phenomena as their comfort and responsiveness increase.

There is a tradition of working in time-extended sessions, where a client may remain in hypnosis for a long period. Within this extended framework, much of the most transformative work is done in deep trance, once the client has had time to settle fully into the experience.

A Practical Working Assumption

In day-to-day hypnotherapy or coaching, you do not need to be dogmatic about depth or timing. However, a useful working assumption is:

• Clients are often more responsive in deeper trances.
• It is often wise to reserve your most important, carefully crafted suggestions for the later stages of the trance.

This does not mean that lighter trance has no value, or that change only happens in very deep states. Rather, it means you can:

• Use earlier, lighter stages for relaxation, rapport, and gentle framing.
• Use deeper stages for targeted change work and key suggestions.

By paying attention both to when you give suggestions and how deeply your client is engaged in trance, you can refine your practice and often enhance the effectiveness of your hypnotic interventions.