About me, Evan

One was that I had parents who were aware of how psychotherapy, like hypnotherapy, can help people to manage their mental health. If you’re lucky enough to have them, supportive parents are a big deal. Simply because they make everything easier, especially as a teenager. To achieve good outcomes in therapy, however, they are not essential.

Another is that I was open-minded enough to try it out. Because if you force anyone to attend therapy of any sort, they will probably resent it, and the outcomes aren’t good. Broadly speaking, real psychotherapy happens under three conditions: when the person who attends is open and willing, when the therapist has genuine skill, and when the two people establish a solid relationship. Which brings me to my next point.

The final reason, and in my view the most important, is that I developed a good relationship with my therapist. In large part this was down to luck. We connected. She made me laugh. And most important, I found her suggestions to be incredibly helpful. In her sessions, I experienced a combination of hypnotherapy and cognitive behavioural therapy. And over weeks and months, I learned about why I was feeling as I did, what I could do about it, and how to manage my own mental health moving forward.

I’m well aware that talk-therapy does not help everyone as much as it helped me. That I discovered from talking to friends. But also more reliably through academic papers that have studied the efficacy of talk-therapy in diverse populations of people. Unfortunately, not everyone finds it as beneficial as I did.

However, in my case, it really did feel life-changing. Indeed it was. And that’s why I’ve started Crookes Hypnotherapy: I want to replicate and build on the successful therapeutic relationship that I felt lucky to experience. I want to recreate and share that wonderful experience with other people who are seeking effective mental health support. I judge the success of my therapy by the consequences of what came after it, of what I went on to do.

Post-therapy, I went on to study history and later psychology at university, graduating both with a first-class degree. I performed stand-up comedy for charity, hitch-hiked, and started a personal website, ww.evanhughesideas.com. Travel and work became a major theme. I’ve worked around England, in Norwich, Manchester, Sheffield, the Peak and Lake Districts - but also abroad, in Germany and New Zealand.

Over the years, I have kept in contact with my therapist, and have returned to continue doing the sometimes difficult psychological work - which never truly ends and which occurs even if you’ve never been inside a therapy room - but also for mentoring: to learn about the profession and lessons on how to become an effective therapist. It is now ten years since I attended my first talk-therapy session. Reflecting on the positive events that have occurred in the last decade simply makes me even more grateful for the experiences of my 17-year old self. Now, moving forward, what I want to achieve with Crookes Hypnotherapy is a calm, warm, rational, and scientific space to explore, support, and strengthen the mental health of clients, however that is defined.