Our clinic nurse asked me yesterday if I could perhaps help her with a little girl she needed to vaccinate. This lovely, smiley, 8 year old had been terrified at the time of her last jab and it had taken one and a half hours to calm her down enough to innoculate her. Yesterday, she needed not one, but two injections and the nurse couldn't see how that was going to be possible.

I invited the little girl to come into my office, where I gave her my Fairy Wand and invited her to sit on my big chair. I told her I would hypnotise her and she smiled. Then I proceeded to squirt imaginary Fairy Cream out of an imaginary tube, which I rubbed onto the back of one of her hands. I asked her to imagine the skin was becoming numb, and after a few seconds she said it was. We tested with a paper clip, comparing one hand to the other. The hand with the Fairy Cream was indeed unable to feel pain, only touch, whilst the other had normal sensation.

With this reassurance, we rubbed Fairy Cream on her upper arm and waited for one minute for optimal results (?!). After that, I invited her to close her eyes and imagine her favourite place in the world, which happened to be on an amusement park ride. In her mind, she got on her seat and drove her little car, with all of her funniest, craziest friends in the back seat, while the nurse injected her left arm. The girl opened her eyes briefly and said "What was that? I felt something, but it didn't hurt". Then I applied Fairy Cream on the other arm and waited for 1 minute again. This time, I asked the girl to use her Magic Wand to add special powers to her car.... smiling, she went flying! She didn't even notice the second jab into her right arm.

What a beautiful experience it is to witness the power of the unobstructed mind.

On my way home, I kept thinking. How can an 8 year old completely suppress pain after 5 minutes of visualization?

This girl knew I had no Fairy Cream, it's not like she believed I really had something on my fingers...but she was willing to play the game and follow my suggestions. And most importantly, I think, she never thought THIS IS IMPOSSIBLE.

Is this a lesson for us adults?

Note. The beautiful fairies above were retrieved from https://mastersoham.wordpress.com/