tried it 3 times twice with a practitioner and once on stage never worked ive still not decided one way or other whether its an effective tool or a sham

I went to a hypnotherapy group session to quit smoking, back when I was about 19 years old. We all lay down on the floor of a hotel meeting room, while the hypnotist spoke gently to us through the ceiling speakers in the room. She talked of floating through the clouds and being in an ice cavern...then something about imagining the clouds were the desire to smoke, and blowing them away with the wind. Then I fell asleep / went under and the next thing I knew I was waking up with everyone else.

Walked out with zero desire to smoke. Also had a magic word to alleviate any cravings I might have. I think it was "free". If I had a craving, I just said the word and Bam! craving was gone.

This worked for a few weeks / months, then one night I had a smoke while out drinking. Next day, I was still fine, had no desire. So I kept doing that, smoking while out drinking, until I finally screwed myself over and started smoking full time again.

So yes, I "think" I was hypnotized, although I might have just fallen asleep and awoke thinking I didn't need to smoke anymore. Hard to say for sure, but it worked, for awhile.

For the record, I then smoked fairly heavily, until about 10 years ago when I quit cold turkey, no hypnosis needed.

So I think the hypnosis was just an excuse for my brain to allow me to stop doing something I already wanted to stop doing, since I ended up doing it on my own many years later.

I'd like to try it