Become a Patron of my Practice

I’ve been making regular videos on topics connected to life coaching or hypnotism for more than a year now. They are first created in Facebook Live, then downloaded, edited and put up on my YouTube Channel with titles, a custom thumbnail and so on.

The videos have become very popular and they are fun to do. People have said they appreciate the “in person” aspect of them as opposed to reading my blog. That’s cool.

Recently, people who have been clients, plus past students and participants at my free clinics for cancer patients have asked to have a deeper and more personal experience of my practice and thoughts. So I decided to create a Patreon Channel. I’ll do it for a year and then evaluate.

Patreon works just like YouTube, except it isn’t free. You have to subscribe to access those videos. The cost is small, $5/month. Once you subscribe you get an email notice whenever a new video is posted for my patrons to see, with a link that will take you right to it. You can also access all the videos I have made for my patrons at any time.

The videos on Patreon are more personal and edgy. I cover spiritual and theological material that I would not put in a public forum because they would attract internet trolls. Patreon requires that someone opt in to see the content. While the fee is small, troublemakers are unlikely to pay it. I want the content to go only to people who welcome it.

Another aspect of Patreon is that it gives people a way to support my work simply because they like what I do and the services I provide to others. Sometimes participants in my free programs tell me they feel bad about attending my programs when they know I am not getting paid to do them. This provides a way for a person to become my patron and support my work even if they don’t need to become a private client (which is the only service I charge for).

So if you’d like to become one of my patrons, come aboard! My blog, YouTube Channel and Patreon Channel can be accessed from the “Blogs, Social and Videos” menu on my website at https://csgiles.org. Or you can sign up with Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/csgiles directly. Thanks!

HypnoCoaching®

We’re making some changes!

As Lindsay has now retired from her parish ministry and has joined my practice, becoming our Reiki Master Teacher, we’ve been discussing how we can coordinate our work and what we want to do about our practice branding. We’ve gotten some consultation from colleagues and have now begun to implement the changes. This blog explains what is going on for those interested. 

First, we’ve simplified our website substantially (http://www.csgiles.org). The consultants felt we’d let it get too big with so much information that it had become overwhelming. We now explain things more concisely. We’ve also moved detailed information onto secondary pages that you can get to by clicking a link if you are so inclined but do not otherwise see. 

The most obvious general change you may notice is how I describe my part of the practice. For the past thirty years I’ve called what I do “Consulting Hypnotism.” I am now referring to it as “HypnoCoaching.”

HypnoCoaching is an advanced certification within the National Guild of Hypnotists. It is an explicit combination of life coaching and the hypnotic arts to create a comprehensive approach to helping clients achieve their goals while also becoming a better version of themselves. HypnoCoaching can address any issue--from cancer to time management--but always keeps the client’s overall life satisfaction in mind.

The HypnoCoaching program was created twenty years ago by Dr. Lisa Halpin, a colleague and friend of Lindsay and myself. Lisa developed it after a series of conversations she and I had about the need for such a program, and I was the very first practitioner to achieve the certification (followed shortly thereafter by Lindsay, although she’ll be confining her work to Reiki going forward). 

I have always used HypnoCoaching techniques in my work but didn’t call them that. However, over the years my clientele has changed. Twenty years ago many of my private clients were people dealing with a scary medical diagnosis, often cancer. However, as my skill set improved and my five group programs for cancer patients around Chicagoland improved in effectiveness (four of them are free), many cancer patients now decide that’s all they need. This opened slots in my private practice for other sorts of work and that is what happened. 

Today most of my private clients come to me for help to improve their personal effectiveness. I still work intensively with some cancer patients, but the bread and butter work has come to be helping people with issues regarding their occupations, relationships, life satisfaction, mood and their overall success. Unfortunately, most people still think of my work in the context of medical issues only and don’t think of me when they have a different need I could help them with. 

Therefore, I’ve decided to fully embrace the HypnoCoaching nomenclature. This will make my brand of hypnotism more clear, differentiate me from colleagues, and make it clear that I provide what amounts to life coaching by means of hypnosis.

Apart from the nomenclature, established clients will not notice many changes. We are not changing our pricing, etc. We will be adding new benefits for our clientele. In addition to our email newsletter, the self-hypnosis recordings I make for clients and the videos I make for my YouTube Channel, we will be improving email and phone support. I will also regularly schedule free Facebook Live events where I will respond to questions or issues suggested anonymously by past or active clients (a recording provided for those who can’t be with us in real time). Details will be announced in Powerlines and on the website soon. 

New clients coming onboard will experience the major change. I will ask every new client to sign up for an initial program of sessions. We’ll provide no-interest financing to make that affordable, but our outcomes data makes it clear that my work is most effective when I get to know a client over time. It is least effective for those who only want a few sessions for minor goals. I’d rather send such clients to colleagues so I can concentrate on the work I do best.

I hope you will enjoy the more straightforward approach to what I do and I’m looking forward to putting my “brand” of hypnotism out to the public in a way that makes it self-explanatory.

Final President's Report to the UU Society for Community Ministries

Monday; June 6, 2016

Dear Colleagues:

This is my final President’s Report to the membership of the Unitarian Universalist Society for Community Ministries. By presenting it I complete my second and final term as President and pass the gavel to my successor, the Rev. Cat Cox.

It has been a blast to have served you over the past six years. I’ve had the opportunity to work with some very fine people as Directors of our Society and feel pride in what we’ve been able to accomplish together. 

I came into office unexpectedly when the President, the Rev. Deborah Holder, had to step down after accepting a position with the Unitarian Universalist Association. I did not have the benefit of the “apprenticeship year” as President-Elect, and had to hit the ground running. I didn’t know the ropes of the organization and had limited involvement with the other leaders. Deborah handed me a well-running organization but there was a lot I had to learn.

Over the years I’ve thrown a multitude of things “against the wall to see what would stick.” Some of these efforts, such as our electronic newsletter Beyond the Walls, creating our organizational management website, taking a stronger position with denominational groups and increasing the rigor of our membership process have worked very well. Other, such as encouraging colleagues to make better use of podcasts, videos and Twitter have not. But on the whole, we got a lot done.

Some of what we got done are the routine business of any organization. We cleaned our membership roles, improved dues collection, updated our bylaws, modernized our logo, created a standardized Identification Badge program, formalized membership nomenclature, and expanded the professionalism of our presence at the General Assembly. With an emphasis on using technology well, we have been able to expand programs and services with no need to increase membership dues during the six years I have served as President.

We also accomplished some exceptional things. We persuaded the Unitarian Universalist Association to better include community ministers in the UU World and the UUA Directory. We successfully lobbied to a greatly expanded mention in the denominational Strategic Plan for Professional Ministry. 

Additionally, we created and published two popular and important documents, the Best Practices Guide for Community Ministry and the Guide to Covenanted Relationships between Lay Community Ministers and Congregations, Organizations and Parish Ministers. Both of these documents have been frequent downloads from the Key Documents section of our website.

One important development was our Task Force on Excellence in Community Ministry, where representatives from the Unitarian Universalist Ministers Association, the Unitarian Universalist Association and our organization met to find ways to work together to improve the quality of community ministry in our denomination. The report of the Task Force will no doubt be an important document, although adoption of its recommendations has been slow by the other denominational groups.

To improve the “optics” of community ministry, your Board began the process of inviting key denominational leaders to meet with the Board to learn about what community ministry means and how it works. I believe these contacts have been, and will continue to be, influential in the years ahead. We also were invited to help the Ministerial Fellowship Committee create equivalencies for community ministers and successfully lobbied for books on community ministry to become part of the Recommended Reading List. 

We have participated in both of the Unitarian Universalist Association Financial Sustainability Summits and have been of counsel to our denomination when asked.

At the request of two student members, we provided assistance and support when their degrees were withheld. We were of substantial influence to protect their civil rights, and both students have been cleared of wrongdoing and have received their degrees. 

Finally, we published a substantial book, Called to Community, which is on the revised Ministerial Fellowship Committee Reading List. It was released in print in 2014 and as a Kindle edition this year. 

We have committed to work on a project for endorsement of lay community ministers. In light of therecent announcement by Unitarian Universalist Association that there will denominational movement toward this goal, our strategy will shift to influencing that process instead. 

We have also begun a comprehensive upgrade to the interface of our website and that will show results in the upcoming year. It will make our website more attractive and easier to use.

One project remains unfinished. We had hoped to create a Discernment Project to help young people make career decisions to enter community ministry but time ran out amidst the press of other demands. Perhaps this project will see development in the future. 

As I pass the gavel to Rev. Cox, I want to say how delighted I am that she will be the next President. I think Cat’s style is exactly what our organization needs going forward. She has my full confidence and I think our best years are ahead.

The people I have worked with on the Board of our organization over the past six years have been some of best people I have encountered in my 38 years as a minister in our Association. They are devoted, hard-working, reliable, intelligent and kind. They have staffed our General Assembly table, represented us on denominational committees and Task Forces, attended important meetings and much more. Our membership has been well served by every Director, past and present, and I am grateful. 

There are two past Directors I want to single out for special thanks in this, my final report.

The first is Mr. Bob Miess. Bob was my Vice-President for five of my six years on the Board and I could not ask for a better. Bob is wise in the ways of the world, calm under stress and always someone who could be counted on. I deeply appreciate his support. I could not have gotten as much done without him at my side.

The second is the Rev. Dr. Michelle Walsh who served us in the crucial role as Membership Director as we increased rigor in our membership process and categories. She also served us in an expanded leadership role in relating to other denominational groups in a way that was vitally important. There was a tremendous amount of work that went on behind the scenes to make all we have accomplished happen, and Michelle did a superb job. 

I want to extend praise for our hard-working Administrator, the Rev. Amanda Aikman. A lot of the basic work of running our organization gets done by Amanda, and she has always been reliable, smart and has shown herself to have excellent interpersonal skills. We have been well served by her and I am delighted she will continue in her role as our organization goes forward.

Finally, I would like to thank the leadership and membership of the Unitarian Universalist Society for Community Ministries for having put up with me over the past six years. I pass the gavel with a sense of accomplishment and optimism. It’s been a privilege.

Respectfully Submitted,

The Rev. C. Scot Giles, D.Min.

President.