He once served as psychological consultant to the Ottawa Board of Education in Canada.

Buckridan explained to TnT Mirror: “The term ‘hypnosis’ is a state of mind.

“It is somewhat like ordinary sleep when a person is temporarily subdued.

“The subconscious mind will become active and ready to accept the suggestions that come forward.”

Buckridan told Mirror that during his practice, he has used hypnosis to, among other things, stop eating disorders.

But he explained that if the process is not done properly, the anxiety that occurs afterwards in the patient’s mind could cause fingernail biting.

He gave an example of a situation where a woman can be stopped from over-eating by suggesting to her to dislike food.

“But eating food was probably a release for her anxiety,” he noted.

“So, if you do not deal with this anxiety it can be re-channelled and the patient could end up biting her fingernails or worse.

“So you have to know how to deal with the dynamics behind it.”

Another critical danger, he revealed, was if you regress a patient.

“For instance, taking a 24-year-old person and carrying her back to being a person who is, for example, aged 12,” he stated.

“In such a situation, a doctor might hit upon an experiment that might have been too traumatic for the person and if you are not skilled enough to pick up on it, the doctor might get a violent reaction under the process.

“The person will leave the office not as the same person who initially came in as before.

“You have now raised an emotional disturbance and if it is not dealt with, the patient can drive a car over a telephone pole, for example.

“Who is responsible for that?”

As such, Buckridan stressed that hypnosis should only be used by skilled practitioners trained in clinical psychology.

Detailing one procedure where someone who suffered a traumatic experience is put under hypnosis, he said that it is not that the person loses his permanent memory but that the thoughts on the experience would be “put aside”.

He said some people are strong individuals and could put aside a traumatic experience but others could not do so.

And as for the myth that most people have about hypnotists forcing the simple-minded to do certain things, he said a person’s morals and values would stop them from performing such acts.

“Medicine came from magic and witchcraft from the early days,” he noted.

“But medicine has grown and has lost that stigma, while hypnosis is still ‘young’ and to a lot of people that stigma has not yet been removed.”

Buckridan said that most people were susceptible to suggestions and sometimes in a few seconds a person could be very deeply hypnotised.

He added: “Most people believe that the procedure was about one mind dominating another, but really, there are two minds working together in harmony.

“For this reason, it is quite near impossible to use hypnosis on an insane person or an alcoholic, since they are both already influenced in some other way.”

Buckridan revealed that he has used hypnosis on women who wanted to get their breast size enhanced, and also to help people get over certain phobias.

When asked about the occurrence of split personalities and the use of hypnosis to cure it, he stated that a person who is suffering from this would have been suppressed in certain ways as a child.

“The basic reason for this kind of suppression was that there was not a proper relationship between the child and parents,” he explained.

“A way of getting rid of split personalities is to let the personalities meet each other and find out why it happened in the first place.

“How long this might take in hypnosis therapy can not be determined, as it depends on the individual and the circumstances.”

Buckridan revealed that he would be offering a course sometime soon in hypnosis.

He also recommended his book, Practical Handbook on Substance (Drug) Abuse.