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Milton H. Erickson
Summary
Milton Hyland Erickson (5 December 1901 – 25 March 1980) was an American psychiatrist and psychologist specializing in medical hypnosis and family therapy. He was the founding president of the American Society for Clinical Hypnosis. He is noted for his approach to the unconscious mind as creative and solution-generating. He is also noted for influencing brief therapy, strategic family therapy, family systems therapy, solution focused brief therapy, and neuro-linguistic programming.
Biographical sketches have been presented in a number of resources, the earliest being by Jay Haley in Advanced Techniques of Hypnosis and Therapy which was written in 1968 and in collaboration with Erickson himself. Though they never met Erickson, the authors of The Worlds Greatest Hypnotists wrote a biography. The following information about his life is documented in that source.
Milton Hyland Erickson was the second child of nine of Albert and Clara Erickson. Born in a mining camp in Aurum, Nevada where his father mined silver, the family moved to the farming community of Beaver Dam, Wisconsin when he was quite young. The family settled on a modest farm, and the children (two boys and seven girls) all attended the one-room schoolhouse in nearby Lowell. The family farm was very demanding of physical labor.
Erickson was late in learning to speak and had difficulties in reading, which he described as dyslexia. He was also color blind and tone deaf. Later in life, when he explained what seemed to be extraordinary abilities, he stated that the disabilities (dyslexia, color blindness, being tone-deaf) helped him to focus on aspects of communication and behavior which most people overlooked. This is a typical example of emphasizing the positive, which is characteristic of his overall approach.
Though the family valued education, books were scarce. Erickson's desire to learn led him to repeatedly read the dictionary from front to back, along with the few other texts that the family treasured.
Official source
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