A New Life: James Jameson tells Sylvia Thompson he always thought there was more to the world than meets the eye
The complementary healthcare sector has long attracted people from a diverse range of professions.
Hypnotherapist and energy healer James Jameson (52) has travelled far from the career he pursued following his diploma in mechanical engineering at Carlow Regional Technical College in the 1970s.
"I enjoyed it, but part of me felt something was missing although I could apply myself to the rigours of engineering and the way you have to think," he says.
Sitting in his consulting rooms on Herbert Road, Bray, Co Wicklow, Jameson is a willing interviewee, happy to exchange roles and be the one answering the questions rather than asking them.
He relaxes into reflection on his successful former career yet doesn't shy away from discussing the work culture that eventually pushed him into such a contrasting area of work.
He says candidly: "I've seen politics take over to the extent that the goals of the company are ignored. I've seen people in management who create chaos around them - they may get their goals met but they also create a lot of angst.
"I've seen people like prisoners of work to the point of a nervous breakdown because they don't have the capability to get out."
Jameson's first big job was for Travenol, a multinational medical devices company with a base in Castlebar, Co Mayo.
"My work was in production, supervision and engineering and within three years the factory doubled in size. This was the time when the foundations for the Celtic Tiger were being laid and Irish people began to get confidence," he says.
Realising he needed a degree to progress further, Jameson returned to college - this time to Athlone Regional Technical College - to take one of the first degree-level courses in plastics technology. One year later, he came first in the world in his exams and moved to Shannon to work for Raychem.
"That was an incredible place to work. Of all the companies I worked for, this was the best. There was a nurturing attitude to employees. People were helped with their education, there wasn't a huge tolerance for playing politics and the mood was more encouraging than negative. But, I worked so hard, I wore myself out."
Headhunted to work for Becton Dickinson in Dún Laoghaire, he moved into junior management but soon moved on to work as an engineering manager for another medical devices company in Letterkenny, Co Donegal.
"I had various jobs there but after five years, I got the home bug and wanted to move back to my home county of Wicklow."
He took a job with a pharmaceutical firm in Dublin which shortly entered a process of major structural and operating changes.
"I found it culturally different from the medical devices industry I was familiar with. I had an ever increasing workload and, given the huge increase in the demands of the industry, it became very difficult to keep up with it all. After some time, I was given an opportunity to move on.
"It was quite a shock when it came but I realised later that it was meant to happen. I was in my early forties."
Another difficulty he faced around this time was that his marriage was breaking up. This and the lack of a similar job in the Dublin/Wicklow region brought about a turning point for Jameson.
"I always had an interest in more esoteric stuff and realised that there was more to the world than what meets the eye: that there are patterns that run underneath the surface levels of reality," he says.
A one-year part correspondence/part practical experience in hypnosis run by the Institute of Clinical Hypnotherapy and Psychotherapy (ICHP) in Cork city attracted his attention.
"This was my first formal introduction to the healing world and after the course I began to practise as a hypnotherapist - first in Wicklow town and then in Bray as well.
"Life became more interesting and more joyous. I was attracting clients [ with problems ranging from smoking addictions to relationship difficulties] and I was able to help the vast majority of them. It is very satisfying to work with people and get good results. I have never been late for a client and when I worked in industry, I was regularly late. I see that as symbolic," he says.
Nine years on, Jameson continues to see clients both in Wicklow town and in Bray. During that time, he has undergone further training in many hypnotherapeutic techniques, neuro-linguistic programming and energy psychology techniques such as guided self-healing.
"My work has opened me up to the joy and beauty in the world and I have met interesting, creative people and learnt about other views of reality. I have been at group healing sessions where you can almost feel the air pulsating and I've got friends on all the continents in the world."