George Urias smoked 20 cigarettes a day, give or take a few, for 30 years.

He made more than 100 attempts to quit, but was unsuccessful. Finally he decided to undergo hypnotherapy. That was four years ago.

Urias has not had a cigarette since.

Hypnotherapy has been used to treat a wide variety of problems encountered in everyday life by a variety of people.

According to hypnotherapist Peter Scott, smoking addictions are most common, followed by weight loss. Hypnotherapy is also used to overcome alcoholism, boost self-esteem, enhance public speaking or athletic abilities, and eliminate phobias and stuttering.

All of these goals can be reached, Scott says, if the client really wants to make it happen.

Changing a behavior because someone else wants you to is not enough of an incentive, and Scott, who has a bachelor's degree in human communications and sociology, screens potential clients to assure they are undergoing hypnosis for the right reasons.

"If a client is not willing to feel it, he is not going to be able to heal it," Scott says. He says he strives for a high success rate in his profession and is not afraid to turn some prospective clients away.

Jacqueline St. Germaine, a practicing hypnotherapist with a Ph.D. in psychology, echoes this belief.

"Hypnosis can't make a person do what they don't want to do," she says. "I try to weed out the ones who are not sincere."

St. Germaine, who specializes in treating smoking addictions, says one session is usually all that is needed for those who are motivated.

Research indicates that hypnosis is 25 percent effective in treating smoking addictions, but it must be coupled with behavior modification, St. Germaine says. For example, one woman stopped talking on the telephone because that was her time to light up.

Urias' hypnotherapy included five hourly sessions with Stephen Emslie, a local hypnotherapist who boasts a 95 percent success rate.

Each day after work, for five consecutive days, the Tucson resident underwent hypnotherapy to kick a habit he thought he could never conquer on his own.

He was skeptical that the $50 sessions would snuff out his urge to smoke. In the past he had suffered withdrawal symptoms - including cramping, sweating and nausea. These uncomfortable side effects would eventually get the best of him and he would reach f or another smoke.

After the first hypnotherapy session, however, he was down to seven cigarettes in one day. When he lit up following his second session, he thought the cigarette tasted bad. He hasn't craved one since.

Scott emphasizes that hypnosis is not magic. It is a natural state of altered consciousness in which the client is always in complete control of what he or she is doing, he says.

The subconscious mind has the ability to overcome all prior fears and set beliefs through hypnosis, through the "replacement of new ideas." Each of us is born with only two fears - loud noises and falling, Scott says. The others are learned.

Smoking, for example, is often a symptom of another problem and Scott attempts to reach the subconscious to approach those issues.

Visitors to Scott's office are greeted by Rajah, a shepherd-Rottweiler mix. Eager for affection, she calms those who are nervous about their induction into the mysterious world of hypnosis.

The mystery can easily be explained with the analogy of watching TV, which most do not realize is a form of hypnosis, Scott says.

To begin, Scott determines if his client is visually, auditorily or kinesthetically oriented by listening for such cues as "I feel" or "I see." Once he has established his clients representational system, the induction is done in one of many ways.

He attaches deep pleasure or pain, vocally, to the behavior the client is trying to alter. For example, Scott had one smoking addict visualize his own grave. He told another, a strong Christian, that everytime he smoked it would be like putting a hypoderm ic needle into the body of Christ.

Scott talks his clients through their sessions, periodically gesturing wildly and even singing.

While treating a client who wanted to lose weight, he repeatedly sang the words "healthy choices" to the familiar tune of "The Messiah." Such a technique can help a client remember that there are alternatives to frequent snacking and overeating.

What Scott wants is for that memory, pleasant or painful, to be imprinted on the client's subconscious. He searches for the "trigger" that will hit a client's innermost nerve.

St. Germaine, on the other hand, does not believe in instilling fear in her clients. Rather, she tries to make the experience as positive as possible. She creates a script in her mind, building in things the client has told her and speaks to the client as though he or she already quit smoking.

She believes in the power of affirmation and instructs her clients to repeated say, "I deserve this non-negotiable decision, I deserve this non-negotiable decision."

While St. Germaine believes that hypnosis is a respected therapy, Scott thinks the general public is apprehensive about it.

However, he says opinions are gradually changing and hypnosis will eventually become more mainstream.

"I can do in six months to a year what they (professional therapists) cannot do in five years," Scott says.

Another hypnosis success story is that of Jim Fowler, who underwent hypnotherapy for smoking addiction with three co-workers in 1986.

Fowler smoked his first cigarette in 1973. It soon became a habit, leading to three packs a day. He tried to quit a few times and finally had it with a habit he found increasingly unattractive.

Partial moments of his first and only hypnotherapy session are still vivid in his mind.

Fowler recalls the dimmed lights and the feeling of deep relaxation as he focused on the painting on the far wall of his hypnotist's office. His memory of the experience clouds there, but he vaguely recalls the hypnotist's repeated assurances that he woul d never have the urge to smoke again.

The hypnosis worked. Aside from a few days of chewing on coffee stirs, Fowler never had the urge to smoke again. His three co-workers also quit smoking after one session with the hypnotherapist.

An additional incentive was the bet placed between them. The first person to smoke had to give the other three each $100, the price of individual sessions.

One of the four had to pay his dues three years later, when he slipped. But his habit never resumed after that.

Fowler continues to preach the power of hypnosis and has passed out his hypnotist's card for many years.

"If I could quit, anyone can."