SLEEP! Rapid Hypnosis Exposed - How to hypnotise people in seconds
By Steven Hall Copyright 2013 - No part of the publication may be reproduced in any way without prior writt wri tten en permissi permission on from the the author author.. This books explains what a rapid hypnotic induction is, how to do one and what makes it work. Once you have read this book, and put what you've learned into practise, you ill be able abl e to hypnot hypnotise ise people in seconds. If you're new to hypnosis, or have very little experience then you are probably much more concerned with getting your subject into trance than what you do with them once they're they're under. under. This book assum as sumes es that that this is i s your goal... goal. .. just j ust getting getting a pers p erson on into hypnosis... and doing it fast. We're not going to look at ways to utilise the trance state, although I will be giving you a few pointers on how to corr c orrectly ectly constru co nstruct ct a hypnotic hypnotic suggestio suggestion. n. We'r We'ree just j ust going going to focus on getting your subject under quickly and waking them safely. Before we jump jump int i nto o the induction itself, itsel f, it's important that that you you unders understand tand what hypnosis hypnosis is. Most people have a grossly grossl y distorted perception of hypnosis, hypnosis, so let's go over the basics to ensure that we're all on the same page. As you've probably heard many many times, trance is an altered state of consciousness. But what does this mean? To be honest, even though I've said this countless times I think it's a little misleading, you see, trance is a specific state of consciousness that we often slip into without even noticing. Granted, it is a different state to fully waking consciousness, but we are very rarely fully awake. In fact, we probably spend more time in trance than we do out of it... and I'm not talking about sleep here. I'm talking about that special state that we call hypnosis. Slipping in and out of trance sounds dangerous, but it really isn't. It's actually very good for you. Trance helps you to relax and let go of stress. So in many ways, the trance state is very similar to meditation.
During what we like to call 'normal' waking consciousness, our brainwaves measure in at 13 to 40 HZ. This basically means that our brains 'pulse' from 13 to 40 times per second. We call this state 'Beta' and it's where most active people find themselves for most of the day. If the brain slows down (which happens when you relax) then the pulse drops. If it drops below b elow 13 HZ you slip into into the the state that that we call ca ll Alpha. Alpha Alpha is a very special state. When you're you're in Alpha you becom beco me increas i ncreasingly ingly open to suggestion. suggestion. Alpha spans s pans from 8 to 13 pulses per second. If you slow down even further you slip into Theta. Theta spans 4 to 7 HZ and if your brain has has slowed slow ed down that that much much you're you're eith ei ther er meditatin meditating g or falling asleep. Next Next we have Delta, which is 0.5 to 4 HZ. HZ. A Delta brain is very probably in deep sleep. sl eep. As you can see, during the course of your day you go up and down this entire scale. In fact, every eve ry night, night, you go go all a ll the the way w ay down dow n into Delta and a nd every ever y morning morning you you come all the way back up into Beta. And throughout the day, depending on what you're doing you bob around around between Beta, Beta, Alpha Alpha and Thet Theta. a. Every time you pass through through Alpha, you pass through through the the state s tate that we call c all hypnosis hypnosis.. So, as you can see, hypnosis is actually very very common. Everybody does it everyday at least twice as they wake up and as they fall asleep. When you pass through hypnosis at night on your way down to Delta we call it the 'hypnogogic state' and when you pass through it in the morning on your way up to Beta e call it the 'hypnopompic state'. Both states are usually accompanied by sensory perceptions, such as seeing seei ng colours, hearing sounds, sounds, or kicking kicking your your bed partner and and becoming becoming a bit confused. confused. Obviously Obviously,, you you don't need to to know know this this to hypnot hypnotise ise people, peop le, but it does illust ill ustrate rate how how 'normal' 'normal' hypnosis hypnosis is. And it goes a long long way to explaining explaining how most hypnotic hypnotic indu i nductions ctions work. wor k. Conventional hypnosis (that's the boring 'you are feeling sleepy' type) works because it simply guides a person from Beta to Alpha by causing them to relax. I know, I know, it sounds way too simple to be true, but that's really all there is to it. As the subject relaxes, they slip into Alpha and they become increasingly suggestible. A hypnotists job is to help a person to relax while paying close attention to clues that reveal when the person enters enters alpha. Most people are utterly useless at relaxing without a hypnotist to guide them. But everyone can relax relatively successfully with a little direction. To give you a quick
example, a hypnotist might ask the subject to imagine that they are lying on a beach. The imagin imagined ed scenario s cenario is i s a relaxing experience experience so s o the subject releases releas es som s omee tension. Of course, hypnosis is not only relaxation, you also need some direction and focus. Without ithout that, that, hypnosis hypnosis is nothing nothing more more than than medi meditation tation (which (w hich is still stil l very beneficial be neficial but not very ent e ntertai ertainin ning). g). During a relaxation style induction, as well as relaxing the subject's body you need to engage their mind. You don't want them to fall asleep, you want them to become increasingly focussed on your instruction. So, if we jump back to the beach for a moment we are able to do this by describing the scene to them in ways that encourage the internal activation of their senses. It really helps if you can get every sense fully engaged into the experience. You might talk about the feeling of the warmth of the sun on their skin or the sand beneath their feet. Or maybe you'll ask them to imagine the sound of the ocean lapping against the shore. All of this narrows narr ows their their focus down dow n to the the thought thought that that you you have planted pl anted in their mind and takes them away from whatever is happening in the outside world. This idea of narrowing down a persons focus is a very powerful way of shifting their state. If you think about it, when you are engrossed in a good book or concentrating on an intricate detail, you do this naturally. We often refer to this state as being in the 'zone'. It's a state that any athlete, author, artist or musician knows very well. We have lots of labels for states that you can find within the Alpha range, and all of them have the capacity to increase our potential. The hypnotic state is very similar to any other that you'll find in Alpha, but it seems to be the most misunderstood. Anyway, let's get back to this idea of focussing for a moment and explore a little trivia. The idea of narrowing down the subjects focus is a foundation for many styles of induction. It's the reason for the archetypal hypnotists swinging pocket watch, as well as the infamous 'Look into my eyes', the spinning hypnodisc and the more recent 'Spot on the the ceil c eiling ing'' style indu i nductions. ctions. Today, Today, most most hypnotists hypnotists prefer to get the the subject s ubject to focus on something something inside their their mind, such s uch as our beach b each scene, s cene, rather r ather than somethin something g external external like li ke a spinning disc or swinging watch. The whole idea of focussing attention started when Scottish surgeon, James Braid, noticed that one of his patients had gone into a trance like state in the waiting room hile gazing at the pinpoint reflections of a polished brass lamp. Braid did some tests and the entire world of hypnosis changed forever. Before that, we had the likes of Franz
Anton Mesmer who 'Magnetised' people using iron rods and bathtubs of filings. As I'm sure you've no doubt already realised, Mesmer's name still lives on today and the idea of mesmerising people is strongly associated with hypnosis, albeit a little more magical. Braid also left his mark on the hypnotic world for it was he that actually coined the term 'hypnosis' way back in 1843. He later regretted it and tried to rename the the phenom phenomenon enon 'Monoid 'Monoideis eism m'. Braid Brai d thought thought that that the word wo rd hypnosis hypnosis would cause the the state to be confused with sleep... which it is. He wanted to change it to monoideism because it means means to to focus focus the the attent attention ion on a single single thing thing... ... which is wh w hat a hy hypnotised pnotised subject does. Braid objected to the idea of a hypnotist having power over a subject and thought that Magnetism as Mesmer practised implied occultist connotations that weren't appropriate. He wanted to keep hypnosis firmly rooted in the psycho-physiological field. In my opinion this shift sterilised hypnosis and removed a lot of its power. I'm a spiritual healer and use energy healing with hypnosis to achieve astonishing results with my clients. Personally, I think that some of Mesmer's work should be explored in more detail, as combining hypnosis with healing seems to be incredibly effective... I enjoy far more success with my clients than many of my colleagues do that confine themselves to a single field (and that applies to psychology and spiritualism) but I digress... What we're focussing on in this book is rapid hypnosis. And that is much more about entertainment entertainment than than it is i s therapy therap y so let's l et's get back on track. Now that that we've explored the trance trance state state a little I'm hoping that that you you are beginn beginning ing to see hypnosis as being something relatively normal. The reason for this is that many people have such a grossly distorted idea of what hypnosis is that they never expect to be able to do it. It's almost as though people think that it requires some kind of mystical or psychic psychic power pow er to put put someone someone under under.. It doesn't. An Anybody can become become a hypnot hypnotist, ist, and that includes you. If you think about it for a minute, one of the most popular hypnotic induction techniques is the the progressive progressi ve relaxation re laxation induct induction. ion. This This is the the one we've we' ve already al ready looked at a l ittle and it's basically guiding a person into a state of relaxation and getting them to narrow down their focus to a single idea while engaging all of their senses internally. All this does is relax them to a point that their brain slows down and they shift from Beta to Alpha. Al pha. There's There' s nothing nothing magical magical or mystical about it. So... So. .. now that that you know know how hypnosi hypnosiss works, wor ks, I'm guessing guessing that that you're beginning beginning to feel more confident about having a go yourse yourself. lf.
What I'm hoping you've noticed here is the way that a hypnotist is able to exploit something that naturally causes a person to enter a suggestible state. This is essentially how all forms of hypnosis work. There are several natural situations that cause a person to accept acc ept suggestions suggestions more more readi r eadily ly,, a hypn hypnotist otist simply explo exploits its these these.. Before we move on to rapid inductions let's get back to this idea of focus for a moment. When a person is hypnotised they become so focussed on one thing that nothing else exists. OK, so that's a slight exaggeration, things do still exist, and your subject is still aware aw are of them them to to som s omee ext e xtent ent but but their their focus is so concentrated that nothin nothing g else els e matters matters.. (Hmm (Hmmm.... Nothing Nothing else matters, one, enter sandman.... sandman.... Metallica Metall ica are on to som s omethin ething g here!) This is why hypnotic suggestions work. You give your subject a suggestion and they act as thoug though h it is true because beca use nothing nothing else matters. On stage you might ight tell a subject s ubject that they are a dainty ballerina and they'll happily pirouette across the stage because that's hat ballerinas do. Conflicting thoughts, such as 'I'll look like an idiot' or 'I'm not a ballerina' balle rina' simply don't get a look in. All that that matt matters ers is the the sugg suggestion itself because because that's the only thing the subject is focussing on and they are focussed on it so intently that nothing else matters. This idea i dea of focussing on somethin something g so int i ntently ently that that you you filter out everything everything else is a really interesting one that deserves a little more attention. I want you to cast you mind back to to a time time that that you you lost someth something ing that that was right in front front of you. you. Maybe Maybe a pen or your your keys. We've all done this many times. We think we've lost something but we swear that it as right in front of us. We search our desk over and over but it's just not there. After a few minutes of frustration we give up. And then, as plain as day, there it is, slap bang in the middle of the desk that we've just checked upteen times. So what happened? This odd phenomena is called negative hallucination. The pen (or keys) was there all along but we just couldn't see it. We filtered it out. It sounds crazy because we are conditioned conditioned to believe beli eve what w hat we see s ee (or don't see) is (or isn't) real. We grow up believing belie ving that that if we can see it it's there there and if we can't, it's not. not. But But sometim sometimes es thing thingss we can't see are there, right under our nose. And other times what we think we can see isn't. Hallucinations don't have to be visual, we can hear and feel things that aren't there too. As well w ell as not hear hear and not feel things things that are. are . A comm common example example of not feeling something something that that is there there is when someone someone injures i njures themsel themselves ves but doesn't notice until until much
later. This kind of thing happens to builders all of the time. While they are working they are focussed on the task in hand and a small cut can easily go unnoticed until they are not so absorbed abs orbed in i n their their job. As you already know, relaxation can cause your brain to slow down to such a degree that you shift from Beta to Alpha. Concentration can do the same thing. If you're really really concentrating on a task, such as drawing or doing math then it's very easy to slip into a highly suggestible state. Then, if you momentarily misplace your pen and give yourself the suggestion that you've lost it, your subconscious mind makes it so. Your eyes can still see the pen, but your brain can't. Your brain filters the pen out of your reali rea lity ty because it's i t's obeying o beying your your com co mmand. Something Something that's that's reall rea lly y interesting about the the brain is that that it thin thinks ks it's always right, right, which which makes makes it very easy to to trick. Again, as with relaxation, a hypnotist can exploit this idea of concentration to induce a suggestible state on cue. If a hypnotist can get you to focus on something to such a degree that nothing else matters, you'll drift into trance. Taoists call this kind of focus contemplation. It's a very beneficial form of focus because it slows down the brain. When your brain slows down you are closer to your ultimate potential. potential. In fact, pretty much anyt anythin hing g and everyth everything ing that that you you do can be done done much much more effectively when your brain slows down. So... concentration, relaxation and focussed attention go a very long way to explain how hypnosis hypnosis works. wor ks. We We don't do n't really real ly know know why hypn hypnosi osiss works. w orks. It's as thoug though h the the part p art of o f our brain that that usually usually compares compares new information information to what what we already alre ady believe to be true true is shut down. Incidentally, this part of the brain is called the 'Critical Factor' and although it has the very best of intentions and faithfully tries to protect us, it can cause all sorts of problem proble ms when an undesirable undesirable sug s uggest gestion ion accidentally accidentally slips slip s past. This idea of a suggestion slipping past the critical factor is very important. When it happens people peo ple change. change. Leaving Leavi ng hypnosis hypnosis aside asi de for a moment, oment, one of the the most incredible ways that people change because of this is when they develop a phobia. Phobias are utterly fascinating. They really illustrate the immense power of the mind. Think about it for a minute. A phobic never ever forgets to feel fear when faced with the object of their phobia. It just happens. Equally astonishing is the speed at which people can develop a phobia in the first place. A phobia can take hold almost instantly, and be ith you for your entire life. Another really interesting thing about phobias is that they are so often completely
irrational. Most people that have a phobia know that it's utterly ridiculous but they are powerless power less to do anyth anything ing about it. Phobias Phobias tell us a great great deal about th the way the the mind mind orks and reveal some really interesting things that help us to understand the reason that hypnotic suggestions are effective. To illustrate this, we're going to split the mind into three parts. This division isn't entirely accurate, nor is it complete, but it'll help you to understand the reason that people do what w hat you say when when they they're 're hypnot hypnotised. ised. The three parts are the conscious mind, the critical factor and the subconscious mind. The conscious mind is the part that you use to think. It's that little voice inside your head that you use to practise what you're going to say. One of the most important things about the the conscious c onscious mind is i s that you can control control it. Not many many people peopl e actually a ctually do, but you you can. You can take complete control of that voice. You can change the way it sounds and the things is says. We use the conscious mind to reason and think. It's a bit like a close buddy that knows all of our secrets. We mull things over with it and play out different ideas and scenarios. The conscious mind is the part that most people are referring to when they say 'I'. By comparison, the subconscious mind is kinda dumb. It doesn't reason or think and it's not available avail able for idle chit chat chat when you're you're bored. It just just does. That said, w hat it does is staggering. The subconscious mind is like an insanely powerful computer. It basically runs runs an a n infinite infinite number number of program pro gramss that keep us ali a live. ve. Just like a computer, the subconscious mind has no idea what the programs are. It just runs them. As I'm sure you're painfully aware, computers get viruses. A computer virus is reall rea lly y just a program pr ogram that that does something something that that you don't want it to. Usually suall y, antivirus antivi rus software protects your computer so that it doesn't get infected, but every now and then one slips through the net and you have to take action to remove it... which isn't always easy. The same thing happens to the subconscious mind. Every so often a 'bad' program slips through through the the net. We We call c all them them phobi phobias, as, addictions addi ctions and a nd bad habits. You're probably one step ahead of me and already guessed that the critical factor is our subconscious minds antivirus software. It's the part of the mind that protects us from running programs that we believe are bad for us. Please notice that I said '...protects us from running programs that we believe are bad...' and not 'protects us from running bad
programs'. programs'. There's a big difference. difference. As you probably know, antivirus software has a database of known threats that it stops from accessing access ing your your computer. computer. This is i s the naught naughty y list, lis t, and if i f you'r you'ree on o n it... you ain't gettin' in! The critical factor doesn't have a naughty list, and this causes problems. What the critical factor does is compare the new suggestion with everything already stored in the subconscious mind. If the new suggestion conflicts with the ones already inside it's rejected, if it supports them it's granted access. This is one of the reasons that change is difficult. It's also the reason that willpower is rubbish! Willpower is a completely conscious activity. When a person tries to change their life using nothing but willpower they are trying to feed new suggestions into a subconscious mind that doesn't want to know. The critical factor just kicks the new suggestions suggestions righ ri ghtt out, out, even ev en if we w e think they they're 're for our greater good. If you want to get a suggestion accepted by the subconscious mind you have to do one of two things. You need to sneak it past the critical factor of remove the critical factor altogether. Most hypnotic inductions aim to do the second of these. They relieve the critical factor of its duties and pop in some new suggestions. On stage these suggestions are usually pretty outlandish, in the clinic they're of a more therapeutic nature. Either ay it's the same process. Get rid of the guard and plant suggestions. If you think of the critical factor as an actual guard then it's very easy to visualise hypnosis working. If you do a progressive relaxation induction, you're lulling the guard to sleep. As soon as he's dozing you can march your suggestions straight in through the front door. Other Other inductions take advant adva ntage age of diff di ffere erent nt ways of distrac di stracting ting the the guard guard.. One method method is to confuse the guard so that he losses concentration and your suggestions can slip past. Anoth Another er is to overwh overw helm the the guard guard giving him so mu much to to think think about that that he he doesn't does n't notice notice your your suggestions suggestions creepi cr eeping ng in. If you suddenly suddenly shock the the guard you can slip sl ip a quick suggestion past before he has to time compose himself and last (and in this case probably probabl y also least) l east) you can pester the the gu guard until until he gives gives in. i n. I think now would be a good time for a quick recap on what we've discovered so far. Relaxation, focus, shock, stress, confusion and repetition are all ways of getting a suggestion accepted by the subconscious mind... even if it conflicts with everything else in there. As a hypnotist, hypnotist, you are going to exploit exploi t the the hell out of these these so that that you can literally command your subject into trance.
Rapid Hypnosis
Perhaps the most notorious of all rapid inductions is the hand shake induction. This induction is fast, easy and effective. For a stage hypnotist it's particularly handy as volunteers are more than happy to shake your hand as you welcome them on stage. From a spectators point of view a handshake induction looks like this. You welcome your volunteer onto the stage and hold out your right hand for them to shake. As they stretch out their hand you move yours away and grasp their wrist with your left hand. You then do something unexpected and they go into trance. This is important... What you do really doesn't matter. It just needs to be unexpected. Most hypnotists will lift up the volunteers arm so that their hand is right in front of their face. They will then give the volunteer a command. 9 times out of 10 this will be 'look at your hand'. Next, they'll slowly lower the hand as they guide the volunteer deeper into trance. The handshake induction falls into a category of inductions that we call 'pattern interrupts'. Pattern interrupts, as the name suggests, are inductions that interrupt something that is usually considered to be a single action. You can execute a pattern interrupt induction in almost any situation where a person is half way through doing something. Pattern interrupt inductions work because they exploit shock and confusion, allowing them to slip a suggestion past the critical factor before it can regain its composure. But that's that's just the tip of the icebe i ceberg. rg. A lot happens during d uring a typic typical al handshake handshake induction that that an untrained observer would completely miss. We're going to pick the handshake induction apart in a moment and explore every nook and crann cr anny y so that you comple completely tely under understand stand how and a nd why it works. wo rks. But first I want w ant to give you a little l ittle metaphor. Imagine Imagine that that you are a door d oor to door salesman sal esman.. You You knock knock on a door d oor and a young young lady lad y answers. Unfortunately for you, she's far too busy to hear your pitch... and not above slamming the door in your face. As the door swings forward you instinctively thrust your foot into the doorway and it jams against your shoe. You see, you know that you have a cracking product and if she'll just hear you out for a few minutes you're positive that that what w hat you're you're offering is real r eally ly gonna gonna make make her day da y. So, with wi th your your foot in the door and an increasingly agitated woman trying to remove it, you have to melt her resistance with
one hell of a benefit... fast. You've probably got no more than a couple of seconds before she won't won't be interested interested in anyt anyth hing you have have to say. say. If you manage anage to say the the right right thing, there's a chance that she'll let down her guard. But you're still a long way from an invite inside. If you can follow up your initial benefit with a pitch that pleases and intrigues her, you'll get the sale. If you can't... the door will close and you'll miss your chance. This is a little bit like a rapid induction. Rapid inductions go through stages of acceptance. The first step is to engage the subject. This is like our salesman knocking on the the door. d oor. For a handshake handshake indu i nduction, ction, this would w ould simply s imply be reaching r eaching out your your hand. Next, Next, e have the the int i nterr errupt. upt. This This is where you do something something that that breaks br eaks the norm. norm. The int i ntent ent here is to confuse the subject. Sometimes, what you do will also shock them, which can help, but it isn't necessary. The interrupt creates a window of opportunity. So in that respect it's very similar to our salesman jamming his foot in the door. It gives you a few seconds... that's all, so you need to act fast. The next step is critical, you need to deliver your first 'official' suggestion. I'll come back to to what makes th this the first first officia officiall suggest suggestion ion later. later. As already ment mentioned, ioned, the the most com c omm mon suggestion suggestion is to tell the the subject s ubject to look loo k at their their hand, hand, but b ut again again it's i t's important to know that you can tell them to do anything. What you say is not as important as the fact that you say something. This will make more sense when you consider what's going on inside their mind. When you engage the subject the critical factor is relatively neutral but aware. If you tried to slip sli p a sugg suggestion in at this this point it would easily easi ly reject it. i t. However, as soon soo n as you break convention and interrupt the expected pattern, the critical factor panics. For a few seconds it has no idea what to do. When you deliver your suggestion the critical factor grabs on to it like a drowning man clinging to a floating branch. Your suggestion is the only reassurance of stability in a sea of chaos. To the critical factor, your suggestion is a lifelin lifeli ne, a saviour s aviour and a very very welcom welc omee friend. However, Howev er, that initial suggestion suggestion is only the the start s tart of the induction. You You must must follow it up ith a trance deepener if you expect to get anything out of it. Similarly, going back to our sales sa lesm man metaphor, metaphor, blurting out a single benefit be nefit while your your foot is still stil l jamming jamming the the door is not going to get you the sale. But it will give you a window of opportunity that didn't exist before. If you do nothing, the window (or in this case door) will close. But if you immediately flow into a decent pitch you'll probably get the sale. Beginning to see the pattern?
Before we move on I want to share something something with you, you, because be cause I find fi nd this this kind kind of stu s tuff ff fascinating. Believe it or not, a fruit machine (or 'Slot Machine' if you live in the States) is just as susceptible to a pattern interrupt interrupt as a person. pers on. What I'm about to share with you really does work... on almost all old machines. It doesn't work on the video slots that you tend to see in casinos these days so don't get too excited, but if you ever find an old fashioned (circa 1990s) type fruit machine you can pretty much guarantee uarantee that that you'll you'll be walk wal king away quids quids in. i n. To pattern interrupt a fruit machine you simple do something unexpected. For example, if the machine drops in two cherries and a lime on the win line and offers you a hold, you don't hold the cherries. Similarly, if it gives you one nudge that would clearly allow you to set up two matching symbols on the win line (in the hope that the next spin lets you hold them) you nudge something else. This conf co nfuses uses the onboard onboar d com c omput puter er and gives you the the upper hand. For the the com c omputer puter to reset its pattern it needs you to do something it expects, so it keeps giving you the opportu oppor tunity nity.. Over the the next 4 or 5 spins s pins you'll notice notice that that it keeps keep s trying to temp temp you with wi th 2 matching symbols on the win line and the opportunity to hold. If you take the bait too soon it takes your cash, but if you sweat it out for 4 or 5 spins you are practically guaranteed that when you do hold the 2 matching symbols it'll drop in a win. Sounds crazy I know but it really does work. Pattern interrupts are very powerful things. In this book we are primarily looking at using a pattern interrupt to induce a hypnotic trance, but you can use them to get people to do things without hypnosis. Remember, a pattern pattern interrupt interrupt temporari temporarily ly confu confuses ses the the critical factor, factor, while while that's that's happening happening you can slip a suggestion into the subconscious mind that will be obeyed. Actually... 'Will' be obeyed is not entirely true. In the right situation with the right subject it will, but you can't get away with doing this kind of thing with everybody. Part of your job as a hypnotist is to be able to pick out the people that will be susceptible to the type of induction you're using. With a little practise this is really easy to do. And there are many ays you can prim pri me your subject subje ct before befor e they have have any idea you'r you'ree hypnotisi hypnotising ng them them.. We'll be covering this in more detail later. Right now I want to take a moment to analyse a pattern interrupt that you may have seen Derren Brown do on his TV show. This particular show is one that people ask me about more than any other, it's the one where he visits Walthamstow dog track and wins a very handsome wad of cash on a losing ticket.
In the show Derren gives the losing ticket to a member of the public and has them take it to the kiosk to collect their winnings. He instructs the guy to hand over the ticket with complete confidence while maintaining eye contact with the cashier. The guy does as Derren instructs but the cashier returns the ticket saying that it's not a winner. This is here things things start s tart to get very ver y interesting. Derren Derre n imm immediately edi ately bangs his hand on the side sid e of the kiosk as the cashier is handing the ticket back. This action is a form of pattern interrupt, it pulls the cashier out of her monotonous routine of processing and handing out tickets and temporarily opens up a doorway to her subconscious mind. This is very similar simila r to the the handshake handshake int i nterr errupt upt.. The wom w oman an is doing something something that that she's done a million times before and she expects the action to follow a set pattern. When Derren bangs bangs the the kiosk he breaks breaks that that pattern pattern,, allowing allow ing him to quickly quickly slip sli p two suggest suggestions ions into into her subconscious mind. Derren's first suggestion is 'This is the dog you are looking for.' He delivers it in a authoritative monotone with a downward inflection. This is important. Had he given the suggestion with a rising inflection it would have sounded like a question not a command. People are conditioned to follow orders. When you say something with a downward inflection it sounds like an order. The authoritative monotone also adds to this making the statement very persuasive. In this situation Derren very quickly establishes a hierarchy of command. Previously, the cashier had taken a dominant position over the man that had initially given her the losing ticket, but Derren's tone, body language and actions all forced her to give him the lead. The ambiguity of the word 'for' in Derren's command also adds to the confusion of the interrupt. Ambiguities require additional processing and can quickly overload a persons conscious mind. They are often used in covert hypnosis as a way of 'piggy backing' a suggestion suggestion into the the subconscious. s ubconscious. In this this case, ca se, although although not intentional, intentional, the word wo rd 'for' had an additional benefit as the dog that actually did win the race was dog number four. I ould have said that this was the reason that Derren used this particular command, but it clearly isn't as he used the exact same command on a different cashier earlier in the show for a race that was won by dog number 2. As you probably noticed, Derren's command is very similar to the classic line 'These are not the droids you are looking for.' from the Star Wars movie. If the cashier has seen Star Wars then the line Derren used can trigger two additional patterns. First, it can instantly regress her to when she saw the movie... just as it did for you a few seconds ago when you read it. This causes her to go inside for a moment, which, as we already know, causes a person to become increasingly open to suggestion. Also, the actual line itself is used in the movie as a Jedi mind trick by Obi Wan Kenobi. So there's already an
association with mind control and persuasion. Next, Next, Derren Derren pops in a rather rather obvious embedded embedded comm command. He He follows his first suggestion with the phrase, 'That's why we came to this WINdow' with enormous emphasis emphasis on the the word w ord WI WIN. N. As he does d oes this this he makes makes a gesture gesture with wi th his his hand. hand. You You can't really see the entire thing because of the camera angle but it appears that he gestures a rectangle with his fingers in the air as though he is drawing a window to emphasise his point. point. Obviously, the cashiers eyes follow Derren's fingers as they trace out the rectangle. He starts at the top, goes out, then down each side, before finally coming back in to the center. This kind of gesture can be used in a non verbal induction as a suggestion for a person to go go down (as in deeper into trance) trance) and narrow narrow their their focus inward inward.. I'm not saying that's exactly what happens here because it's impossible to see from the camera angle angle but it definitely seems s eems as thoug though h the the gesture adds a dds to the pattern. At this point the woman rechecks the ticket and sees that it is indeed a winner. After taking the money, and affirming that mistakes can not be rectified after leaving the kiosk indow, Derren asks the woman which dog won the race. She checks the computer and tells him that dog number 4 won. Then he asks her to check which dog she just paid out on and she sees that the ticket was from dog number 1, which actually came in last. When Derren points out her mistake and asks her why she paid out you can clearly see her battling ba ttling with confusi confusion. on. She later says that the the com c omput puter er told her to pay p ay out and that that at one moment one dog had won and then it was another. This suggests that the winning dog changes changes on the the com c omputer puter,, not the the ticket. tic ket. So it's it' s safe s afe to assum a ssumee that Derren's Derre n's suggestions caused her to see dog 1 as the winning dog on her computer when she processed process ed the the ticket, ticket, then then dog 4 later when he asked asked her to to check it. This comes back to our missing pen from earlier. She simply doesn't see something that is there and instead sees something that isn't. It sounds utterly crazy, but the mind can filter and change what the eyes see if it has been tricked into expecting to see something else. If you haven't seen this episode I strongly recommend that you watch it. It is episode 3 from series 4 of Derren Brown: Mind Control. Derren often uses pattern interrupts on his show to make a subject more suggestible. You'll notice that many of his routines include some form of handshake interrupt, even hen a handshake wouldn't be appropriate. Handshakes are very deeply ingrained in
our society, if a person offers their hand for you to shake it is very difficult to resist even if you didn't expect the offer. Once a handshake has been initiated, regardless of how inappropriate it might be, the subject is in a pattern. They expect to complete the pattern pattern and and when it is suddenly suddenly interrupt interrupted ed it takes takes a few seconds for them them to regain regain their composure. During those precious few seconds suggestions can slip past the critical factor and gain access to the subconscious mind, where they are processed and obeyed just like li ke a computer computer program. Now let's take a more more detailed detaile d look at the the actual actual interrupt and initial initial suggest suggestion. ion. As As already stated, the most common thing that hypnotists do to interrupt the handshake is to lift li ft the the subjects s ubjects arm so that that their hand hand is i s in i n front of their their face. They then then give give the the suggestion for the subject to look at their hand. This is a really useful suggestion because it imm immediately narrow narrowss the the subjects focus focus of attent attention. ion. It It can also be used to seamless seamlessly ly flow int i nto o a very powerfu power full association associ ation deepener by simply lowering loweri ng the the hand. We'll come back to the deepener later, for now let's explore the transition from interrupt to focus. As you already know, the interrupt confuses the critical factor, which temporarily allows you to slip a suggestion into the subconscious. In most cases, the suggestion is used to get the subject to do something that is known to increase their suggestibility even further. further. Obviously, when Derren Brown Bro wn used the the int i nterr errupt upt at the the dog d og track he skipped skipp ed this step and went straight for the final suggestion. This is because he didn't need to hypnotise the cashier, he simply needed to get her to comply with one command. We are exploring ways of using pattern interrupts to get a person into hypnosis. This is different from getting compliance on a single command. If you're doing a show, you don't want to have to do a handshake interrupt for every routine. You use the handshake interrupt to initiate i nitiate the induction process proc ess.. You You then then deepen deep en the the trance tra nce state and a nd continue continue ith your show in the usual way. You could achieve exactly the same results with a progressive relaxation r elaxation induction induction,, this this is just quicker quicker,, so it's particularly particularl y suited to to stage stage and street hypnosis. When you instruct the subject to look at their hand you are immediately giving them a direction to follow that rescues them from the confusion of the interrupt. As already stated this narrows their focus of attention. To narrow their focus even further you instruct them to become increasingly aware of smaller details, such as the lines on their palm, the the ridges of their their skin or the the subtle subtle variation vari ationss of colour. colour. This This exploits a techniqu techniquee that naturally causes trance to happen. Narrowing a persons focus of attention is a very powerfu power full way of inducin inducing g hypn hypnosis, osis, that's that's why w hy it features features in so many many different different sty styles of induction. It's also one of the most common ways that we unintentionally hypnotise
ourselves without even realising. When you're doing a hand shake interrupt, having the subject look at their hand should be done in such a way that the focus becomes more refined over time. That's why you begin with the instruction for them to look at the hand, then progress on to a finger and finally the ridges of their fingerprint. Before we go on I should reiterate that you really don't have to do this exactly as instructed here. Remember, Remember, hypn hypnosi osiss is i s a completely natural natural state that often happe happens ns ithout any formal induction whatsoever. When you first begin learning about hypnosis it's very easy to fall into the trap of thinking of an induction in the same way that you might think of casting a spell. In other words, a very specific and rigid incantation that only works if you say it in exactly the same way every time. Hypnotic inductions are not like li ke that, that, you have have a great grea t deal of flexibili flexibi lity ty.. As long as you understand understand the intention intention and purpose of each stage stage of the the induct induction ion you you can make up up the the actual actual words wo rds of induction induction as you go along. The next next step is to deepen dee pen the trance. The most common common trance deepener de epener that that you're likely to encounter is to imagine that you are walking down a flight of stairs. Perhaps second to this is to visualise yourself going down in a lift. Both of these deepeners work by creating creating an association associ ation between the the idea of moving moving down and and going going deeper int i nto o trance, or becoming increasingly relaxed. I like to use a lift deepener for therapeutic ork as it's really easy to have the subject imagine the lift going down past the ground floor all the way into the basement, which acts as a metaphor for accessing the subconscious mind. I often use a staircase deepener for stage inductions and have the first routine waiting for the subject behind a door at the bottom of the stairs. Again, you really can do anything that you want, just link the download movement with the increasing trance. The most obvious trance deepener to use for the handshake interrupt is to connect the position of the the hand hand itself to the the depth depth of trance. trance. So, as the the hand hand lowers low ers the the subject goes goes deeper into into trance. This This association associ ation is very ver y powerful, powerful, and really rea lly useful. useful. It can be used in three different ways. You can use it as an indicator of how deep in trance your subject is by instru instructin cting g them them to only only lower their hand hand as quickly quickly as they they can go into into trance, trance, or you can use it to guide the depth of trance by forcefully lowering it yourself, or (or rather and ) you can use it to set up a trigger that fires when the hand comes to rest against the thigh. Personally, I like to take control of the hand so that I can force the subject into trance very ver y quickly. quickly. And then lift it to bring br ing them them back out for a second seco nd before forcing forci ng them them back down again. again. This This technique technique of repeatedly waking waking a subject subject and re-inducing re-inducing the the trance state very quickly creates a much more profound state than a single induction
over the same time frame. It's a bit like tempering steel by subjecting it to alternating hot and cold col d temperatures, or, if you prefer, pre fer, tensi tensing ng your your muscl muscles es before you relax them. them. The effect of which whic h is much more more profound than than relaxation rel axation alone. alo ne. It was Dave Elman that first explored this idea of repeatedly waking and re-inducing the subject into hypnosis. He noticed that his clients always responded much more favourably to his suggestions after a few sessions and postulated that it was the accumulated accumulated experie e xperience nce of each ea ch induction that that made made the the subjects s ubjects more suggestible suggestible.. To To test his theory he decided to try compacting several inductions into one session and discovered that it had the same deepening effect as a series of sessions that would normally span several weeks. This discovery really helped to speed up the hypnotic process and goes goes a long way to to explaining explaining what happens happens during during a typical typical stage stage show here subjects repeatedly enter hypnosis between routines that become more and more extreme as the evening unfolds. As with w ith any set movemen movementt that that has a predetermined pre determined end point po int you can set up a tri trigg gger er that automatically fires when the end point is reached. In this case you can set up a trigger for the moment that the hands comes to rest against the thigh (or in the subjects lap if they are sitting down). It may sound crude but the most common suggestion that is linked to the trigger in this way is simply to go deeper into trance. Some hypnotists say twice as deep, others say ten times as deep, either way has pretty much the same result. An intere interesting sting spin on the trigger trigger is to tell the the subject s ubject that when their their hand hand touches yours they will come back to normal waking consciousness and forget everything that just happened. Then you catch their hand as it lowers, complete the handshake as though nothing has happened and continue to welcome them onto the stage. At first glance this might seem like a bit of a waste but it's actually a very powerful technique with three benefits. benefits. First, it drops the the subject into into trance trance and and brings brings them them back up up very quickly quickly,, hich, as we've just discovered, will increase the depth of the next trance that you'll be doing when you officially begin your show. The other two benefits are not so obvious, but they they are equall equally y valuable. One One of the the benefits benefits is that that other other potent potential ial volun vol unteers teers that that see the the indu i nduction ction wil w illl be b e much much more more likely li kely to respond res pond when w hen you you hypnotise hypnotise them them.. In fact, this is the reason that many hypnotists used to use stooges in their show. Most people think of stooges as actors that pretend they are hypnotised because hypnosis isn't real, but that's that's not the the case. Stooges Stooges were wer e primarily used used as the first first volunteer volunteer to demonst demonstrate rate the hypnotists power. Subsequent genuine volunteers were then much more likely to go into trance as they had already seen that the hypnotist can really hypnotise people. This use of stooges is recommended in Ormand McGills classic work, The Essential Guide to Stage Hypnosis. Years ago this kind of thing was very common, but today, given the advances in genuine induction techniques and the increase in acceptability and
awareness awar eness of hypnosis, hypnosis, the the use of stooges stooges is i s very ver y rare. I've personally never used one, although I can definitely see the value. The final benefit of dropping a volunteer into trance as you welcome them on to stage, only to wake them up seconds later as though it never happened, is that it looks good. Many novice stage hypnotists are so focussed on the actual hypnosis that they sometimes forget that the primary reason for doing a stage show is to entertain the audience. Dropping a person into trance very quickly and aking them a few seconds later with no apparent awareness that they've 'been under' is a very impressive demonstration of the power of hypnosis, even if the subject doesn't actually do anything. The Transition
The transition between the initial command and the trance deepener is very important. It needs to happen quickly. The easiest way to do this is to use the word 'because' and then to immediately flow into the deepening script. So in our example of using the 'look at your hand' command with the hand lowering deepener you might say something like this: "Look at your hand. Notice the subtle variations of colour in your skin. Look closer now and see the tiny ridges on the surface of your skin because as your hand begins to lower you can go deeper into trance..." The 'because' doesn't even have to make sense, it's just used as a way of leading the subject subjec t in a directio dir ection n and preventin prev enting g them them from from distracting dis tracting them themsel selves ves out of the the experience. Linking two phases of the induction together in this way is called a linguistic bridge. There are several strengths of bridge that can be used to link your commands, all of which will increase the acceptance of the linked command. The eakest linguistic linguistic bridge is the the word w ord 'and', ' and', next next we have words w ords like 'as, 'as , when and and hile' and the strongest are words such as 'makes, causes and because'. A linguistic bridge does a couple of very usefu useful thing things. s. First, as we've we 've already alr eady seen, seen, it allows allow s you to flow into your your next next command command very ver y quickly, quickly, avoid av oiding ing an otherw otherwise ise natural natural pause that could be perceived by the subject as the end of the routine and a signal to wake themselves up. Second, it creates an association between the two commands. The idea here is along the line of A causes B or because A we have B. The logic of the association doesn't have to make any sense, or even be grammatically correct, it's just a ay of connecting the the two tw o statem s tatements ents together together.. I like l ike to think of linguistic linguistic bridges bri dges as as a ay of avoiding avoi ding the the natural pause p ause at a t the the end e nd of a senten s entence. ce. It's It's almost as thoug though h you're you're bombarding bombarding the the subject with an endless endless stream s tream of comm commands that that doesn't give give them the the opportunity to do anything other than follow them. If we jump back to our mini script for a moment we can add in some linguistic bridges
to make it more effective. Now we have something like this: "Look at your hand and notice the subtle variations of colour in your skin as you look closer now causing you to see the tiny ridges on the surface of your skin because as your hand begins to lower you can go deeper into trance..." As you can see, this sentence doesn't really make sense. It's definitely not grammatically correct, but that doesn't matter. In fact, distorting the flow of the sentence can be a very effective way of adding additional confusion to your induction. As we have already seen, lots of induction scripts do this by including ambiguous words. Other clever little tricks that you'll see in many inductions are to link two sentences by over lapping a single word or hide a command by overlapping it between two sentences. I'll explain these techniques in more detail in just a moment, but first I want to very quickly say that I appreciate that things might seem to be getting a little bit confusing here, but don't worry. These techniques are all very simple when you tackle them one by one. Igor Ledochowski, an expert in covert persuasion (website http://www.hiddenhypnosis.com)) uses a fantastic analogy that beautifully describes the subtle power of hypnosis.com layering layeri ng multiple multiple techniques techniques together together.. He compares resisting hypnosis to snapping a pencil. Snapping one pencil is very easy, anybody can do it. One pencil is like a very basic induction, it's easy to resist. But when you start layering language patterns into your induction it's like adding more pencils. Individually each pencil is very weak, but together they quickly become very strong. Once you have four or five pencils, it's almost impossible to break them. Similarly, hen you layer four or five language patterns into your induction it's almost impossible for your subject to resist going into hypnosis. OK, let's take a look at these layered commands and how linking sentences in different ays can aid the induction process. For now, don't worry too much about trying to remember any of this, just practise a basic induction and add these techniques as you become become more more comfortable. comfortable. First we'll look at merging sentences by compacting them together. When you link two sentences in such a way that they flow into each other it temporarily overloads the conscious mind, which, as we know, confuses the critical factor and gives us clearer access to the subconscious. The following is an example of how you might use this during an induction, with the merged word/s CAPITALISED for clarity. 'As you listen to THE SOUND OF MY VOICE causes you to go deeper into trance.'
Obviously, the merged sentence makes no sense. You don't want to overuse this technique, but throwing in one or two of these can really confuse a person. The extra processing process ing that that is required can overload the conscious conscious mind mind and and cause a person to to almost 'short out' into a trance state. It's almost as though the conscious mind is saying to the subconscious mind, 'I have no idea what's going on, you take over.' The second technique that is often used allows you to slip a command into the subconscious subconscio us mind mind by forming a new command command that overlaps overl aps the the end e nd of one sent se ntence ence and the beginning beginning of another. another. I primarily primaril y use use this this technique technique before b efore the the indu i nduction ction when w hen I'm explaining to the client how hypnosis works. This is what I was referring to earlier hen I said your your first 'officia ' official'l' suggestion. suggestion. During most most hypnotic hypnotic inductions the the suggestions start before the subject realises. Before any session you usually spend a few minutes explaining to the client a little about what you're going to do, and what they can expect as they go into trance. This is the perfect time to include these suggestions, especially if the client is nervous about hypnosis, as their guard will be down at this point having having not not yet yet realised realis ed that that you you are already directing them them.. Again, here is an example of this technique in action with the overlapping command CAPITALISED for clarity: 'You 'You will wi ll feel be rela r elaxed xed as you GO GO INTO TRANCE. TRANCE. NOW, NOW, just j ust sit back ba ck and make make yourself comfortable.' Another technique is to hide a command by splitting it up into several words and embedding these into a larger sentence. This creates an embedded command that can be presented to to the the subjects subconscious subconscious by subtly subtly markin marking g it out out from from the the rest of th the script. You can mark out your embedded command in several ways, most people favour a slight shift in tonality as this can be used on a subject that has already closed their eyes. If you're working with a subject that is looking at you then you can mark out a command with a visual cue, such as raising your eyebrows, blinking or lifting a finger on specific words that, when tagged together, form a completely separate command. If e quickly jump back to Derren's 'That's why we came to this WINdow' command from earlier then you can clearly see how the word 'WIN' is picked out with a shift in tonality that causes the subconscious mind to notice it. We can't say whether of not Derren also included other embedded commands that he marked out visually because he has his back to the camera, but I would guess that he also marked out the word 'we', forming the command 'we win'. The beauty of marking out embedded commands is that the subconscious mind will
notice the marked marked words wor ds and link li nk them them together together to form a new sentence, and because be cause the the new sentence is actually formed inside the subconscious mind it doesn't have to bypass the critical factor. Here is an example example of embedding a comm command and into a longer sent se ntence. ence. Again the command is CAPITALISED for clarity. For these to work, you must mark out each capitalised capitali sed word w ord in i n a way that that the the subjects subconscious mind mind will wil l notice. 'As you GO into trance, you may notice you are breathing a little DEEPER than you usually do.' Embedded commands will not necessarily cause a person to blindly follow your suggestion, but they will increase the likelihood of the person doing what you've suggested. So if the subject doesn't immediately respond in the way that you expect it doesn't mean that the command has failed. Think of it this way... Before the command there was a 5% chance that the subject was going to do what you were about to suggest anyway, after the command that percentage is pushed up, let's say to 40%. With just one embedded command we've substantially increased the chance of the subject doing something they otherwise wouldn't have done. A second embedded command might push it up even higher, let's say to 80%. If we keep layering commands into our speech in this ay then we keep pushing up the possibility that the subject will obey them. This comes back to to those those pencils, it only takes takes a few work wor king togeth together er to make make them them practically practical ly unbreakable. Non-verb Non-ve rbal al commun communicat ication ion
As you've no doubt realised by now, hypnotic language patterns can be very powerful. However, you also need to consider your non-verbal communication. In fact, I would go so far as to say that this is the most important factor of any induction. It's also the reason that that lots of people peopl e using pre-written pre-w ritten scripts fail. Remember, hypnotising people is nothing like casting a spell. The actual words you say don't have some mystical power that automatically puts your subject into a trance. The ay you say the words is far more important. As is any message that you communicate to your subject non-verbally. Before we look at the power of non-verbal communication let's take a moment to consider tonality. Tonality is a topic of hot debate in the hypnotic community. Most hypnotists favour an authoritative monotone, others prefer a more dynamic delivery.
Personally, I much prefer the dynamic approach. I like to imagine that my tonality is taking my subject on a roller-coaster ride. Sometimes I speak very quickly and build excitement in my inductions, other times I slow it right down and induce relaxation. I find that mixing it up a little really helps the induction process. This works in exactly the same way as repeatedly dropping a subject into a succession of trance states during a single induction. This can be a very valuable and powerful tool when used correctly. When you are first starting out, you may want to stick with the monotone approach as this gives you much more time to prepare what you're going to say during the induction. When When you feel feel more comfortabl comfortable, e, you can int i ntroduce roduce more variety var iety to your tonality if it suits your style. A very powerful way to mix up your tonality is to use the meaning of the word itself. For example, when you say the word exciting, sound excited. Likewise, if you say the ord relax, use a relaxing tonality. This may sound obvious, and easy, but it does take a little practise to get it right. Try reading a paragraph or two of this book aloud in this style, shift s hifting ing your your tone to ill i llustrate ustrate the meaning meaning of each word. wo rd. Body Language
The next next important thin thing g to consider consid er is your your body b ody lang la nguag uage. e. It's imperative that that you project projec t confiden confidence ce when using using rapid hypnosis. hypnosis. Even if your your volunt volunteer eer knows knows absolutely ab solutely nothing about body language they will definitely be able to determine whether or not you believe belie ve in your your own ability abili ty to 'put 'put them them under'. If they they don't don't think think you're you're confident, confident, they they ill have no confidence in your ability and probably won't go into trance. In many many cases 'fake it until until you make make it' is enough. enough. In other other word w ords, s, it i t doesn't does n't really real ly matter matter hat you're feeling inside, just as long as you look good on the outside. However, it's much better, and makes much more sense, to build your confidence first. If you go into the induction bursting with confidence then you'll naturally do everything right. You'll say the right things, use the right tone and make the right gestures. This is a little bit of a catch 22 situation. You'll feel much more confident when you've hypnotised more people, and you'll hypnotise more people when you feel more confident. Over time, as people learn that you are a hypnotist (and see or hear of you successfully hypnotising other people) you'll find that it gets easier and easier. The more famous you become the greater your volunteers expectation will be that they will go into trance. trance. There is actually actually a case where a very famous famous and and well w ell respected respec ted hypnot hypnotist ist was w as giving a talk to some hypnosis students. As he stepped up to the podium to deliver his speech the audience all stood up to applaud him. In response, he innocently waved his hand, gesturing for them to sit. Several members of the audience had worked themselves
into such a state (wonderi (w ondering ng what this master was w as going to do to them) them) that they they instantly instantly dropped into a deep trance, just from a hand gesture inviting them to sit. Obviously, this is not going to work for you. Well... not yet anyway. Right now, nobody knows you're a hypnotist, so the expectation to go into trance is very low. What you need to do is present yourself in such a way that people believe that you can do it. Talking knowledgeably about hypnosis really helps (and it gives you plenty of opportunity to slip in some embedded commands). Acting like you've done it a million times before also helps. And to pull that off, you must appear totally confident. I'm going to give you a very simple confidence booster in just a second. But first I want you to think about the people that you're going to be hypnotising. Who will you hypnotise first? Are you going to hypnotise a friend or a stranger? This is a very important point to consider. conside r. A fri friend end may may seem see m like the best option, o ption, but your your friends fri ends already know that you're not really a seasoned hypnotist with years of experience. At best they they probably know know you're you're studyin studying g hypnosis hypnosis and are happy happy to to help help you out by being a willi wi lling ng guinea-pig, guinea-pig, but but they they are far from the the ideal subject. A stranger stranger has no no idea how experienced you are. If you are interested in pursuing a career as a stage or street hypnotist then you might like to take your new skills to the streets and invite total strangers to experience hypnosis. Obviously you'll need to check with your local authorities before you do this as the law on hypnosis changes from place to place. Walking up to a complete stranger in the street and offering to hypnotise them is not for everyone. It takes a certain kind of person to be able to do this, to put it bluntly... you need balls! If you don't think that this kind of thing is for you (which is totally fine) then you'll probably want to practise on friends... and confine your hypnotic displays to parties and social gathering atherings. s. If you do start out with friends, then I suggest that you approach the subject as though it's an experiment, not a challenge. Don't allow them to drag you into a situation where they are challenging you to put them under. Leave that kind of thing until you have a little more experience. For now, simply play with the inductions and get plenty of feedback from everyone you hypnotise. Whether you start out with friends or strangers the confidence rule applies. You must project projec t confiden confidence. ce. You You can fake fake it if you you have to to but ideally ideal ly... ... you you need need to be feeli feeling ng it. Confidence in your ability to put someone into trance is much much more important than any book, DVD or course on hypnosis ever gives it credit (With the possible exception of one course called The Confident Hypnotist by Nathan Thomas - available at http://www.nathanthomashypnosis.com)
Henry Ford once o nce said sa id "Whether "Whether you think think you you can, or you can't, you're you're right." This This is never more true than in hypnosis. Be confident and believe that you can do it and you ill. So, I think you'll agree that now would be a good time to reveal that little confidence boosting trick. Th This is i s a really real ly simple simple trick that that you you can use in any situation situation that that you need to feel more confident. You can do it in seconds, you don't need to close your eyes or anyth anything ing like that and it works w orks like l ike magic. magic. All you have to do is imagine that you are really tall. And I mean really tall! Like 15 or 20ft! or more if you like. Then visualise yourself as being made of solid diamond. Take in a nice deep breath and feel your chest expand. If you're increasing your confidence to deal with wi th a negative negative person pers on that that was w as bothering you, you, then then you can imagine imagine how insignificant they they are compared to you. you. You You could swa s watt them them like a fly if you wanted to. Their tiny squeaky voice can barely reach your ears and your booming confidence blows blow s them them away like a tornado. tornado. If you're increasing your confidence to approach somebody (such as a potential date or business business colleagu col league) e) then then imagin imaginee that that you you have have a brig bri ght red cape draped dr aped over your your shoulders and as you walk toward them feel it dragging along the floor behind you. Take confident strides stride s like l ike a roman emper emperor or and imagine imagine a fanfare fanfare of trumpets trumpets ann a nnoun ouncing cing your arrival. This simple visualisation exercise really does work. You can use it to switch your confidence on when w henever ever you need need it and a nd it instan i nstantly tly transforms transforms your dem de meanour. eanour. Do this this before you you approach a person that that you you are going going to hypn hypnotise otise and you're you're non-verbal non-verbal commun communica ication tion will wi ll automatica automaticall lly y send them a very ve ry clear cl ear message ess age that you you know know exactly hat you're doing. Psychic leakage
Every book, DVD and course that I've studied on hypnosis champions the importance of correc cor rectt tonality, tonality, som so me go the extra mile and talk about abo ut the the importance of body bo dy language language but none none consider the the one thin thing g that that I truly truly believe belie ve will wil l give you you the the edge over all other hypnotists. This is your psychic leakage. In other words, your thoughts. Whatever Whatever you believe belie ve about psychic com c omm munica unication tion I want wa nt you you to stick stic k with me me on this.
From my own experience and experiments I am without a doubt that what you think during a typical induction will wil l affect the the out o utcome come of that that induction. If you you do and a nd say everyth eve rything ing perfectly, but your your internal dialogue dia logue is doubting that that it'll it' ll ork, it probably won't. Now don't get me wrong, negative self talk won't sabotage every induction, but it will hamper your success. However, if you mess up your induction, say a few things wrong, look a little nervous but think think with complete complete confidence confidence and and expect success, you'll you'll probably probabl y get it. Again, Again, I don't want to mislead you here, your thoughts alone aren't going to be enough but they are far more powerful than most hypnotists realise. If you have what's commonly known as a 'monkey mind' (lots of internal chatter) then I suggest you keep it occupied by thinking your induction to your subject at the same time as saying it. You can do this in several ways. You could say the actual words inside your head as you say them out loud, or you could visualise your subject responding to your induction in the way that you want them to, or you could simply compliment your script with suggestions such as 'That's right, deeper and deeper" etc. When you hypnotise somebody try to think of your communication as being in several layers. The most obvious layer is the words of the script that you are using. This is here many many basic basi c hypnotists hypnotists stop... which is i s proba p robably bly why w hy they they struggle struggle so s o much. much. The second layer is the way that you say the words. I use a little trick here that really helps my delivery. I pretend that the person I'm hypnotising speaks a different language to the one I am using, so they can't actually understand anything I'm saying. In order to hypnotise hypnotise them I therefor therefor need to deli de livery very my words wo rds in such a way w ay that that my my tone, tone, pace p ace and inflections guide the subject into trance. One of the easiest ways to do this is to slow down the tempo of your voice as the trance progresses and they go deeper. The next layer is the language patterns. This is where you make use of ambiguous words and embedded commands. It really helps if you prepare a few of these in advance so that you don't have to think too much during the actual induction. Next Next we have have your your body languag languagee and general general demeanou demeanour. r. As As we've we' ve already alre ady seen, seen, feeling confident is the trick to this layer and a simple visualisation exercise is all that it needed to make make sure you'r you'ree doing do ing everything everything right. right. Something Something that that we w e haven't real r eally ly touched on yet but also fits into this category is gestures. Gestures are a very powerful ay of influencing people. If you make a downward gesture you are subconsciously communicating the idea of going deeper into trance. An inward gesture (such as bringing your your hands together together in front of you) you) subconsciousl s ubconsciously y comm communica unicates tes the idea id ea of narrowi narro wing ng
ones focus. The final layer is your psychic communication. These are the thoughts that you transmit to your subject during the induction. Before we move on I want to take a moment to talk about this a little more. What we are talking about here is not a conscious recognition of your thoughts. Your subject does not have to have any psychic ability for this to matter. We are talking about a subconscious awareness. You think something and at a subconscious level your subject picks it up. If your thought is conducive to them going into trance then it will help the induction, if it is not then it will hinder the induction. If you want to experiment with this then I strongly recommend that you do so with an animal. animal. If you you have a pet, send s end it thought thoughtss and a nd see how it i t responds. res ponds. I know this might might sound crazy to some people and it's not the kind of thing you usually read about in a book on hypnosis hypnosis but it is definitely worth the the effort. effort. A dog is probably the the easiest animal to transmit thoughts to. With no other changes (don't move or talk) try transmitting different things to a pet dog. Experiment with words, such as walkies or food, then try to send mental images to your pet and see how it responds. I've been doing this with my pets for years. If my dog whimpers I send him pictures to find out what he ants. When When I get the the right r ight picture picture he responds. res ponds. If the pictu pic ture re was milk il k he he run r unss to his bowl, bowl , if it was to go go out into into the the garden he run runs to the the door, door, if it was to go go for a walk he he runs to his lead. I can't pick up on anything he's trying to communicate to me, but I am absolutely convinced that he picks up my projected thoughts and I'm also convinced that other other people peopl e do too. Whether you subscribe to this idea of not, I strongly recommend that you think your subject subjec t into hypnosis hypnosis while whil e you're hypnotising hypnotising them. them. If for for no other other reason rea son than to to keep you focussed and to ensure that any negative thoughts don't taint your other non-verbal communication. All this may seem a little overwhelming, but just take it one step at a time. To begin, focus solely on the actual induction process itself. Don't worry about all of the layers in the the beginn b eginning. ing. Get comfortable comfortable doing doi ng the the basi b asics cs and build up gradually. Over time time your inductions inductions will wil l becom bec omee incredibly incredi bly powerful... just like those those pencils! pe ncils! The complete process
We're going to have a bit of a recap here and bring everything together. This is what you might call a rapid induction recipe. All of the basic components are here, you just need to flesh it out with your own style. Step One: Get conf c onfide ident nt!!
Step Two: (Optional) Pick somebody that looks like they would make a great hypnotic subject. (Eye's glazed over, transfixed on what you're saying, focussing on you intently etc) Step Three: (Optional) Chat about hypnosis, answer questions, tell them what you're going to do (or not do.. i.e., you won't make them strip!) Include lots of embedded commands commands during d uring this this 'pre-hypn 'pr e-hypnotic otic chat' Step Four: Do something that causes the subject to begin a familiar pattern, such as presenting presenting your your hand hand for them them to shake. shake. Step Five: Fi ve: Interrupt Interrupt the pattern and cause confusio confusion n by doing doi ng somethin something g unexpected. unexpected. (Such as... Grabbing their wrist, putting your hand in front of their face, lifting their arm, holding the back of their head, asking an illogical question, saying something weird etc.) Step Six: Si x: Give them them an instruction instruction to follow fol low immedi immediately! ately! (Example (Examples: s: Look at your hand, look into my eyes, look at my finger, watch this swinging watch.. etc..) A great instruction is to get them to take a deep breath. This works well if you do it in a slightly unexpected way by getting them to breathe in through their mouth and out through their nose. It's a bit different to what people expect so it further captures their focus. Step Seven: Create an association between moving down and going deeper into trance. (Example (Examples: s: Lower owe r their arm, their their eyelids, eyelid s, your your arm, a rm, your your finger, finger, have them imagine imagine alking down some stairs, go down in a lift, walk down a forest path etc... and connect this to the idea of becoming more sleepy and relaxed.) At this point, if they haven't already tell them to close their eyes. Step Eight Eight:: Narrow Narr ow their their focus. focus. Describe Descr ibe a scene incorporating all of their their senses. At this stage you can also tell them to listen only to the sound of your voice and that any other sounds simply cause them to relax even deeper. Step Nine: Give some simple suggestions. (We'll look at this in a moment.) Step Ten: Wake them up. (Don't worry... we'll cover this later.) As I've said many times, this basic recipe is not a spell. This isn't the only way to hypnotise people and you don't have to use specific words. We've talked a lot about interrupting a handshake, but you could skip the interrupt altogether. Another common induction is to suddenly tilt a persons head forward, causing shock and confusion, as
you slip in a suggestion to sleep. This particular induction is one that I demonstrate on my free hypnosis course available at http://www.freehypnosislessons.com That's really all there is to a rapid induction. And, in fact, it sounds much more complicated like this than it really is. Once you've memorised a few key phrases and had a little practise you can start to include more advanced language patterns and layer your induction so that it becomes even more powerful. When you're just starting out it's perfectly acceptable to role-play role- play the the entire entire thing thing a few times times on your your own (or with w ith a illing friend) just to get the hang of it before doing it for real. If you have a willing friend then have them act as though they are hypnotised when you go through the induction and give them a few simple suggestions to follow. Even though they are only acting this will really help to boost your skills and create a subconscious pattern pattern of success that that will make fut futu ure inductions inductions feel feel more natu natural. ral. The wake up process
Some people are too scared to try hypnosis because they worry about getting stuck in trance. I hope, by now, that you realise that this simply can not happen. Think of the hypnotic state as being similar to meditation. It takes years of dedication to master meditation edi tation and a trem tr emendous endous amoun amountt of focus and disci di scipli pline ne to maintain maintain a meditative edi tative state for any length of time. Being hypnotised is a little bit like have a meditation coach that guides you into an altered state of consciousness. If the guide stops helping you it's very difficult to maintain the state on your own without training. When you hypnotise a person you are essentially acting as that guide, helping them to achieve an altered state of consciousness. If you stop helping them, they'll very probably ake up within a few minutes. On occasion a person may be so tired that they fall asleep during trance, this is no different to falling asleep during a boring lecture. Contrary to popular belief, it's impossible to become 'stuck' in hypnosis. Even if a hypnotist tried to keep a person in a trance state for a prolonged period of time eventually the person would fall asleep. So don't worry about not being able to wake people up, it's actually actually much much easier than than keeping keeping them them under! under! To correctly wake a subject from trance you should count upwards (usually from 1 to 3). Most inductions count a person down into trance (usually from 10 to 1 as they walk down imaginary stairs) so counting upwards reverses this process and brings them back. The direction that you count is not a rule, you can actually do whatever you like. You could put people under by saying "3, 2, 1 Sleep!" and bring them back saying "3, 2, 1
Eyes open, wide awake!". But, in my opinion, counting people down into trance and up out of it makes much more sense. It's good practise to change your voice and lead a person out of trance. You do this by speaking faster and in a more conversational tone. This mirrors vocal changes that you make during the induction to guide them into trance, where you talk slower and lower your tone. As with the induction, deliver the wake up script in such a way that a person that that doesn't doe sn't even eve n understand understand Engli English sh would wo uld know know what is expected of them them.. You You want them to become increasingly alert, so make your voice increasingly alerting. Finally Finall y, you may may want wa nt to to sli s lip p in i n a few post hypnotic hypnotic suggestions suggestions as you wake your your volun vol unteer. teer. Usuall Usually y this this would wo uld be a sug s uggestion gestion to feel good. A very com co mmon example example might be something like this: "On the count of 3 you will wake from this trance state feeling fantastic. You'll feel refreshed and alert, happy and confident. 1, becoming aware of the position of your body now. now. 2, your your eyes eyes beginnin beginning g to open now as you recognise recognise that you are back in th the room with me feeling wonderful and 3 eyes fully open now and wide awake! Welcome back." Creating Suggestions
Now that that you you know know how how to put put someone someone into into hypn hypnosis, osis, and wake them them up. You need to to know how to create a suggestion. I'm not going to give you actual suggestions here, but I am going to furnish you with some very simple rules that you can apply to any situation. However, before we get to that, a word of caution. It is very possible, and very easy, to relieve pain using hypnosis. For example, you could hypnotise a persons headache away. But don't. Unless you are a qualified professional, never ever assume that you know what something is, no matter how obvious it seems. Helping a person by relieving a headache could cause them to bypass a professional diagnosis that might otherwise have saved their life. I know it sounds a little over the top, but pain is a sign that something is wrong, and that something could be serious. If a person is in pain and you'r you'ree not qualified quali fied to diagn di agnose ose the the cause, c ause, don't d on't treat the symptom symptom.. I don't want to get all doom and gloom here, but I have two more very serious warnings for you. On occasion you'll have the good fortune to bump into someone that is incredibly responsive to hypnosis. We call these people somnambulistic... And trust me, they are amazing! These are the people that every hypnotists wants in their show. One of the the most incredib incre dible le thing thingss about a bout a som so mnambulisti nambulisticc is i s that they they respond res pond to your suggestions suggestions as thoug though h they they are completely real. re al. So, if i f you were to say sa y that that your finger finger
as actually a red hot poker, then poke them with it, they will burn. They'll actually feel genuine pain and their skin will blister. Sounds Sounds incredibl incred ible? e? Think Think about it. When When you burn burn yourse yourself lf your skin doesn't does n't automatically blister, a part of your mind sends a signal for it to do so in order to start the healing process. That part of your mind sends the signal because it believes you have been burned, whether you have really been burned or just been told that you have by a hypn hypnotist otist is completely completely irrelevant irrele vant.. The The mind mind follow followss the the same same protocol for both. both. So, here's a golden rule that you must always stick to. Only ever give suggestions that ould be OK if they were actually real. That means red hot poker fingers are out, but eating an onion that your subject thinks is an apple is fine. After all, an evening of bad breath isn't isn't such such a bad thin thing g. And... And... Even if your your subject subject doesn't appear to have have gone gone into into a trance, stick to this rule. Act as though everyone you hypnotise is a somnambulistic and only give suggestions that would be safe for everyone concerned if they were actually actually real. real . The next next rule is equally equall y important important and can have dire dir e consequences. c onsequences. When you you hypnotise hypnotise a person they are very very suggestible. In fact, they are so suggestible that, it you're not careful, it's possible that you could create a completely false memory just by asking a leading question. So, for example, if someone had a scary dream a few days after atching a film about aliens, then came to you asking if you could hypnotise them as they think they may have been abducted, your questions will very very probably create a very real memory of a very scary abduction that never actually happened. Several years ago a group of well meaning counsellors suspected that some children ere being abused by their parents. In an attempt to uncover the truth the children were asked lots of suggestive questions about their experience. Over time, one by one, the children gradually recalled painful memories of abuse. The counsellors thought they'd uncovered uncovered a paedophile paedo phile ring ri ng and several of the the parent par entss were w ere charged charged and sent to to prison. pri son. Later, it was discovered that the uncovered memories couldn't have been real and were accidentally planted into the subconscious minds of the children during questioning. This phenomena is called false memory syndrome, and it's just one of the reasons that evidence gained during hypnosis can not be used in a court of law. This particular case created cre ated so s o much much unnecess unnecessary ary suffering, suffering, not just for the inn i nnocent ocent parents par ents that that were w ere rongly accused but also for the children who actually came out of the ordeal with memories of being abused by their loved ones that were as real to them as any other. I think think it goes withou w ithoutt saying that that you should should be very ver y cautious of leadi le ading ng questions and a nd don't hypnotise hypnotise people peopl e to try to uncove uncoverr anyth anything ing they they may may (or may not) have repr r epress essed. ed. Leave that to the professionals.
Our next rule isn't quite so serious, more of a guideline really. Your suggestions should be stated in the the positive. This one one is very ver y simple. The The subconscious subconscious mind mind can't can't process a negative. To give you a rather crude and overused example, if I say 'Don't think of a pink elephant' elephant' you you have have to think think of one one in order to know know what not to to think think about. about. In a similar way, asking a person not to forget something will actually increase the chances of them forgetting it. Instead, ask them to remember. In fact, any 'don't' command is a bad idea. Most parents learn this the hard way. Don't stay out all night, don't get drunk, don't forget to do your your home home work, w ork, don't do n't make make a mess, ess , don't do n't hit your your brother! br other! All of these these commands do exactly the opposite of what you actually want. And when a person is in hypnosis this effect is magnified considerably. By sticking to to these simple s imple rules r ules you can create cr eate sug s uggestions gestions for anyth anything ing.. It's usuall usually ya good idea to start with some very simple suggestions, and work up to the more outrageous stuff later. While your practising on your friends, just give some basic suggestions suggestions that they'll they'll feel reall rea lly y good. Perhaps Per haps you can tell them them that that each eac h time time you clap your hands they become more and more excited, like a child on Christmas Eve. This creates an anchor that you can fire over and over again by clapping your hands repeatedly. It also makes your friend feel great, making them much more willing to volun vol unteer teer for you next next time. time. I lear l earned ned the the hard way wa y that that if i f you make make a person per son look lo ok stupid, they don't volunteer again and you very quickly run out of people to practise on. Be nice to your friends and think of ways that you can use hypnosis to help them, then you'll have lots of willing volunteers and get lots of practise. Learning hypnosis from a book is far from ideal. The printed word can only convey so much. To help you develop your skills as a hypnotist, and to actually see it in action, I've created a free hypnosis hypnosis course for you. The The course consists c onsists of several video lessons less ons here I demonstrate hypnosis in action and share the secrets that I've learned over the years. The complete course is totally free, you can get started right now at http://www.freehypnosislessons.com
Recommended hypnosis courses for further study
The Art of Covert Hypnosis by Steven Peliari http://steven-peliari.com Covert Hypnosis Exposed by Igor Ledochowski http://hidden-hypnosis.com
Free Online Hypnosis Course by Steven Hall http://freehypnosislessons.com To watch my in-depth review of the most popular covert and conversational hypnosis courses courses please pl ease visit: visi t: http://freebookoftheday.com/coverthypnosis.php For more information on hypnosis please visit my website at http://inducingtrance.com
