Hypnosis FAQ

Often, when I talk to people about hypnosis it seems that I get the same types of questions and comments over and over again. So, I thought I would put together a list of these common and questions and my responses to them. It should be noted that whilst the answers to these questions should be straight forward, in a lot of cases they are not.

1) Only weak-minded people can be hypnotized
I love hearing this,”I’m too strong willed/clever to be hypnotized”. If you can hear my voice then you can hypnotized. In fact because many people don’t know what the actual experience of hypnosis is they cannot tell whether they have actually been hypnotized or not. Intelligence, stubbornness it doesn’t matter. The difficulty generally comes when the subject cannot pay attention for whatever reason OR is in an unsuitable state of mind or cannot follow due to some kind of brain injury.

2) You cannot be hypnotized against your will.
In my experience this is only true IF i the hypnotist goes against a persons will. So if I alert someone that I intend to hypnotize them and they resist everything I do then YES, it will be very difficult to get them into trance quickly. However through fractionation OR not alerting the person to hypnotic techniques a person can be put into trance without knowing what is going on

2) Hypnotist has complete power over you when you are hypnotized
Many folks get into hypnotism under the misunderstanding that a hypnotized subject is a zombie who’s mind can be controlled. It is true that a persons beliefs and perspectives can be changed, they can imagine amazing things, can be influenced by the Hypnotist but they are not under MIND CONTROL

3) You can get permanently stuck in a state of hypnosis.
Some people just LOVE hypnosis and when in trance don’t want to come back. The reality is no matter how much a person loves trance and wants to stay they will either come back or transisition into sleep. Again, no Zombies

4) When you wake up from hypnosis, you don’t remember anything that happened
It is not a given that you will have amnesia. I myself seem to suffer a degree of amnesia. I remember I was in hypnosis but not what was said. I have found that most people remember what has been said UNLESS I as the hypnotist induce amnesia!
People also confuse hypnosis with sleep and expect to be asleep. In fact for many the experience can be heightened senses as upposed to dulled ones

7) You can be made to do things that you don’t want to do
It is very difficult to get people to do things that they don’t want to do. If you aren’t a killer, I cant hypnotize you to kill someone. Hypnosis however can be used to subtly influence the way a person thinks and over time with the right person, this person may find themselves doing things that previously they would not have considered doing (in a positive way of course)