How does hypnosis work?

[aommaster]

Like the title says

[wolfson]

http://www.innermind.co.uk/hypnosis.html

 

Try the above.

[aommaster]

thanx very useful, but i am talking about the hypnosis without seeing anything. The hypnotist just talks to you and puts you in a hypnotic trance.

[Pinch Paxton]

I want to know how you actually hypnotise someone. Is all of that Paul Mkenna stuff faked?

 

Pincho.

[aommaster]

Who's he? Also, the fact about learning hypnosis is a totally different subject

[Kevin Conti]

http://www.innermind.co.uk/hypnosis.html

 

<quote>

Our mind consists of two parts:

 

The Conscious Mind (10%) is responsible for thoughts, language, decisions and will power. It is the part that is in charge when we are awake.

 

The Unconscious Mind (90%) is a vast store of everything that we have ever learned or experienced. It is also responsible for bodily functions, breathing, blood pressure etc. In fact, anything we can do without thinking about it consciously, is controlled by the Unconscious mind.

 

</quote>

 

This is absolutely wrong and there is no neurological support what so ever for that assertion. This myth is reinforced by the media and serves as a motivational factor to encourage that are apprehensive about mental change. From an evolutionary point of view, it is incredibly unlikely that the evolution of larger brains would have evolved if there were no survival or reproductive advantage. if we do not use 90% of it, what is the point? Furthermore, functional brain imaging studies accentuate that individuals, if given the correct experimental stimulation, will use every region of our brain, albeit depending on what the stimulation is. We do not use all of our brain obviously at once, but we have access to most of it if required - i.e. when we are dealing with the necessary stimuli.

 

In addition, there is a principle in neuroscience that can be said to be "use it or use it". Specifically, neural development for every particular region in the brain is determined in the genetic phenotype, however, it is the formation development from birth of the neural areas associated that cause it to develop. If there is insufficient use and stimulation of the particular function in the early stages of life, it will not develop properly. For e.g. monkeys who are born with one eye closed artificially ultimately lose that eye's vision.

 

Therefore it stands to reason that if we did not use 90% of our brain, then numerous neural pathways would deteriorate.

 

In terms of hypnosis, it is fundamentally a relaxed state of consciousness. In the electroencephalogram (EEG) the state appears to that of alpha (8 - 12 Cycles per second). It is suggested that individuals in that state are far more susceptible to suggestion hence are far more likely to have their behaviour changed. This process is known as hypnosis. But is hypnosis effective? The jury is still out but certainly there is an abundance of medical research that has shown hypnosis to be an effective alternative psychological technique for changing behaviours and promoting new ones. In one study I read recently it suggested that hypnosis may result in the release of endorphins, which may explain why individuals are inclined to feel a greater sense of well-being and more likely to release anxiety. However, it may just be another advanced form of the placebo effect, especially as those individuals who have deep belief in it are far more easily hypnotized effectively. However, I doubt that claim and my personal view is that it does work and it may allow us to systematically change our behaviours by tricking particular parts of the brain and through reinforcing particular thoughts/feelings in the alpha mode, when we are less inclined to be mentally active and challenge thoughts and feelings. Nevertheless, it is not the answer to everything and its effects are small to moderate.

 

Hypnosis has many myths that are unfounded, such as it accesses the unconscious mind and allows individuals to be completely controlled by the researcher. That is simply wrong.

 

I would give you some hypnotic scripts I have used in practice but I accidentally deleted them when I reformatted my hard drive last week. Sorry, I was drunk

 

 

Want to try hypnosis???? Sit down and close your eyes and wait until are very calm and relaxed. Now hold your hands out straight, with both of them in parallel. Now say to yourself through your inner voice, and MEAN IT. My left and right hand are the same weight and are in same position relative to the floor. Now imagine someone putting a weight on your left hand. Say to yourself, I can feel it getting heavier than the right hand. Keep doing that, progressively adding more weight. Furthermore, pretend that there is a helium blood on your right hand and that it is beginning to rise above to the ceiling. At the end your hands will be some distance from how they were at the start, if it works ofc!

[mooeypoo]

This is a VERY VERY broad explanation, and I don't pretend to be a psychologist. It's just a few very general stuff about the subject to help you understand things.

If anyone wants to correct me, feel free. I'm writing what I know.

 

The mind is "functioning" on a few levels. Basically, when you're awake, your subconsciousness is relatively blocked, which means you can't access it regularly, while when you're asleep (truely asleep, that is. Some people can't reach taht state truely), your entire body is relaxed, and your subconsciousness is "open" to communicate with your consciousness. That's what they say about dreams.

 

You know when you have a problem people tell yuo "Sleep on it"? that's the reason. It's a common belief that when you're sleeping, your mind is solving problems in your subconsciousness, even if you don't know they're bothering you.

It doesn't mean that if you don't know the answer to 1+1 you will when you sleep on it - it does mean that if you are confused about something, or can't decide, your mind will try to show you what you "truely" want in your subconsciouesness, and that way solve the tension that usually accompanies such worries.

 

Now, in hypnosis, the point is to bring the mind to that "Subconscious" level in a WAKEN mode. Why? So you will be able to actually control what you want to see, and actually CONSCIOUSLY feel and experience that "communication" between your conscious mind and your sub conscious.

 

Hypnosis depends greatly on the person's willingness to participate, since it includes a lot of psychological sides to it.

 

No, if someone tells you "You're a chicken!" while in hypnosis, you will not walk around cwacking. It doesn't work liek that, because your brain has natural "safety" mechanisms that prevents that from happening.

 

The mind CAN be lead to different things though. Like, I've heard of a case a young woman was being treated at a hypnotherapist that was certain she was raped by her father.

It wasn't true, but during the sessions (it's not clear if that was intentionally or not, not that it matters) the hypnotherapist appearantly lead the young woman to believe that the person that touched her was indeed her own father.

 

So it's really ... "gray" zone. I've never heard of anyone that went through hypnotherapy without his will. It's psychological, you need to agree and accept it. On the other hand, you also need to be careful. Ther'es a reason the subconsciousness is SUB conscious.

 

Hope I helped on that one.

I'm practicing "Self-Hypnosis Medication" techniques since I'm 3 years old. You don't know how helpful that can be

 

 

~moo

[mooeypoo]

Another thing, in response to some idiotic beliefs in "hollywood-movies-hypnosis" --

 

The only reason you see hypnosis linked so much with those pendulums and weird spirals is because that tends to RELAX the mind, and help a person concentrate.

 

I can also tell you to count from 100 to 1 and it'll have the same effect, if you want to be "hypnotized".

 

~moo

[Kevin Conti]

When i first read what u wrote, i thought u were attacking me and saying that i wrote too broad. LOl, i need to stay off those delusion pills.

[aommaster]

lol. The thing is, proper hypnosis is obtained by a hypnotist just telling the person to relax. hmm..... Thanx for the explanation. Really useful

[Kevin Conti]

np bud. It would perhaps be useful for you to download hypnotic scripts from the net or rather sound files from kazaa or something similar, allowing you to test them. Basically, you just relax and listen to what the dude has to say.

[mooeypoo]

The best "hypnotics" (its not really hypnotic but.. well.. its similar) is something that's called "Guided Meditation".

Try downloading one from Kazaa or something.

 

You should try it once Its really good, if you concentrate and allow yourself to relax.

 

~moo

[BrainMan]

Kevin-

 

I think you misunderstood. The site did not say that we only use 10% of our brains, it said that only 10% of it is conscious. I agree that the number is made up, but you seem to attack something that the site was not really claiming.

 

 

The idea of hypnosis dealing with a person's unconscious is simply that people won't be able to consicously remember what happened during hypnosis and won't know, consciously, why they are acting the way they do with respect to post-hypnotic suggestions. In fact, you can give people explicit instructions that conflict with the post-hypnotic suggestions, and actually see the conflict between the two when you look at the data (compared to controls).

 

Hypnosis, then, has unconscious influences. But this does not mean that people are unconscious while hypnotised (they aren't) or that there is some kind of "direct link" being established with the unconscious mind.

[Kevin Conti]

ah, ur absolutely right. sorry dude.

[aommaster]

I have also heard, from my father, that hypnosis comes in stages, from 1 to i think 10 or something. 1 is a very simple form of hypnosis, where you look at a person and stae, and without knowing, he or she would look at you then turn away. Level 7 would be to actually erase memories and all that, used for hypnotherapy. This proves that it involves the inconcious mind, right?

[Kevin Conti]

I am not away of any stages, hypnosis just involves the individual being put into an alpha state of conscious and giving hypnotic suggestions by the person hypnotising. The individual is fully awake all the time and is able to exercise freewill.,

[mooeypoo]

There are basically three main stages in the mind's.. uhm... "function" or however you want to reffer to it.

 

Alpha - complete wake, your entire body is waken and your senses are "on", while your subconscious is "closed".

 

Beta - Halfway between full sleep and full awake. This stage is USUALLY the stage you start remembering your dreams at night even when you don't control them)

 

Gamma - Full relaxation of the body. The muscles are relaxed, the senses are "off" and the subconsciousness is open.

 

 

 

You can devide these basic levls to sublevels. Like there are stages in self hypnotic that you can reach "deep alpha", or "shallow betta" and such.

 

But basically, those are the levels.

You guys should really try guided meditation. It's another word for Self Hypnosis.

 

 

And it works, specially against pain and such. If you have a headache, it can solve (the symptom, of course... if oyu're dehydrated you should still drink, hypnosis or not

 

 

hope that helped ..

 

 

 

 

~moo

[aommaster]

wow! Thanx for the facts!

[mooeypoo]

No problems I have to stress though - i wouldn't treat this as a complete "fact"... I don't want to mislead you or something. The entire thing of hypnosis and self meditation hypnosis and such, is quite a "not proven / broken facts" subject.

 

Since this is entirely (or mostly) psychological, there are a zillion views on the matter. I gave you the one I believe in. I didn't invent it, but it's not the only one out there

 

Many beliefs, many views, I just gave you one I know is used quite broadly in the "hypnosis field"..

 

But there are more sides to this

 

~moo

[aommaster]

ok. Thanx alot

[Kevin Conti]

Moneypoo, Indeed sir.

[aommaster]

Moneypoo, Indeed sir.

 

What???

[Kevin Conti]

am just backing up what he said.

[aommaster]

oh ok!

by the way, its not moneypoo, its mooeypoo

[Kevin Conti]

LOL my bad, i was just drunk at the time. (no am not al alchy!, my football team glasgow celtic got knocked out the UEFA cup so i was annoyed, ended up getting leathered with all the boys.