Suggestions Blog Update

Though the mechanism of neural excitation and inhibition is as yet imperfectly known, nevertheless its observed effects are highly significant. Some of them take most striking forms, as when perspiration, appetite, or sexual desire is aroused solely by suggestion, with no adequate cause given in sensory experience; or as when activities of the intestines are inhibited merely by the recollection of a "nauseating" experience. I do not want, however, to convey the impression that excitation and inhibition, as produced by the autonomic nervous system, are unusual phenomena. Nor that their effects are confined to involuntary activities. Quite the contrary, they modify not only mechanical processes but also conscious experience. Only striking cases of excitation and inhibition attract our attention. Ordinary cases, on the other hand, occur every day, in fact every minute, yet pass unobserved, unnoticed, as a matter of course.Take, for instance, habits. Some of them, doubtless, are acquired or lost in a slow, gradual fashion. But then again we find habits formed, modified, or broken almost instantaneously. This may happen under the influence of a powerful suggestion or emotion, such as fear; or a more mechanical process may be responsible for the change. Professor Pavlov, starting with his doctrine that "extinction of conditioned reflexes is accompanied by inhibition," has actually developed a specific technique as to how to break habits. The truth is, in brief, that anything that has been learned, can also be unlearned either through the gradual process of obliviscence or through the abrupt process of inhibition. We forget either slowly or suddenly.

Suggestions Bulletin Blog

Though the mechanism of suggestion is one and the same in every case, phenomena produced through it do not always resemble one another. We should not forget that the autonomic nervous system controls every sort of involuntary action. Consequently, manifestations and effects of suggestion or auto-suggestion are so varied as to constitute a vast realm in their own right, so closely intertwined with the realm of voluntary experience-as in love, hope, or dreams-that the two realms can seldom be fully separated.

Art of Suggestion News Blog

The habits of exact observation and logical thinking are being slowly established among men, and field after field begins to be studied with a scientific attitude of mind. And research men gradually learn to trace phenomena of suggestion into the tissues of the organism. More and more, they comprehend the ways of the body and of the mind, in their mutual dependence. As one of these research men, I am anxious to help in transforming the art of suggestion into a science and in providing a scientific foundation for the study of hypnosis. I do not believe that I have retained many prejudices of the past. And I am quite certain that no mysticism vitiates my thinking. So I wrote this book. As to positive results attained in the course of my studies, the following summary is offered for consideration:

1. Most people, in getting acquainted with hyp-nosis, usually take a prejudicial attitude to it: they are aroused either to idle curiosity and enthusiasm or to unjustified contempt and disregard of the phenomena.
2. The truth is, however, that hypnotic phenomena are as natural as those of physics, biology, or economics.

Hypnotism Updates Blog

Not all fields of learning are equally adapted to hypnotic suggestion. There is hardly any great future for it in ordinary sciences, such as mathematics, history, economics, or physics. Much more promising, in this respect, are arts and skills in which emotion, particularly fear, are involved. Take, for instance, stage-fright or self-consciousness in public appearances. Everybody knows its psychological effects. One's memory is ready, one is willing and anxious to act according to one's best ability; but something happens the moment one appears on the stage : movements become clumsy, voice trembling, and memory refuses to perform its normal service. Clearly, it is a case of inhibition, and often a rather ridiculous sight. Stage-fright is due, of course, to lack of confidence and is anything but useful to the performer. It deprives the speaker of that "at-home" attitude on the platform which is essential to the stage. It makes the actor self-conscious and, therefore, unnatural in his behavior precisely at the time when mental and bodily ease are a condition of his success. Both the cause and the cure of these wide-spread difficulties are psychological. Practice may help. But there is no better remedy for them than hypnotic treatment.

Hypnotism Updates Blog

The first principle in treating objectionable habits is to condition the subject to some powerful emotion. Disgust and fear seem to be most effective, in this respect. But other emotions can be employed as well, either pleasant or unpleasant, as the case requires. Pre-hypnotic suggestions are useful, but the practician should concentrate more extensively on suggestions during the trance. Not to repeat the common but faulty practice of amateurs, the hypnotist should avail himself of, rather than violate, the rules of everyday psychological approach. Thus, it is not enough to reiterate, however vehemently, statements like "You are disgusted with your habit. You hate it. You will do your best to overcome it." Rather, one should utilize Pavlov's discovery, extensively applied to human beings by K. Dunlap, that a deliberate and repeated stimulation tends to extinguish a conditioned reflex. If the subject has, for instance, the habit of biting his nails, he is urged, while in the trance, to bite his nails consciously and repeatedly. At the same time, this procedure is associated with the feeling of disgust. Light hypnosis (oneirosis) is, of course, preferable to achieve the intended results.

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No less interesting are the possibilities offered by hypnosis in childbirth. A number of medical authorities, among them von Oettiger, J. Raefler, Schultze, and Mohr, advocated suggestion to facilitate labor, especially when the mother is psychologically opposed to having a baby. In commenting upon this question, Mohr said in effect: "There are a number of well authenticated cases in which the term of labor was fixed in hypnosis and the term kept. This offers a therapeutic possibility which is not surprising if one recalls how often psychic excitement exerts an accelerating or inhibiting influence on the process of labor. The extent to which the normal course of labor may be disturbed by psychic factors is seen perhaps most readily in cases where, because of complete distraction of attention, the automatic course of the process is not inhibited, i.e., in psychotic patients. A woman whose earlier deliveries could be handled only instrumentally can give birth easily in abnormally short time to a child of the same weight, after she has become mentally ill (this is something to which Bleuler also has called attention.)"

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Hypnotic Experiments News Blog

Though anaesthetics (ether and nitrous oxide) were known from the beginning of the nineteenth century, they were not applied to surgical practice until much later. The first operation under ether was performed in 1842, but anaesthesia was not generally used until about 1850. As far as local anaesthesia is concerned, it (cocaine) was not discovered until 1884 by C. Koller. It was approximately at this time that Esdaile, a British surgeon in India, decided to try hypnosis. In the brief period of 1847-1851, he performed, on the natives, altogether several hundred operations, both minor and major. During the first year, he was not completely successful, and some of his patients suddenly awoke in the midst of an operation. But in the subsequent years he improved his technique, gained in confidence, and operated without any disturbance on the part of his patients.

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Somnambulistic News Blog

Somnolence, it is true, may be all that is required in some cases, just as deep hypnosis may be needed in others. But in most instances, the advantages proffered by a closer contact with the autonomic nervous system are so great that a light trance is preferable whenever it can be produced. For it combines an adequate control of the subject's bodily functions with his willingness and cooperation. I have come also to the conclusion that the prevailing tendency among hypnotists to stress muscular and sensory inhibitions-not to move this limb or that, not to see this object, not to hear that sound, not to feel any pain-serves largely to conceal from scientific attention the vast field of positive suggestion. It consists in stimulating, rather than in inhibiting, various bodily and mental functions, as well as in removing undesirable inhibitions. Positive suggestion cannot always rely on mechanical obedience of the subject, which is usually connected with somnambulism. It often calls for an intense activity of the mind, in recalling forgotten experiences, in imagining new sensations, in reasoning out problems, and in establishing fresh forms of emotional conditioning. These purposes are promoted by the clearness of the subject's mind. He manifests a better response in a light trance.

Hypnosis Info Bulletin

Not only do I recommend practicians in hypnosis to take every sort of precaution for the sake of their patients and themselves; I also urge them to discourage every sign of a frivolous attitude toward this interesting field among their acquaintances and students, and to fight the abuse of hypnotic power by unscrupulous persons pursuing satisfaction of their vanity or an increase of income, rather than growth of knowledge and understanding. Not that hypnosis offers a rich field for abuse. As we have already seen, it is naturally protected against charlatans and criminals, both in regard to physical safety and moral corruption. Nevertheless, this protection is far from being sufficient. On the whole, it is true, as most scientific hypnotists assume, that the subject himself revolts against being forced to commit immoral or anti-social acts. But this is true only under normal and ordinary conditions. The possibility still remains that, in evil and skillful hands, suggestion can be used as a tool of considerable harmfulness.

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Hypnotic Suggestion Bulletin

Emotional agitation which naturally accompanies the expectation of being hypnotized for the first time should alone lead, as it seems, to unpleasant consequences and accidents. Fortunately for all concerned, this danger finds its antidote in the fact that hypnotic suggestion, properly controlled, is soothing. As J. B. Dynes says,2 "the hypnotic trance acts as a quieting influence." I have found, in my experience, nothing to contradict this observation.

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Hypnotic State Scoops

While suggestions are being given, the hypnotist should watch his subject closely. If he happens to feel uneasy or desires to make some important statement, he is not always able to manifest his wishes sufficiently plainly to attract the hypnotist's attention. Often his muscles are paralyzed for every practical purpose except to follow instructions given him. Nevertheless, motor impulses may succeed, not unlike in ordinary sleep, in breaking through the ties of inhibition and in producing a groan, a movement of the head, or result in some other slight indication. Five years ago I conducted a group experiment in education under oneirosis (a species of light hypnosis). Soon after I began to lecture, I noticed that one of my subjects, a girl already in the trance, moved her little finger again and again. The movements were merely incipient, but sufficiently obvious to make me realize that the girl wanted to express something or to communicate with me, but was unable to break the ties of muscular inhibition. I immediately interrupted the experiment, awoke her, and was told she was trying hard to inform me that I was talking too fast.

Hypnosis Daily Info Updates

In some cases requiring medical treatment, drugs may be of valuable assistance, as facilitating the process of hypnotizing. Alcohol and also chloroform, chloral hydrate (5 grains), paraldehyde (20 mms.), veronal (2 grain), and cannabis indica (12 grain) have been used with considerable success (Esdaile, Schrenck-Notzing, Herrero, Bernheim, Jastrow, and others). All systematic use of chemicals should be discouraged, however, and the hypnotist should resort to their application only in exceptional cases. In experiments, too, the practician should avoid drugs, unless the procedure be specially devised, following a careful estimate of the narcotic effect. Drugs will raise the percentage of successful hypnotization, to be sure; but, on the other hand, the significance of the results may be thereby greatly obscured. It then becomes somewhat difficult to determine precisely what role was played by the drug and what by the suggestion, and also to what extent did the narcotics interfere with the hypnotic regulation of bodily processes.

Hypnosis Daily Bulletin

These simple rules, though by no means compulsory in every case, are so elementary that they are being applied wherever suggestion is of value. Life imposes them, in fact, upon virtually all professional men, in their relations to clients. Any good physician, for instance, knows that the atmosphere of his office accounts for half of his success among patients, not only from the monetary but also from the curative point of view. And if he estimates soundly the role of these seemingly irrelevant factors, he will not hesitate to pay a high rent, to furnish his reception-room cleanly and impressively, and even to purchase an automobile whose make tends to magnify his prestige. That environment, if properly selected, facilitates suggestion should be best understood, of all people, by the hypnotist.

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The Hypnotic State Blog Update

There is, therefore, no need for us to believe that sleep and hypnosis are strictly identical. Their apparent similarity may signify a certain kinship of the two kinds of phenomena, a kinship assumed by the practicians since the days of Braid who called the hypnotic state "a nervous and artificial sleep." The late Professor I. P. Pavlov was the leading champion of the "Differentiation of the Hypnotic Trance from Normal Sleep," Journal of Experimental Psychology, hypothesis that ordinary sleep and hypnosis belong to the same group of phenomena and are merely different manifestations of inhibitory processes. According to him, the distinction between them can be briefly described as follows: "Inhibition is partial sleep, or sleep distributed in localized parts, forced into narrow limits. . . Hypnosis is inhibition spread over the usually active points in special areas of the hemispheres. Sleep is inhibition irradiated over the whole area of active points of the hemispheres and even over some parts of the brain below the cerebral hemispheres."

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Hypnotic State Blog Update

Full identity is out of question between the two sets of phenomena, hysteric and hypnotic. But the relationship is doubtless close. How can it be explained? A similarity of effects, anywhere in nature, can be accounted for, barring accident, in one of two ways: either the phenomena in question are themselves of the same kind or they proceed from a common source. The first alternative having been disproved by Bernheim, it remains for us to accept the second. As a parallel study of the phenomena of suggestion (including hypnosis) and those of hysteria shows a remarkable functional similarity, it must be rooted in the identity of the bodily mechanism underlying them, that is to say, in the mechanism of the autonomic nervous system. Hysteria, like the hypnotic state, manifests the signs of both the excitatory and inhibitory functions of the autonomic nervous system. The precipitating cause of neurosis is, as clinical observation demonstrates, almost invariably some shock of personal experience, but the basic explanation is to be looked for in some functional or organic disorder of the autonomic nervous system.

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Hypnotism Helpful Hints News

Persons have been known to drink kerosene or diluted ink with apparent pleasure, as if it were wine, tea or milk, depending on the suggestion. Persons have been known to turn away with the expression of disgust on their faces from an excellent perfume; or to inhale with delight the vapors from a bottle of ammonia. Perception, evidently, is subject to serious modification in hypnosis.Krafft-Ebing made his subjects develop goose-pimples by suggesting a cold bath to them; also to lower or raise their bodily temperature, in accordance with his directions. Bramwell changed the rate of pulsation, to range on different occasions between sixty and over one hundred beats per minute. Eichelberg caused fever, in the same manner. Skin blisters were produced by suggesting a burn in experiments undertaken independently by Wetterstrand, Schrenck-Notzing, Delboeuf, C. Kreibich, F. Heller, and others. Even time could be regulated in some instances almost to the minute when blisters were to appear.

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Hypnosis News Today

However, underneath the sensational appearance, there is nothing miraculous about the phenomena of hypnosis. It is important for scientific men to recognize this fact, before they can free themselves from mysticism in investigation as well as from the opposite (negative) prejudice that the phenomena of suggestion are not worthy of scientific attention. When a problem had been interpreted in a wrong way, the scientist is not justified to turn his mind away from it in disgust. He must face it and correct whatever mistakes had been committed. The truth remains that everything in nature deserves serious and accurate study, and that every phenomenon is natural. Such recognition is the first principle of scientific method and the chief prerequisite for all fruitful and careful research. A talented observer converted to mysticism ceases to be a scientist. Let there be no mistake, science comes not to promote but to destroy superstition. And now let us keep in mind that the phenomena underlying the field of hypnotism are natural.

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Hypnotizing Your Subject News

Process of Hypnotizing Once you have made up your mind to hypnotize a subject, be sure that there exists between you the relationship of prestige-and-faith. Furthermore, ascertain yourself that the subject is in good health. If you are not a physician, make him undergo a preliminary medical examination. Finally, take a written consent of your subject that he is willing to be hypnotized. This latter precaution is necessary mainly for your own protection. When you, or still better your assistant or secretary, are through with these preliminaries, everything is ready for hypnotizing. How will you go about it ?

Let it be understood that there exist countless techniques, all of which are equally good so long as they give confidence to the practician and faith to the subject. The only purpose of any method of hypnotizing is to concentrate the subject's attention and thus to eliminate most of the disturbing influences while leaving but a single channel of suggestion, which is usually the voice of the hypnotist and the ear of the subject.

Hypnosis Helpful Hints Blog

The subject of hypnosis needed to be taken off of the vaudeville stage, out of the laboratory, and into the minds of thoughtful persons everywhere. Its merits are solid and various. It begins by showing that the phenomena of hypnotism are not mystical but natural. As such, they are susceptible to scientific analysis as well as control.The author then arouses our interest by proceeding to give one of the best descriptions of hypnotic wonders in the literature of hypnosis. These, he shows, are closely connected with hysteria, and with the still better known effects of suggestion and emotion. His running account of all these effects makes the reader feel he owes it to himself to grasp the situation.

Hypnotic Influence Info

As to the causes of this condition as produced Dr. Cocke says: "I firmly believed that something would happen when the attempt was made to hypnotize me. Secondly, I wished to be hypnotized. These, together witha vivid imagination and strained attention, brought on the states which occurred."

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Free Hypnotism Helpful Hints

Such facts as these have stimulated experiment in the direction of testing thought transference. These experiments have usually been in the reading of numbers and names, and a certain measure of success has resulted. It may be added, however, that no claimants ever appeared for various banknotes deposited in strong-boxes, to be turned over to anyone who would read the numbers. Just why success was never attained under these conditions it would be hard to say. The writer once made a slight observation in this direction. When matching pennies with his brother he found that if the other looked at the penny he could match it nearly every time. There may have been some unconscious expression of face that gave the clue. Persons in hypnotic trance are expert muscle readers. For instance, let such a person take your hand and then go through the alphabet, naming the letters. If you have any word in your mind, as the muscle reader comes to each letter the muscles will unconsciously contract. By giving attention the muscles you can make them contract on the wrong letters and entirely mislead such a person.

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Hypnotism Scoops

It is on power of supersensory, or extra-sensory perception that what is known as telepathy and clairvoyance are based. That such things really exist, and are not wholly a matter of superstition has been thoroughly demonstrated in a scientific way by the British Society for Psychical Research, and kindred societies in various parts of the world. Strictly speaking, such phenomena as these are not a part of hypnotism, but our study of hypnotism will enable us to understand them to some extent, and the investigation of them is a natural corollary to the study of hypnotism, for the reason that it has been found that these extraordinary powers are often possessed by persons under hypnotic influence. Until the discovery of hypnotism there was little to go on in conducting a scientific investigation, because clairvoyance could not be produced by any artificial means, and so could not be studied underproper restrictive conditions.

Aspects of Hypnotism News Blog

In this book the reader will find a summary of the theories of hypnotism. There is no doubt that hypnotism is a complex state which cannot be explained in an off hand way in a sentence or two.There are, however, certain aspects of hypnotism which we may suppose sufficiently explained by certain scientific writers on the subject.

First, what is the character of the delusions apparently created in the mind of a person in the hypnotic condition by a simple word of mouth statement, as when a physician says, "Now, I am going to cut your leg off, but it will not hurt you in the least," and the patient suffers nothing?

Clinical Hypnotherapy Blog News

"The next day I placed him in a chair and induced hypnotism, by a fixed gaze, in less than a minute. Two Italian physicians, Drs. Triani and Colombo who were present during the operation, declared that the subject lost all sensibility and that his muscles retained all the different positions in which they were put exactly as in the cataleptic state. The patient saw nothing, felt nothing, and heard nothing, his brain remaining in communication only with me.

"As soon as we had ascertained that the patient was completely under the influence of the hypnotic slumber, I said to him: 'You will sleep for aquarter of an hour,' knowing that the operation would not last longer than that; and he remained seated and perfectly motionless.

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Hypnotherapy Online Blog

A waiter at Nantes, who was magnetized by a commercial traveler,remained for two days in a state of lethargy, and for three hours Dr. Foure and numerous spectators were able to verify that "the extremities were icy cold, the pulse no longer throbbed, the heart had no pulsations, respiration had ceased, and there was not sufficient breath to dim a glass held before the mouth. Moreover, the patient was stiff, his eyes were dull and glassy." Nevertheless, Lafontaine was able to recall this man to life.

Dr. Courmelles says: "Paralysis of one or more members, or of the tongue, may follow the awakening. These are the effects of the contractions of the internal muscles, due often to almost imperceptible touches. The diaphragm--and therefore the respiration--may be stopped in the same manner. Catalepsy and more especially lethargy, produce these phenomena."

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Hypnotic Sleep News Blog

Among the most definite claims of the evil deeds that may be compelled during hypnotic sleep is that of Dr. Luys, whom we have already seen as being himself deceived by professional hypnotic subjects. Says he: "You cannot only oblige this defenseless being, who is incapable of opposing the slightest resistance, to give from hand to hand anything you may choose, but you can also make him sign a promise, draw up a bill of exchange, or any other kind of agreement. You may make him write an holographic will (which according to French law would be valid), which he will hand over to you, and of which he will never know the existence.He is ready to fulfill the minutest legal formalities, and will do so with a calm, serene and natural manner calculated to deceive the most expert law officers. These somnambulists will not hesitate either, you may be sure, to make a denunciation, or to bear false witness; they are,I repeat, the passive instruments of your will. For instance, take E. She will at my bidding write out and sign a donation of forty pounds in my favor. In a criminal point of view the subject under certain suggestions will make false denunciations, accuse this or that person, and maintain with the greatest assurance that he has assisted at an imaginary crime. I will recall to your mind those scenes of fictitious assassination, which have exhibited before you. I was careful to place in the subject's hands a piece of paper instead of a dagger or a revolver; but it is evident, that if they had held veritable murderous instruments, the scene might have had a tragic ending."

Hypnotherapy Online Daily

"We know that many hospital patients who are subjected to the higher or greater treatment of hypnotism are of very doubtful reputations; we know also the effects of a temperament which in them is peculiarly addicted to simulation, and which is exaggerated by the vicinity of maladies similar to their own. To judge of this, it is necessary to have seen them encourage each other in simulation, rehearsing among themselves, or even before the medical students of the establishment, the experiments to which they have been subjected; and going through their different contortions and attitudes to exercise themselves in them. And then, again, in the present day, has not the designation of an 'hypnotical subject' become almost a social position? To be fed, to be paid,admired, exhibited in public, run after, and all the rest of it--all this is enough to make the most impartial looker-on skeptical."

But is it enough to enable us to produce an a priori negation? Certainly not; but it is sufficient to justify legitimate doubt. And when we come to moral phenomena, where we have to put faith in the subject, the difficulty becomes still greater. Supposing suggestion and hallucination to begranted, can they be demonstrated? Can we by plunging the subject in hypnotical sleep, feel sure of what he may affirm? That is impossible,for simulation and somnambulism are not reciprocally exclusive terms,and Monsieur Pitres has established the fact that a subject who sleeps may still simulate." Messieurs Binet and Fere in their book speak of "the honest Hublier, whom his somnambulist Emelie cheated for four years consecutively."

Hypnotherapy Training Helpful Hints

It has already been remarked that hypnotism and hysteria are conditions very nearly allied, and that hysterical neuropathic individuals make the best hypnotic subjects. Now persons of this character are in most cases morally as well as physically degenerate, and it is a curious fact that deception seems to be an inherent element in nearly all such characters.Expert doctors have been thoroughly deceived. And again, persons who have been trying to expose frauds have also been deceived by the positive statements of such persons that they were deceiving the doctors when they were not. A diseased vanity seems to operate in such cases and the subjects take any method which promises for the time being to bring them into prominence. Merely to attract attention is a mania with some people.

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The Hypnotic Experience Blog

The next step was to put the hypnotists hand over his head, and tell him he could not put it down. Then he stroked the arm and said it was growing numb. He said: "You have no feeling in it, have you?" Dr. Cocke goes on: "I said 'No,' and I knew that I said 'No,' yet I knew that I had a feeling in it." The operator went on, pricking the arm with a pin,and though Dr. Cocke felt the pain he said he did not feel it, and at the same time the sensation of terror increased. "I was not conscious of my body at all," he says further on, "but I was painfully conscious of the two contradictory elements within me. I knew that my body existed,but could not prove it to myself. I knew that the statements made by the operator were in a measure untrue. I obeyed them voluntarily and involuntarily. This is the last remembrance that I have of that hypnotic experience."

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Suggestive Hypnotism Daily

The will of another is not so easily implanted during hypnotism as has been claimed.While a patient will follow almost any suggestion that may be offered,he readily obeys only commands which are in keeping with his character.If he is commanded to do something he dislikes or which in the waking state would be very repugnant to him, he hesitates, does it very reluctantly, and in extreme cases refuses altogether, often going into hysterics.

It was found at the Charity hospital that one patient absolutely refused to accept a cassock and become a priest. One of Monsieur Richet's patients screamed with pain the moment an amputation was suggested, but almost immediately recognized that it was only a suggestion, and laughed in the midst of her tears. Probably, however,this patient was not completely hypnotized.

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Anxiety and Phobia Workbook Blog

If the muscles, nerves or tendons are rubbed or pressed during the hypnosis, paralysis maybe produced, which, however, is quickly removed by the use of electricity, when the patient awakes.

By manipulating the muscles the most rigid contraction may be produced during the hypnotism, until the entire body is in such a state of corpse-like rigidity that a most startling experiment is possible. The subject may be placed with his head upon the back of one chair and his heels on the back of another, and a heavy man may sit upon him without seemingly producing any effect, or even heavy rock may be broken on the subject's body.

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Suggestive Hypnotism News

The moment he made them desist during the hypnotism, by snapping his fingers, the spell was broken. It was most astonishing to see that as each one awoke, he seemed to be fully cognizant of the ridiculous position in which his comrades were placed, and to enjoy their confusion and ludicrous attitudes. The moment, however, he was commanded to do things equally absurd, he obeyed. While, therefore, the class appeared to be free agents, they are under hypnotic control.

One young fellow, aged about eighteen, said that he was addicted to the cigarette habit. The suggestive hypnotism was made to him that he would not be able to smoke a cigarette for twenty-four hours. After the entertainment he was asked to smoke, as was his usual habit. He was then away from anyone who could influence him. He replied that the very idea was repugnant. However, he was induced to take a cigarette in his mouth, but it made him ill and he flung it away with every expression of disgust.

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The Hypnotic State News

"After having inquired of the patient what he is suffering from, without any further or closer examination, he places his hand on the patient's forehead and starts to hypnotize, scarcely looking at him, says, 'You are going to sleep.'Then, almost immediately, he closes the eyelids, telling him that he is asleep. After that he raises the patient's arm, and says, 'You cannot put your arm down.' If he does, Dr. Liebault appears hardly to notice it. He then turns the patient's arm around, confidently affirming that the movement cannot be stopped, and saying this he turns his own arms rapidly around, the patient remaining all the time with his eyes shut;then the doctor talks on without ceasing in a loud and commanding voice.

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Hypnotism Helpful Hints

In short--whether it be a coincidence or the truth--imagination was considered the sole active agent in hypnotism. Where upon d'Eslon remarked, 'If imagination is the best cure, why should we not use the imagination as acurative means?' Did he, who had so vaunted the existence of the fluid,mean by this to deny its existence, or was it rather a satirical way of saying. 'You choose to call it imagination; be it so. But after all, as it cures, let us make the most of it'?

There is also another thing that must be taken into account with hypnotism. Science teaches that all matter is in vibration. Indeed, philosophy points to the theory that matter itself is nothing more than centers of force in vibration. The lowest vibration we know is that of sound. Then comes, at an enormously higher rate, heat, light (beginning at dark red and passing through the prismatic colors to violet which has a high vibration), to the chemical rays, and then the so-called X or unknown rays which have a much higher vibration still. Electricity is a form of vibration, and according to the belief of many scientists, life is a species of vibration so high that we have no possible means of measuring it. As every student of science knows, air appears to be the chief medium for conveying vibration of sound, metal is the chief medium forconveying electric vibrations, while to account for the vibrations of heat and light we have to assume (or imagine) an invisible, imponderable ether which fills all space and has no property of matter that we can distinguish except that of conveying vibrations of light in its various forms.

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Mental Method of Hypnotization Daily

"The hypnotic state can be produced in one of the following ways: First,command the subject to close his eyes. Tell him his mind is a blank.Command him to think of nothing. Leave him a few minutes; return and tell him he cannot open his eyes."

"If he fails to do so, then begin to make any suggestion which may be desired. This is the so-called mental method of hypnotization."

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sleep hypnosis

The Neurosis Theory. We have already explained the word neurosis, but we repeat here the definition given by Dr. J. R. Cocke. "A neurosis is any affection of the nervous centers occurring without any material agent producing it, without inflammation or any other constant structural change which can be detected in the nervous centers. As will be seen from the definition, any abnormal manifestation of the nervous system of whose cause we know practically nothing, is, for convenience, termed a neurosis. If a man has a certain habit or trick, it is termed a neurosis or neuropathic habit. One man of my acquaintance, who is a professor in a college, always begins his lecture by first sneezing and then pulling at his nose. Many forms of tremor are called neurosis. Now to say that hypnotism is the result of a neurosis, simply means that a person's nervous system is susceptible to this condition, which, by M. Charcotand his followers, is regarded as abnormal."

sleep hypnosis

Sometimes this sleep is deep and lasting, and the patient is totally insensible; but the interesting phase of the condition is that in certain stages the patient is only partially asleep, while the other part of his brain is awake and very active.

It is well known that one part of the brain may be affected without affecting the other parts. In hemiplegia, for instance, one half of the nervous system is paralyzed, while the other half is all right. In the stages of hypnotism we will now consider, the will portion of the brain or mind seems to be put to sleep, while the other faculties are,abnormally awake.

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The fixity of gaze must, according to him, exhaust the nerve centers of the eyes and their surroundings. He made a friend look steadily at the neck of a bottle, and his own wife look at anornamentation on the top of a china sugar bowl: sleep was the consequence. Here hypnotism had its origin, and the fact was established that sleep could be induced by physical agents.

This, it must be remembered, is the essential difference between these two classes of phenomena (magnetism and hypnotism): for magnetism supposes a directaction of the magnetizer on the magnetized subject, an action which does not exist in hypnotism."

sleep hypnosis

Sardonic laughter, piteous moans and torrents of tears burst forth on all sides. The bodies were thrown back in spasmodic jerks, the respirations sounded like death rattles, the most terrifying symptoms were exhibited. Then suddenly the actors of this strange scene would frantically or rapturously rush towards each other, either rejoicing and embracing or thrusting away their neighbors with every appearance of horror.

"Another room was padded and presented another spectacle. There women beat their heads against wadded walls or rolled on the cushion-covered floor, in fits of suffocation. In the midst of this panting, quivering throng, Mesmer, dressed in a lilac coat, moved about, extending a magic wand toward the least suffering, halting in front of the most violently excited and gazing steadily into their eyes, while he held both their hands in his, bringing the middle fingers in immediate contact to establish communication. At another moment he would, by a motion of open hands and extended fingers, operate with the great current, crossing anduncrossing his arms with wonderful rapidity to make the final passes."

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Hypnotism of animals

CHAPTER X--Hypnotism of animals--Snake charming

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History of hypnotism

INTRODUCTION--History of hypnotism--Mesmer--Puysegur--Braid--What is hypnotism?--Theories of hypnotism: 1. Animal magnetism; 2. The NeurosisTheory; 3. Suggestion Theory


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