On the Hypnosis Listserv in which I participate, a member shared a Youtube video that supposedly demonstrated the use of hypnosis with a volunteer. The two hypnotists used rapid fire instructions: “You are getting relaxed, more and more relaxed,” and “go deeper, deeper, deeper.” Dr. Dan Kohen, pediatrician and child hypnosis pioneer, objected to this directive style and use of language.
But this video, with 20,000 views ain’t nothing compared to the vast wasteland of hypnosis shows and demonstrations out there. Most of them make a Barnum and Bailey freak show look as tame as a Sunday school class.
I won’t even go into the shameless videos that that purport to show hypnotists doing things like making a woman take off her clothes and lie on a pool table. Well, one recent example, with 482,000 views, comes close. Entitled “Hypnosis Ambush,” a dude in a tight muscle shirt in the middle of a crowd of anonymous young people. says to the camera, “Look at this, she won’t even see what’s coming.”
He walks up to two young women, says his name, grabs her hand and points her palm at her face, close range, “Look at those two lines come together, Go to sleep,” and she collapses backwards in his arms.
Not quite as threatening, or misogynistic, but just about as spooky are the “hypnotists,” (I use that word advisedly) who have set up some “volunteers” (in quotes because they are probably co-conspirators) who have been “hypnotized” beforehand with a posthypnotic suggestion so they will do something funny and demeaning when they hear the hypnotist guy (and they are always guys in seersucker jackets and/or tight T shirts) say a cue.
One such fellow made it on to a news show on CNN. A couple, previously “hypnotized,” sat between him and the gullible newscaster. He quickly hypnotized with them with a 1,2,3 and a snap of their fingers. They immediately “fell asleep,” sitting up, on the couch, with their heads tucked to their chests. Then the newscaster and the hypnotist talked for awhile about the process. The newscaster commented “how relaxed” the couple looked. If you’ve ever set upright on a couch with your head chin touching your chest, did you find it relaxing? If they really were “asleep,” do you think they would have sat there upright without even tilting to the side?
After about 5 minutes, he “woke them up,” with another fingersnap, and then said the magic word, “Atlanta,” I believe, and the man, on cue, took off his shoe, believing it was a telephone. The woman asked “What are you doing?” before she did something silly, and they were both put back “to sleep.”
This Youtube also had hundreds of thousands of views, not to mention being on CNN.
In other video, a hypnotist at some sort of hypnosis meeting goes around through the crowd of men, all wearing suit jackets and snaps his fingers and zonks them out, as they stand there (no, they don’t fall over either.) Why all men? I thought. Why all in suit jackets? Why are they all standing?
Still another video shows a white hypnotist, doing his thing with a black man, who is then, creepily, under his control.
All these hypnotists, use rapid fire directive talk, all the same phony language—about as modern and scientific as Anton Mesmer’s magnetic batons and healing baths of the 18th century. But it’s worse. At least Mesmer was trying to heal people, and at least occasionally, he did. But these hypno-frauds are just in it for the money.
Those of us who REALLY use hypnosis, to help clients and patients, do exactly the opposite of what you see in these videos. Our language is slow, soft, gentle, and often dependent on what the client or patient suggests. We don’t snap fingers. Eye closure is at their own pace, or not at all. We never say “Go to sleep.” We never say “deeper deeper deeper". Post hypnotic suggestions, if used, are simply what any therapist does at the end of the session, reminding the person to think of the solution to a problem, if/when that problem comes up again. It’s alot like meditation.
As Dr. Michael Yapko has famously said, “Hypnosis is not so unique or special, but it can do special things.” But that doesn’t make for sexy air time on Youtube. His videos and those of a few other teachers and colleagues of mine, only have a few hundred views. (And unfortunately, I don’t foresee this blog going viral either!)
It’s too bad. If you want to learn about the real thing, ignore Youtube and check out some of the good summaries about clinical hypnosis at the VeryWellMind or National Institute of Health websites. Or read Dr. Yapko’s book, Trancework. Take a meditation course; that’s a lot more like real hypnosis, than what you see demonstrated on Youtube. Or see a bonafide psychotherapist, nurse practitioner, or physician trained and certified through the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis or the National Pediatric Hypnosis Training Institute.