Hypnosis is a topic that lived for centuries in the realm of mysticism and obscurity. We all have seen hypnotists that seem to have total control over peoples mind just by touching in a certain or saying "magic" words.

Hypnosis is strongly connected to unconscious manipulation and the removal of the free will. Hypnotists seem to have hidden, magical power over the mind of people being able to make them do things they never would do consciously.

The fact of the matter is that hypnosis is nothing of it all. So called stage hypnotists, the people that do hypnosis in front of an audience for entertainment purposes, use some techniques to entertain the audience but there is no evidence, quite the opposite, that they really have even access to the unconscious mind of their clients. It is just a funny entertainment with some nice effects like magician show.

On the other hand hypnosis is used in therapy for more than 200 years and its results often are stunning. Today we know much more about how the mind and brain works than only 100 years ago. Keep in mind that psychology is a very young branch of science.

The phenomenon we call hypnosis is known for a long time but the scientific explanation was missing. Nowadays we have better models to explain the ways our brain and mind works and with them we have better theories about phenomena like hypnosis and the unconscious and conscious mind.

Hypnosis, as most of us understand it now, is a way to allow deep relaxation with the help of language and is a process that gives a sequential path to reach deep enjoyable relaxation states.

In no way whatsoever can hypnosis conquer the mind of a person and replace her will with the will of the hypnotists. People in hypnosis are not unconscious about what is going on, rather they are hyper-conscious about what is going on but focus on their non-rational part.

Focus is the magic word. Our brain is a marvelous organ with huge processing capacities, yet it is not huge enough to process all information that it receives through the senses.

Let us have a quick look on how we sense the outside world -- and parts of our inside as well. We can see something, hear something, feel something, smell and taste something. That is it. There are exactly 5 sensory systems to get us information about the outside world.

Our eyes, for example, are basically lenses that concentrate light falling through them at a specific point -- called the focal point. Right at that point are special cells -- the retinal cells that have the capability to transfer light into electrical signals. These signals are sent to the brain and the brain interprets them and makes something out of the information.

We see through our eyes but with our brain. Now, sure enough our lenses (eyes) receive every single light ray that falls on them and, given it is intensive enough, this ray triggers an electrical signal on our retina. Yet, we do not see everything that is in our field of view.

Make a short experiment with me. For 5 seconds look around and try to remember everything in your room that is blue. Now close you eyes for a moment and tell me everything that is green. Hey, thought you where looking for blue?

Well, I just hypnotized you. What I did was I asked you to change your focus to something specific (everything that is blue) and your brain did something interesting. It filtered, even deleted, the information it was not interested into. Things that are green for example or any other color but blue. Bottom line, our brain focuses on what seems to be important for it and deletes or at least distorts the rest. Same goes with every other sense.

We can say that what we focus on is conscious and what we dont focus on at a given time is unconscious. We receive the information but we do not process it. We have the memories but we do not focus on them. Hypnosis has some techniques to shift focus from the conscious to that what usually is unconscious. It is a way to set the conscious, rational mind aside and to focus on a part that is usually unconscious.

Our conscious mind constantly evaluates. Our unconscious mind is not in the foreground most of the time because we do not focus on it. Most of us even do not know how to focus on it. Our feelings, beliefs and values are stored in a part of our mind we usually do not focus on. For good reasons because the means of a belief is to help the brain decide quickly without having to ask too much questions about an event. If we belief that something leads to pain we do not test it, evaluate it rational, we just act as if.

Hypnosis helps to get in touch with these unconscious, unfocused areas. And, hypnosis helps to change beliefs by reevaluating them. Making you aware of limitations in beliefs you might have and change them to something more useful and appropriate.

Given that all behavior is based on what our beliefs tell us, change of beliefs changes behavior. Smoking, over weight, depression, wrong nutrition and so forth are all behaviors we have learned and there are beliefs at the basis of these behaviors that make us act in a certain way, like overeating.

Hypnosis connects us to those beliefs, even if our conscious mind is not aware of it and can turn those limiting beliefs around so we can develop new beliefs that support us in achieving our personal goals.

This article may published freely only in its whole including all appendices.

2005 by Norbert Haag

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