Read Online Hidden Depths: The Story of Hypnosis by Robin Waterfield - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Robin Waterfield
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trance: the hypnoidal state, light trance, medium trance, deep trance, somnambulistic state. The term âsomnambulismâ is a hangover from the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, and since it means âsleepwalkingâ it is inaccurate, but it has been perpetuated in the literature on hypnosis. âSleep-wakingâ, a term which also has a long history, might be a better alternative. Since a regular hypnotic subject soon develops shortcuts to reach the full hypnotic state, the different stages of deep hypnosis are easiest to observe in a novice subject. If you've been hypnotized yourself, you may have noticed different phases in yourself. A light trance feels like being relaxed, but in a deeper trance, impressions are fresher, imagery is more vivid and so on.
What's happening, as the trance deepens, is that our generalized reality orientation is fading. Every situation every one of us encounters at any second of the day is actually unique. There has never been exactly this time before; even your front door has never been in exactly this light before. One of the main reasons that childhood is a time of wonder is that children are constantly meeting events they have never seen before, which strike them afresh. As we get older and our egos become the focal point of our lives, we assimilate new situations with old ones, accepting second best. Each of usdevelops a frame of reference, a world view, which we use to assess events and experiences. Those which don't fit in are often rejected, while the rest are slotted into a preformed category. Psychologists call this our âgeneralized reality orientationâ or GRO. It's not a bad thing: it enables us, for instance, to recognize that a movie is not real life, because we have a context in which we know that the movie is just a movie. One of the main things that happens in hypnosis is that our GRO fades in favour of a special, temporary orientation. The more the GRO fades the deeper the trance. The fading of the GRO involves a reduction in our critical faculties, so that things like fragmentary memories which might not normally impinge on our minds are accepted. That, to continue with the example of memories, is how recall can be enhanced by hypnosis. More generally, it is how we become more open to the suggestions the hypnotist puts to us.
Since the GRO is our filtering and editing mechanism, as the trance deepens and the GRO fades you get more in touch with unconscious regions of the mind. The unconscious is the basement of the mind. Far from everything down there is bad, but there are dusty corners where odd and potentially dangerous things lurk, all one's primitive impulses and desires. Everything we do not want to face about ourselves and the world has been shoved into one such corner. Every memory that we have is stored somewhere, capable of reconstruction. Everything of which we are not immediately conscious is by definition in an unconscious part of the mind. The conscious mind is characterized by everything that is immediately accessible; its relation to the unconscious mind is somewhat like a person taking a torch down into the cellar: we can use our consciousness to illuminate, or gain access to, areas of the unconscious mind. But the point is that the unconscious is taking in, storing and processing information on its own, even when it is not illuminated by consciousness. One scientist has put it like this: âThe Unconscious is not unconscious, only the Conscious is unconscious of what the Unconscious is conscious of.â Hypnosis is a good way of bringing into consciousness material from unconscious regions, and so facing and reframing such material.
I'm not a very good hypnotic subject myself, but I can fairly easily go into a light trance, and in that state one of the primarysubjective impressions is a peculiarly ambiguous feeling. On the one hand, you are certain that if you chose to you would not go along with the hypnotist's
What's happening, as the trance deepens, is that our generalized reality orientation is fading. Every situation every one of us encounters at any second of the day is actually unique. There has never been exactly this time before; even your front door has never been in exactly this light before. One of the main reasons that childhood is a time of wonder is that children are constantly meeting events they have never seen before, which strike them afresh. As we get older and our egos become the focal point of our lives, we assimilate new situations with old ones, accepting second best. Each of usdevelops a frame of reference, a world view, which we use to assess events and experiences. Those which don't fit in are often rejected, while the rest are slotted into a preformed category. Psychologists call this our âgeneralized reality orientationâ or GRO. It's not a bad thing: it enables us, for instance, to recognize that a movie is not real life, because we have a context in which we know that the movie is just a movie. One of the main things that happens in hypnosis is that our GRO fades in favour of a special, temporary orientation. The more the GRO fades the deeper the trance. The fading of the GRO involves a reduction in our critical faculties, so that things like fragmentary memories which might not normally impinge on our minds are accepted. That, to continue with the example of memories, is how recall can be enhanced by hypnosis. More generally, it is how we become more open to the suggestions the hypnotist puts to us.
Since the GRO is our filtering and editing mechanism, as the trance deepens and the GRO fades you get more in touch with unconscious regions of the mind. The unconscious is the basement of the mind. Far from everything down there is bad, but there are dusty corners where odd and potentially dangerous things lurk, all one's primitive impulses and desires. Everything we do not want to face about ourselves and the world has been shoved into one such corner. Every memory that we have is stored somewhere, capable of reconstruction. Everything of which we are not immediately conscious is by definition in an unconscious part of the mind. The conscious mind is characterized by everything that is immediately accessible; its relation to the unconscious mind is somewhat like a person taking a torch down into the cellar: we can use our consciousness to illuminate, or gain access to, areas of the unconscious mind. But the point is that the unconscious is taking in, storing and processing information on its own, even when it is not illuminated by consciousness. One scientist has put it like this: âThe Unconscious is not unconscious, only the Conscious is unconscious of what the Unconscious is conscious of.â Hypnosis is a good way of bringing into consciousness material from unconscious regions, and so facing and reframing such material.
I'm not a very good hypnotic subject myself, but I can fairly easily go into a light trance, and in that state one of the primarysubjective impressions is a peculiarly ambiguous feeling. On the one hand, you are certain that if you chose to you would not go along with the hypnotist's
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