Repeat. We all know the power of repetition from experience with insidious TV or radio commercials. By repeating your suggestion several times, perhaps using various wordings and images, you will increase its effectiveness.I’d been floating for about an hour, and several times had focused on my right foot, trying to tune in to the problem there. I had succeeded in getting rid of the pain, but every time I turned my attention elsewhere, I was brought back to the foot. It seemed to glow as if the bones were made of red-hot metal. For over a month the foot had been quite painful, ever since I had hurt it in a minor traffic accident—a bone bruise, I assumed, and ignored it. But it had refused to go away. I decided to hypnotize myself and find out what the trouble was. I began with my usual self-hypnosis induction and, once in a trance, started asking myself questions using a technique called ideomotor response: If the answer to my question was yes, my right forefinger moved in response; if no, my left forefinger. Is my right foot healing? I asked, and my finger frantically signaled NO! Is there something wrong with my foot other than a bruise? I wondered. YES, came the immediate answer. Is it serious enough that I should see a doctor? YES, cried my body to myself. After I got out of the tank I made an appointment to see a foot doctor, who took an X-ray that showed a complete fracture of a major bone.
Self-hypnosis is easy. I picked it up in about a half hour from a popular paperback on the subject, and I have never demonstrated any talent at all for “psychic” activities. Generally when you speak of hypnosis, people visualize a wild-eyed Svengali imposing his twisted will on some gentle Trilby, or a poor fool, manipulated by a stage hypnotist, barking like a dog and running around on all fours. People imagine a deep and unconscious sleep, a surrender of self-control. At bottom, they think it’s weird. Also, many look on self-hypnosis as some kind of mental feat akin to multiplying ten-digit numbers in your head: interesting, yes, but somehow suspect.
The truth is, hypnosis is a common mental state, one that most of us drift into and out of without even being aware of it, as we watch TV, read, listen to music, brush our teeth, drive our cars, ride on the subway, sunbathe, jog, or sit at our desks tapping our fingers. Not only is the hypnotic state normal, but it’s very simple to enter. The two essential elements are relaxation and focused attention. Any time you have these two elements—whether you are shaving, spaced out on a TV commercial, or listening to a Beethoven piano concerto—you are likely to be in at least a mild hypnotic state. To make conscious use of the hypnotic state one more element is required: suggestion. Such as when that TV commercial shows stalwart moose hunters cracking open a frosty beer and you find yourself heaving up out of your easy chair and moseying robot-like to the refrigerator.
Hypersuggestibility. These are just examples of ordinary trance states and suggestions that go on without our awareness much of the time. But experiments have conclusively demonstrated that when someone becomes deeply relaxed—more so than is usual in day-to-day life and eliminates distractions by focusing attention on something, such as an object, a repeated word, music, then that person enters a state known as hypersuggestibility and whatever statements or suggestions are made to him enter directly into his mind, bypassing the mental filters and other mechanisms by which we usually judge such statements. The mind accepts suggestions, and virtually any information, so readily and completely when it is in a hypersuggestible state that many educators are capitalizing on the phenomenon by inducing the state in their students and then cramming astonishing amounts of information into their brains. Some language students, for example, are said to have learned, with total recall, thousands of new words in a single session. This technique, known as superlearning, is particularly useful for floaters.
There are a number of theories as to why the mind is so open in a hyper-suggestible state. Some scientists trace it to the reticular activating system, which directs our attention and regulates our level of arousal. They suggest that when we are in a state of deep relaxation, with external stimuli eliminated or restricted by a focusing of attention, the RAS “turns up the volume” in certain receptive parts of the brain, so that when suggestions are made they are received directly and with greater volume (i.e., more attention and imputed value) than ordinarily.
Another theory, proposed by biofeedback expert Thomas Budzynski, traces hypersuggestibility to the difference in function between the left and right brains: In the relaxed state, with external awareness turned off, the usually dominant left hemisphere (in which much of our logical thought and word processing goes on) is restrained, while the right brain, seat of emotions and imagery, gains power, reaching a state of equilibrium with the left brain. Thus, in the hypersuggestible state, the two hemispheres are working together, each half potentiating the other, so that the words of the suggestion are received and linked with deep emotional associations, the rational meaning of the words strengthened by the images they call forth from the right lobe. “Get access to the right hemispheres of individuals very quickly,” says Budzynski, “and keep them in that state, and that’s where a lot of work gets done very quickly. We get at this same place with float techniques, ‘twilight learning,’ subliminal processing, hypnosis, all of these.”
Budzynski emphasizes that when the mind is in this relaxed state, with the dominance of the left hemisphere suspended and the right hemisphere functioning freely, it “has these properties of uncritical acceptance of verbal material, or almost any material it can process. What if you could cause a person to sustain that state, and not fall asleep? I believe floatation tanks are an ideal medium for doing that.”38
People in hypnotic trance respond to suggestions in ways that seem hardly possible: When told they are becoming numb, they will experience total anesthesia; when told something hot is being touched to their skin, they will form immediate blisters. But in the floatation tank, everything is intensified. The relaxation is far deeper than any available outside the tank; the ability to concentrate is enormously enhanced, since there are no distractions; and as a result, receptivity to suggestions is increased dramatically.
Hypnosis expert and rest researcher Ian Wickramsekera, of the Eastern Virginia Medical School, delivered a paper at the First International Conference on REST and Self-Regulation, “Sensory Restriction and Self-Hypnosis as Potentiators of Self-Regulation,” which presented evidence that sensory deprivation not only increases the depth of self-hypnosis, making the experience “much more vivid and more personally meaningful,” but also results in more profound hypnotic effects, such as time distortion. The most significant discovery Wickramsekera made was that the chamber is very effective in helping people enter the hypnotic state who are not ordinarily receptive to, or able to enter, hypnosis.260 This is supported by a study done by Arreed Barabasz, of Harvard Medical School, who used an isolation chamber to study hypnotic susceptibility, and concluded that “hypnotizability can be significantly and meaningfully enhanced by REST. Indeed, some [subjects] who initially scored in the lower ranges became hypnotic virtuosos ….” When we consider that hypnotic suggestion can be used for a whole range of remarkable effects—such as helping people eliminate chronic pain, overcome illness, or undergo surgery without anesthesia and its accompanying dangers—the enhancement of hypnotizability caused by floating can be seen to have great significance. Barabasz touched on this in his conclusion: “Perhaps of more importance is the finding that the enhancement effect was significant and meaningful in its generalizability from the posthypnotic suggestion to greatly increased pain tolerance scores.”13
Scripts, Programs, Habits. Those who are wary of hypnotism should remember that we are all slipping in and out of light hypnotic trances all the time, and that our beliefs, self-images, in fact all our ideological baggage, are largely the result of hypnosis. If we see ourselves as sexually irresistible, threatened by the Russians, unlucky, or cursed with a violent temper, it’s largely because we’ve been programmed, or hypnotized, to do so, through suggestions that have lodged themselves in our psyches in moments when we were particularly receptive or suggestible. Many of these suggestions, or “scripts,” are a result of childhood experiences. Budzynski points out: “If you slap a child, or in any way get it into an altered state (and an altered state by definition seems to be more of a right hemisphere dominant state), and then say something to the child, you’re going to be laying down a script in the right hemisphere, which may not have access later on to consciousness in the left hemisphere, but nevertheless will alter the behavior and attitudes of that child as an adult.” Budzynski mentioned such scripts as “You’re no good” and “You’ll never amount to anything” as particularly powerful suggestions, leading to constant self-sabotage in adult life.38 The question is not so much whether you want to be hypnotized as it is how conscious you are going to be of your hypnosis and how much control you will have over the suggestions or programs that enter your mind.
The difficulty in attempting to eliminate harmful programs, or decondition ourselves, is that our habits and beliefs tend to cling to us like leeches while we remain engaged in living our lives. It’s difficult, for example, to decondition someone’s habitual low self-esteem while he or she continues to circulate among people who seem to verify the negative self—perception. The answer, clearly, is to do the deconditioning while completely separated from the world in which one’s habits and beliefs have their being. The most effective means of “getting away from it all” yet discovered is the float tank. It is the perfect deconditioning tool, since while we are floating we are completely separated from our normal relationship with the world, including our habitual responses, our conditioned acts and attitudes. And while deconditioning ourselves from the hypnotic baggage we’ve brought with us, we find that the tank is just as ideal for reconditioning—that is, hypnotizing ourselves and offering ourselves suggestions that counteract and supersede the unwanted beliefs and habits.
Even people convinced of the positive value of self-hypnosis often say regretfully, “Oh, but I could never do it,” so certain are they that hypnosis requires some rare talent or knack. Hypnosis has been carefully and extensively observed and documented in experimental and clinical settings by scientists for over a century, and their conclusion is that under the proper conditions virtually everyone can be hypnotized. Psychoanalyst and hypnotherapist Dr. Roger Bernhardt writes, “anyone who is not neurologically impaired, retarded or psychotic can benefit from Self-hypnosis.”26 All that is required, Bernhardt insists, is a sincere desire to be hypnotized.
The reason many people feel themselves incapable of self-hypnosis is that successful self-hypnosis requires deep relaxation and the ability to concentrate so intently that external stimuli are ignored. Very few people other than those specially trained in meditation, progressive relaxation, and other mind/body control techniques, are able to fulfill these requirements, but the float tank provides them effortlessly. And as the studies of Wickramsekera and Barabasz show, floating is particularly successful in inducing a hypnotic state in people who are highly resistant to hypnosis outside the tank.
Induction. Outside the tank, the hypnotic induction process can be lengthy, but much of the time is spent in becoming progressively more deeply relaxed. In the tank, we can assume that by the time you want to induce hypnosis, you are already relaxed, either by letting go or by using one of the techniques described in the last chapter. Once you are relaxed, focus your attention on the process of hypnosis. There are countless ways of doing this, but these are among the most effective:
Counting Backward. Many hypnotists advise you to count backward from 100, but this is to ensure deep relaxation. In the tank you are already deeply relaxed and a shorter count works just as well, say from 10 down to zero. Count backward one number with each outbreath, and intersperse your counts with suggestions of increasing relaxation, increasing concentration, increasing suggestibility, and the repeated suggestion that when you reach zero you will be in a state of deep hypnosis.
Visualization of Sinking. My favorite induction method is one that takes me back to favorite diving spots on the barrier reefs of Belize and Central America. I visualize myself floating slowly downward through the clear Caribbean waters. As I sink deeper and deeper, I look upward and watch the bottom of the boat grow smaller and smaller. I can see my air bubbles streaming slowly upward toward the surface after each breath. As I sink deeper I feel the water pressure increasing on my body. I seem to grow heavier. From the corners of my eyes I see coral cliffs, coming from below and then rising above me as I sink past the multicolored outcroppings. With each counted breath I sink deeper, suggesting to myself that I am becoming deeply hypnotized, and as I reach the bottom of the sea, several hundred feet down, I sink through an opening and continue deeper and deeper into the hole, watching my boat on the surface shrink to a speck….
Signal. Most people find it helpful to have a hypnotic signal or cue, a special trigger word you use to indicate to yourself that you are now, at this instant, in hypnosis. Some like words with amusing connotations: Shazam, say, or abracadabra. Another favorite is zero—the logical end of your count, enabling you to give yourself repeated suggestions as you count down, such as “As I reach zero, I will be in a deep hypnotic trance.” Whatever signal word you select, it lets you know that at that moment you are hypnotized, and you can then move on to making use of the hypnotic trance.
Suggestions. Research shows that the hypnotic state is beneficial in itself, but in this it is little different from meditation or other kinds of deep relaxation. What distinguishes hypnosis from these other practices is its power to change behavior through suggestion. Suggestion lies at the root of all the astonishing powers of hypnosis, including total or local anesthesia, rapid self-healing, access to memories, body changes (such as disappearance of warts or tumors, or increased breast size), time distortion (making a few minutes seem like hours, or vice versa), age regression, strengthening the immune system, elimination of unwanted habits, elimination (or deconditioning, or deprogramming) of harmful attitudes such as lack of assertiveness, shyness, phobias, etc., and creation or strengthening of positive or desired attitudes and beliefs. Here are a few general principles that will enhance the effectiveness of suggestion in whatever context you wish to use it.
Repeat. We all know the power of repetition from experience with insidious TV or radio commercials. By repeating your suggestion several times, perhaps using various wordings and images, you will increase its effectiveness.
Use present tense. The unconscious mind appears to be very literal in interpreting our suggestions, so if you suggest that something will happen, your deepest conscious interprets this to mean that it is something in the future, i.e., not now. And the future, of course, is always not now. To suggest I will recover from this illness is to put recovery off until some indefinite tomorrow, while the suggestion I am now in perfect health or I am now growing stronger and healthier affirms that the process is already underway.
Suspend disbelief. When you make suggestions, try to feel that they are, at least for the time being, completely true. Suppose you are suggesting you have great confidence at public speaking, when in fact it terrifies you. Try to experience your suggestions of confidence as absolutely true; create a mental image of yourself speaking with great poise and assurance; allow the physical experience to become real. Once you have experienced it as real in your imagination, your subconscious accepts it as real.
Be positive. Positive suggestions have more force than negative ones, perhaps because the mere statement of the negative gives it substance. I don’t feel any desire to smoke reminds us subconsciously that we do in fact have a desperate desire for a cigarette, while I feel so energetic and clearheaded when I am not smoking emphasizes the positive, creating a mental image in which smoking itself is not present. Research into the differing capabilities of the two hemispheres of the brain shows that the visual-oriented right hemisphere is able to comprehend spoken language but does not process negatives very well. So, if we’re trying to bypass the logical brain and get into the deeper and more unconscious levels of the mind, we must speak in a language that every part of the brain can understand.
Be concrete and specific. Rather than making suggestions about general attitudes—I am full of confidence, or I am successful in whatever I do—deal with specific circumstances, seeing yourself confidently performing that recital, giving that speech, successfully making a certain sale, or passing a required test. Brain researchers have discovered that, in the words of Thomas Budzynski, “Right hemisphere speech comprehension is simple, concrete, nothing abstract—it doesn’t seem to process abstract material at all.”38
Visualize. Suggestions are much more potent when linked with an appropriate visual image. See the boffo review of your performance in the local newspaper. See the healing energy pouring into that broken ankle. See yourself capably handling that business negotiation. This ensures that your suggestion is implanted firmly in the visually oriented right hemisphere as well as in the verbal left, so that the suggestion is imbued with emotional energy and engages your entire mind. Also, there is evidence that any visual image held in your mind firmly enough is accepted into your permanent memory as if it were a real experience; remember the experiments in which boys who visualized themselves shooting basketballs improved as much as those who actually practiced free throws every day.
Find the rhythm. There is now evidence that suggestions are more effective when they are stated rhythmically, and linked to your own rhythms. Repeat your suggestions in a kind of internal poetry or song, in phrases that come easily, repeated in a way that harmonizes with your breathing. Brain researchers have found that voice intonation and rhythm are processed by the right hemisphere. People who are largely left-brain oriented often talk in a monotonous, unrhythmic way, while those who are skilled in gaining access to the right hemisphere—like gospel preachers—speak with powerful rhythms and great variation in voice intonation. (Compare, for example, the speech patterns of Henry Kissinger and Martin Luther King, Jr.) The rhythm and intonation of suggestions is particularly important to those who are preparing tapes of suggestions to listen to while in the tank.
Measuring Depth of Hypnosis. One frequent question is, “How do you know when you’re hypnotized?” The answer is that generally you just know: The deeply relaxed state of calm, alert lucidity and control is recognizable. With practice it becomes very familiar. However, there are a number of tests that have the added value of deepening your trance at the same time they verify it. Among them are:
Eye closure. Simply suggest to yourself that your eyelids are firmly shut, that the lids are sealed, that no matter how hard you might try to open your eyelids they will remain closed—in fact, the harder you try to open your eyelids the more tightly they will remain closed. Repeat this suggestion over and over in various forms and wordings, adding visual images (perhaps a golden needle stitching the lids shut with silver thread, or glue oozing out of a tube onto your eyelids and sealing them shut). Finally, suggest that at a given signal you will try to open your eyelids (the word try is important, since it implies failure) but will not be able to. Add to this the suggestion that when you try to open your eyelids and are unable to, it will be a signal for you to fall even deeper into hypnosis. When you try to open your lids you will find that the muscles seem paralyzed. Accept this and feel yourself falling even deeper into hypnosis.
Ideomotor response. This is the method I used to interrogate myself about my ankle. Ask yourself questions, and answer with predetermined body movements, such as moving the right forefinger to mean yes, left forefinger for no, right thumb, “I don’t want to answer the question”; left thumb, “I don’t know.” Some of the answers you get will astonish you, but it doesn’t mean your body is inhabited by an alien spirit. It is simply your subconscious or unconscious mind directing the movements of your body to convey information that you are not consciously aware of: a sort of hypnotic Ouija board.
Ultimately, the whole question of depth is of little importance. Hypnotists stress that level of trance does not significantly affect the power of your suggestions: Even in a light trance suggestions work very well. Suggestions made just in a state of deep relaxation are still quite effective and long-lasting. Concern about whether you’re actually hypnotized, and if so how deep your trance is, can be counterproductive. The best approach is the same one used for floating in general: Simply let go of striving, and allow yourself to sink as deep as you can without effort.
Implant a Cue Word. After you have given yourself the appropriate suggestions for changing behavior, and before you are ready to emerge from the trance state, implant a suggestion that will help you return easily to a trance at any time you wish by using your personal trance signal word. Pay attention to how you feel—relaxed, focused, alert and suggest that you will be able to hypnotize yourself and return to this state at any time you wish, simply by saying your trance induction word. Suggest that each time you hypnotize yourself you become more skilled and proficient at self-hypnosis; each time you go to a deeper level of trance more easily and rapidly than before.
Emerging from Trance. There is usually no pressing need to emerge from the trance while floating. When you have finished your hypnotic suggestions, simply relax, with the thought that when your float session is over you will emerge from the tank alert, relaxed, clearheaded, peaceful, and feeling wonderful. At no time is there any chance you will go into a trance and not come out. This is impossible, since you are quite conscious at all times, and should there be any need for you to act quickly, you will immediately emerge from the trance clearheaded and ready to act effectively and rationally.