Is Hypnotherapy Mind Control?
By Rev. Dr. Nadine Rosechild Sullivan, Ph.D.
Oftentimes clients are unsure, or frightened, of hypnosis. Their image of hypnosis is based on old
movies in which mesmerists make townfolk walk like zombies, or on stage hypnotists, who make
audience members quack like ducks. These images do not represent the reality, or the potential, of clinical hypnotherapy.
Stage hypnotists put out a call for willing audience participants—a self-selecting sample that excludes those too reserved or circumspect to participate in, what is, essentially, a show. The hypnotist then reduces the pool further by testing for “hypnotizability,” rejecting those who don’t respond immediately. The finely-strained sample that remains on stage for the demonstration is a select group, looking for fun and open to the suggestions that might yield that fun.
And as for old movies, well, they are, quite simply, fiction, and the image of the hypnotist in film is
sensationalized as part of the thrill of the film.
Neither of these represents the truth of clinical hypnosis.
Anyone can be hypnotized.
There is a lot of talk about whether it takes more, or less, intelligence to be “able” to be hypnotized, and sometimes, people who have been hypnotized in the past are not sure that they were “really under,” because they didn’t feel all that different.
Hypnotic states are natural functions of the mind.
Whenever you drive a familiar route, say between work and home, and arrive at your destination
without really remembering the drive, it is because you slipped into a light level of hypnosis.
Deeper levels of hypnosis include the state just before, or just as you awake, from sleep. You are
conscious and aware, but your conscious has stepped back and your unconscious has stepped forward.
Since hypnosis makes use of mental images and memory, if you can shut your eyes and picture what’s in your refrigerator or "see" a large yellow dog in your mind's eye when someone says, "large yellow dog," you have enough imagination and intelligence to be “hypnotizable."
You can be hypnotized, because hypnosis is not something done to you.
If I “hypnotize” you, it does not mean that I have any “control over” you.
It only means that you have decided to trust me enough to allow yourself to relax to the sound of my voice and picture, in your mind's eye, the agreed-upon images I suggest and/or to tell yourself (either vocally or simply internally) the answers to the pre-agreed-upon kinds of questions you want me to ask.
But you never "have to" answer or imagine. You never "have to" do anything.
The person “under” hypnosis, even in a stage demonstration, is always and at all times, in control of themselves. You can always bring yourself out of it, and it is always you who allows yourself to go into it.
Despite the slight-of-hand of the stage magician, even stage hypnosis is not a state in which a person is controlled by another. And hypnotherapy is not intended for entertainment purposes.
Much more accurately, hypnosis/hypnotherapy is a combination of relaxation and focused imagination.
Since the unconscious (subconscious) is not as directive and logically-oriented as the conscious mind, the benefit of working with a hypnotherapist (over self-hypnosis or hypnosis CDs) is that you have a trusted guide to ask your unconscious the next logical question. I use progressive relaxation through guided visualization and couple that with the questions you want to explore. (Without a guide, your unconscious will answer only the questions you went in with. You will see one scene, not the complete picture.)
In hypnotherapy, two people (the client and the hypnotist) are cooperating toward a mutually desired end result. In the clinical use of hypnotherapy, both client and hypnotherapist are interested in accessing the power of the client’s subconscious (or unconscious) mind to help the client achieve specific understandings and bring changes, and more control (to the client) of, her or his own life. Hypnotherapy is a social interaction set up at the request of the client, for the good of the client. It is client-directed. In each new session, the client and hypnotherapist discuss the progress of the previous sessions, and lay out the next step of the journey.
In hypnotherapy, YOU are in control and aware at all times.
Many of us are survivors of abuse— emotional, physical, sexual (primarily women but including many men), and spiritual. Because we have faced these violations in the past, it is only logical that one of our foremost concerns is trying to insure that we are never in such a situation again. While we must all extend some degree of trust just to function in this world, our concern for our own safety sometimes means that we limit our own freedoms, as we go to extra lengths to insure our safety and security.
The gender of practitioners can be important to survivors. Clients also, often, have a need to find
practitioners who can understand other specific diversities—including racial, ethnic, cultural and
religious differences. And members of sexual minorities, like those who are lesbian, gay, bisexual,
transgender, intersex or questioning, want to know that a provider is not only accepting—but
affirming—of who they are and knowledgeable (I have a graduate concentration in sexuality and
gender) about their life experiences and worldview.
Over many years of working across lines of diversity and with survivors (either of abuse or of the
tremendous demand for conformity in our society), I have learned that we sometimes deny ourselves access to healing modalities that might help us, because we don’t know a practitioner who is likely to understand us, or because the modality includes a loss of control—like medical tests or treatments that require anesthesia.
Hypnosis involves no loss of control. Even when hypnosis is used to reduce the need for anesthesia — in dentistry or childbirth — there is no loss of consciousness.
The words “sleep” and “trance” are commonly used to describe the relaxed state one can achieve
through hypnosis, but these words are actually overstatements. You are never unaware “under
hypnosis.”
“Under” hypnosis, nothing can be done to you, or with you, that you aren’t aware of or that you
cannot immediately stop. Even if a practitioner were to give you a post-hypnotic suggestion that you would forget everything that had been said or that you had experienced, this suggestion would only work if you were willing to cooperate with it.
Even when fully, deeply, “hypnotized,” you never lose consciousness, since hypnosis is simply a
relaxed state. One can be more or less deeply relaxed, but it is still only relaxation.
And yet, it is a powerful relaxation that allows YOU to choose to shift the programming in your own subconscious mind.
Freud talked about the conscious and the unconscious (or subconscious) mind. We spend our lives functioning through our conscious minds. With our conscious minds we think, worry, feel, desire, and more. But, as scientists say, we use only a limited portion of that which is available to us. We may use as little as 10%, leaving the other 90% untapped.
Hypnosis is a way to access the other 90%—to tap your own mental power.
Picture an iceberg.
From the deck of a cruise ship, you can see and experience only the tip of that iceberg, the part that extends above the water. But if you can get beneath the waves, you can see and experience, just out of sight, the majority of that iceberg—the base that supports and influences the part you can see from the ship.
While we are generally unaware of the workings of subconscious minds, we all experience flashes of insight when the light bulb goes off, when that great idea comes to us that we didn’t seem to think up. Wisdom and knowings, intuitive insights that don't originate in our conscious mind, break through the surface and come to awareness in our conscious minds.
Hypnosis can be used to get in touch with those higher knowings on purpose.
And hypnosis can be used to help you take control of that which so often defeats you.
Every year, about New Year’s, millions of people make “resolutions.” They decide, “This year I will
change A, B, and C.” A, B, and C usually have to do with things like losing weight, quitting bad habits (e.g. smoking), starting regular exercise—things we feel we should be able to change by force of will alone.
And every year, within weeks, the same millions fall away from those resolutions.
Most of us have had the experience of beginning a diet (or breaking up our cigarettes), and wrestling with ourselves and our cravings—successfully—for a limited time—days or weeks (sometimes months)—only to return to our old habits the minute the period of self-imposed deprivation was up.
The truth is that we all have tremendous willpower. We have proven our willpower time and again. But the rest of the truth is, willpower is located in the conscious mind and it is not our conscious mind that is in control of our habitual behaviors.
Habits are programmed into the subconscious. They’re in the base of the iceberg, in that greater part of the mind, and unless you reprogram it, they will beat you time and again.
Hypnosis is a key to self-mastery. You can rewrite your internal programming.
Some of this reprogramming can be achieved through self-hypnosis, and there are many good
instruction manuals and CDs out there to help you use self-suggestion to bring about desired change. But self-hypnosis is limited. If the situation is one that will be benefited by some exploration of the subconscious, it is difficult to instruct yourself to explore your own subconscious motivations.
Clinical hypnosis is a valuable tool, long-recognized by the American Medical Association. A trained and sensitive hypnotherapist functions as a trusted guide to help you uncover the underlying structure of habits or fears. Where did they originate? Why are they so strong? What are the connections?
With the help of this exploration, the suggestions later given to the subconscious can be fine-tuned to best correct its programming.
With the help of your practitioner—
- You can permanently lose weight.
- You can stop smoking forever.
- You can gain mastery over long-standing fears and phobias.
- You can intentionally change how you deal with stress.
- You can manage, or reduce, chronic pain and your need for pain killers.
- You can decrease performance anxieties.
- You can increase your self-confidence.
- You can generally fix yourself up.
- You can help heal your self-esteem.
- And you can do even more.
And, if you desire, through regression therapy, you can explore memory.
You can (only if you choose) go back into the past, to difficult situations, and release them.
You can say the things you always wanted to say to those who have harmed you.
You can put the blame where it belongs, by finally telling your subconscious
what your conscious mind knows, that as a child, you were not the one at fault.
You can also, if appropriate (even if only for your own sake), take a conscious decision to forgive,
carry it deep into your subconscious, and finally be free of past hurts. (Hypnosis lends itself to the
purposes for which you decide to use it. If your intent was to receive suggestions to stop smoking, not explore the past, you won’t suddenly find yourself in the midst of a painful memory. If you decide to explore the past, it is also important to note that hypnotherapists are trained* to help you through any painful memories you uncover.)
So hypnosis is not mind control. It is not possible for a hypnotist to take you over and direct you
against your will. You are, always, the navigator. You are never unconscious or unaware. You are, as you allow, deeply relaxed, but always in control. Later, you remember everything that was said, done, or experienced. You can’t “get stuck.” (If a hypnotherapist were suddenly called away, you would simply and easily come out of the relaxed state and go on your way.) Being hypnotized does not leave you open to any wild suggestion your conscious mind would reject or stop you from being you. (Even in the hypnotic state, your personality remains intact.) And clinical hypnotherapy is a valuable tool, with many wonderful outcomes.
Guided hypnosis, with a trained and experienced hypnotherapist, can be a valuable aid toward
becoming your own best self.
© 2007-2014 Rev. Dr. Nadine Rosechild Sullivan, Ph.D.
*In and of itself, hypnotherapy is not psychology or medicine.
A hypnotherapist does not, cannot, and should not replace other helping/medical/psychological/spiritual professionals.
Hypnotherapy is a complementary modality. Individuals should continue their work with other care providers.