What comes to your mind when you hear the word Hypnosis ?

May be a witch laughing hysterically and saying “You are under my control; you’ll do as I say” or perhaps a stage hypnotist calling some volunteers and making them do certain things like behaving foolish, barking like a dog or walking like a cat?

It is largely because there has been lack of awareness and many misconceptions about this beautiful phenomenon called Hypnosis . For many centuries people considered it as evil. Something associated with Black magic, Satanism and kind of overpowering others against their will.

I am not saying that overpowering some one against his/her will is impossible because I also keep hearing about such things. Many cases have been reported mostly by women that some body stopped them while they were walking down the street, showed them a piece of paper to inquire about some one’s address.

As soon as they looked at the paper, they got numb and the person asked them to give him their jewellery which they did and realized what happened with them only after that person fled away from the scene.

I feel looting someone by using some unexplained power IS evil and comes under Black Magic but we are not talking about black magic here.

We are talking about HYPNOSIS.

In hypnosis , a hypnotherapist can hypnotize you ONLY if you permit him or her to do so. No one can overpower you. Hypnosis is completely safe and during the process YOU remain in control. You can open your eyes anytime if you like to.

I am not going into technical details or the history and origin of hypnosis . You can easily find it on the internet.
So, what will you get after reading this article?

This article will clear your doubts and you will get basic knowledge of Hypnosis, Self hypnosis and Subliminal programming.

Let’s get hypnotized!

Before we dive into the details let’s talk about your mind a bit. Generally you say “It just came to my mind” or “I changed my mind.”

But the fact is your mind is not one. It consists of two parts. Yes! Your mind has two parts and both of them have unique characteristics.

Consider your mind to be ten parts. One part is your Conscious mind and the remaining nine parts is your Subconscious mind. Since the subconscious mind is larger it obviously is more powerful than the conscious mind.

Let me explain further.

Conscious Mind
Conscious mind is that part of your mind which is easily accessible. It is active most when you are awake. It helps you make decisions, think logically, writing, walking , solving equations, driving, comparing pros and cons of given circumstances etc.

Conscious mind has a very unique characteristic - It never accepts anything that does not match with its line of beliefs. It examines every thing before letting it in.If you are trying to introduce something to it that does not match with its previous beliefs and experiences, it will not accept that.

Subconscious mindGenerally talking, this part of your mind is not easily accessible. It is functioning all the time though but you never even think about it.

It takes care of many processes without you even noticing them. Here are some examples - pumping your heart, breathing, digesting food, healing wounds and many other things that you are not even aware of.

It is active when you are sleeping, making love, watching a beautiful sunset or meditating.

Subconscious mind is a great store house. It stores your habits , fears, phobias, beliefs, past life memories etc.

In order to change your life you need to work on subconscious mind and not the conscious one. Have you ever wondered that no matter how hard you try quit smoking you never succeed, why? You decide that from tomorrow you are not going to smoke and you persist for 3, 4 or even 10 days but again you start doing it. What happens?

You are missing something. Just like driving, you started smoking consciously but over a period of time it has gone to your subconscious mind and you are trying to change this in your conscious mind. It can never be done because now conscious mind has nothing to do with it. If you are to change this you need to change your subconscious programming regarding your smoking habit.

The subconscious mind also has one unique characteristic.It accepts everything without questioning. Whatever you declare to it as true becomes its truth.

If you make it believe that you are confident and successful person then it will accept that.

If you make it believe that you are a looser and can not do anything in life it will accept that too.

Remember the wonderful movie ‘Spiderman’? Uncle Ben says to Peter “With great power comes great responsibility”. This is true in regard to your subconscious mind as well.

Your subconscious mind is more powerful than anything you can think of. So, be responsible enough to choose what you are going to do with it.

The best way to access your subconscious mind is through hypnosis.

HypnosisHypnosis is a process to access your subconscious mind so that you can improve any aspect of your life.

Hypnotherapist
The person who helps you get hypnotized and change your subconscious programming is known as a hypnotherapist.Remember, relaxation is the first condition for any hypnosis to take place, if you can’t relax you can’t enter hypnosis.

The hypnotherapist asks you to lie down on a comfortable arm chair or a chair specially designed for hypnosis. The ambiance usually is very calm and relaxing. The hypnotherapist might burn some incense and play calming music in the background to help you relax faster.

InductionThe process of making you feel relaxed is called induction. You might be asked to concentrate on your breathing or may be to visualize something.

Something like you are lying in a garden, there is a river flowing nearby, birds are chirping, the breeze is very tranquil and so on.

This is just an example, there could be numerous induction processes a therapist can use depending upon the situation.By the time you are completely relaxed; your conscious mind will be almost 95 percent in sleep. It is important to put your conscious mind to sleep so that the therapist can access your subconscious mind and give you the suggestions for the change you desire.

TranceThe state you will be at this point of time is called trance. Now, your conscious mind is inactive and the subconscious mind is ready to receive suggestions.

Let’s say you are afraid of speaking in public. For this she may install a suggestion like “You are comfortable and relaxed when speaking in public. You love your audience and your audience loves you. You connect with your audience easily and speak with clarity and confidence.”

This whole process of making you feel relaxed, going into trance and installing suggestions in your subconscious mind may take 20-40 minutes or more. During this process you stay completely aware of everything happening around you.

Self HypnosisSelf hypnosis is a simple process in which YOU hypnotize yourself without taking help of a hypnotherapist. The process remains the same except that now there is no other person (The therapist) to hypnotize you, you yourself give suggestions to relax your body and mind and enter a trance.

I am giving an example of a sample self hypnosis session below.

Lie down or sit in a comfortable position. Make sure you are wearing comfortable clothes and the room temperature is normal. Not too hot or cold.

Close your eyes. Take 3 deep breaths. Start talking to your body and say to it – relax, take it easy, relax. It is better to talk to your each body part individually. For example you can start off with your toes.

Focus your attention on your toes and say “I want you to relax now……… loosen up…… relax…… yes………. you are relaxing now…….. and you have relaxed.”Just imagine your toes getting relaxed and soon you’ll find the same.

Repeat this process with your legs, thighs, abdomen, chest, shoulders, arms, head and face. Soon you’ll find your whole body completely relaxed. This should take 5-10 minutes.

Once you are done with this, concentrate on your breathing, feel that with each breath you are going deeper into your mind. Now start counting 10 to 0 backwards and before you do that tell yourself that now I am going to count 10 to 0 and by the time I reach 0, I will be in a trance. Start counting 10.........9………….8………..7…………6…….……………………………………0

If you do this in a calm manner you’ll soon find yourself in a trance. Make this a point not to force yourself. Do everything calmly. Self Hypnosis is a gentle process that needs time and patience.

When you are in trance, start speaking your suggestions, repeat your suggestions as many times as you feel. For example you could say to yourself “I am comfortable and relaxed when speaking in public. I love my audience and my audience loves me. I connect with my audience easily and speak with clarity and confidence.”

This is just an example. You can speak suggestions for anything you want to improve in your life - health, sex, relationships, money, positive thinking or anything else.After speaking your suggestions, wait for some moments; let the suggestion sink deep down in your subconscious mind. When you feel complete, start coming out of the trance by counting 0………1.……..2……….3………4……………..5…………………………………………...10
When you reach 10, open your eyes slowly. Your self hypnosis session is complete.

You might fall asleep during the process but that’s ok. It is absolutely normal.

Also, in some of your starting sessions you might not feel like you are in the trance, you might have trouble relaxing yourself or you might feel a little uncomfortable. That’s normal too. It is part of the game. With each and every session you’ll get better at this. It is just a matter of patience and practice.

Subliminal ProgrammingAs we discussed earlier your mind has two parts – Conscious and Subconscious.

Generally the subconscious mind is not accessible during your awakened state and that makes install suggestions in it a little difficult.

To solve this problem, subliminal programming came into existence. Subliminal programming helps you bypass your conscious mind and install suggestions directly into your subconscious mind.

I’ll help you understand this with an example. Suppose you are headed towards Haridwar from New Delhi. Instead of entering Meerut city and struggle with the chaos and traffic inside, you take the bypass and go straight to Haridwar. That way you saved a lot of time, effort and moved much faster.

Same is the case with your subconscious mind. You CAN reach your subconscious mind via your conscious mind but that’s not worth it. According to its nature, your conscious mind will give you resistance. Trying to be positive when you are feeling negative inside by convincing your conscious mind will not help because it runs by logic and the logic says that you are a negative person.

Subliminal programming can help you overcome this. Usually subliminal tracks have two layers. One layer has the suggestions and the other one has the music. When you listen to them, your conscious mind will get to hear only music and not suggestions.

While the conscious mind is hearing the music, suggestions will go directly to your subconscious mind. That’s how subliminal programming works. You will be amazed to know that you can use subliminal programming to improve virtually every area of your life and that too very conveniently.

Suppose you are traveling in metro, just put in your earplugs, play the track and enjoy your journey. The track will install suggestions automatically without minimum effort on your part.

You can also play these tracks in the background while working on your computer. (I am listening to ‘ Positive Thinking ’ track right now while writing this article for you).

Subliminal programming can assist you to achieve almost every goal - Weight loss, quitting smoking, feeling more confident, being more assertive , being more positive or any thing else.

A word of caution: - Don’t depend on subliminal programming to alter your life overnight. It is not magic. It takes time. Yeah, some fraudulent internet marketers want you to believe that it can change everything drastically overnight. That is not true. It is a wonderful tool but will give results only if you use it along with hard work and dedication. So be careful not to fall into any trap.

Good luck!!!

Author's Bio: 

Avdhessh Arya is a Personal Development Coach, RJ & Voice Actor based in New Delhi, India.

He is on the mysterious journey of self discovery since childhood with Meditation and Hypnosis as his powerful tools. Also he has deep Interest in exploring paranormal phenomenon like spirits, ghosts, fairies and angels. He loves coaching people in personal development.

He started his career as a Radio Jockey with All India Radio’s FM Gold Channel in 2003 and has been doing live radio shows and voice over for various TV and radio channels like National Geographic Channel, Fox History Channel, NDTV, All India Radio and more.

Learn more at his website http://www.avdhessharya.com