My beginnings in hypnosis

My beginnings in hypnosis

In this world we live in, every story has to have a beginning.

In relation to the world of hypnosis, this is mine. Taken from a memory that was born around 1968 or 1969.

In remembering this story I’ve pretty much always thought that my experiments with hypnosis began when I was about 11 or 12, but as I write this I remember that truly they began long before…

I remember when I was just 6 years old purposely attempting to put the cat into a trance state. It did of course work. Where had I gotten the idea of hypnosis? I’m imagining that I must have seen it in a movie or television show and became fascinated with it. I am at this point only guessing that that must be what happened, but really I have experienced enough strangeness in life by this time to understand that I very well could have been born with the gears for hypnotic experimentation already turning. Turning and waiting, waiting for the moment to arrive, to begin or perhaps continue human experimentation.

And so… It was around 1968 or 1969 it was a warm bright sunshiny day in the city of Springfield, Massachusetts. And I was probably 11 or 12 years old and at the time visiting my next door neighbor Ray. With the sunlight filling the world out side of his bedroom window on the 3rd floor of his parents house the thought popped into my mind of attempting to actually hypnotize him.

So I suggested the idea and after I convinced him that I knew enough at least to try and see if it would really work, he agreed, but with the condition that after him, he could try to do me. Of course I said “Okay”!

And so he sat in the straight backed wooden chair and we began. I’m not recalling at this time exactly what I did for the induction but I do remember that there was counting involved so I imagine it was pretty much a fast countdown from 10-1. Maybe even 5 to 1. Just a guess but really a good guess since my only training in this life would have been what I’d seen on television.

Okay I’ve done the countdown and from what I’ve seen on television if he’s really hypnotized then if I tell him that he won’t feel pain then he won’t feel it and if I tell him he won’t bleed he won’t bleed. Okay. That sounds like a good place to start. (please remember I was only 11 or 12) So I found a large safety pin. Not the small variety but really one of the big ones.

I’m pretty excited at this point and I’m having fun. Is he really hypnotized or is he just faking? Well if he’s faking I will soon find out and that will be fun too! Because he has no idea of what I’m about to do.

Okay so he’s sitting there with his eyes closed and I tell him that he will not feel what I’m about to do and also I suggest that he won’t bleed. And then of course I stick the pin in his thumb a little bit. Naturally enough a sharp yelp coming out of his mouth is what I expect!

But… Nothing. No flinch. No notice. Just nothing. As if nothing had happened.
Okay no problem. He’s just faking it. Which means I need to stick him harder.
But… Nothing. No flinch. No notice. Just nothing. As if nothing had happened.

Also I notice that he’s not bleeding. Okay now I’m REALLY excited! Could it be? But I have to be sure! So now I drive the large pin deeply into the flesh of his thumb! Over and over with all the ferocity of an 11 year old mad scientist! (and that’s a lot I assure you) Nothing. No flinch. No notice. Just nothing.

Blood… Still there is no blood! So I take his thumb and squeeze it and SQUEEEEEZE it to FORCE it to bleed. And it doesn’t…

Surely he can’t be faking this! I mean I have just savagely attacked his thumb with a very large pin. Even if somehow he was through some sheer act of adolescent will pretending not to feel it just so he could get me back, he certainly couldn’t fake not bleeding. Okay… I’m convinced.

Uh oh… He’s supposed to get his turn on me next… I don’t like that idea at all. I know for certain that he is every bit as capable as I am of being inventive when it comes to testing and it’s quite possible that his tests could actually be dangerous to my very life… after all we are on the 3rd floor… he knows that under normal circumstances that I am far from fond of climbing out his bedroom window to walk the small and slanted ledge to the small overhang above the second floor porch…

Needless to say I didn’t like that thought very much and so decided to decline when he said it was his turn. But I of course I didn’t want him to be mad or hold a grudge so I gave him the suggestion that he wouldn’t remember what I had done to him and also that his thumb would be okay and wouldn’t hurt and it would heal quickly and whatever else I could think of. Actually I’m pretty sure it healed instantly. Amazing.

Anyway when I brought him out of hypnosis, and he said it was his turn, and I said "no", he didn’t get upset or mad or anything. It was just, “okay” and then we went and did something else. Yup. That did it. I was totally convinced.

Hypnosis doesn’t just work. Hypnosis is amazing.