Part 6

Fifth, The substitution for the concentration of the “locked in” thought of sleep; who are the easiest to hypnotize? Those possessing the greatest concentration.

Can the insane or half-witted be hypnotized? No; they cannot concentrate.

Therefore, choose for your first subjects, those with pronounced concentration, who are distinguishable by the fulness of their heads at the temples, and avoid those with big perceptives (shown by the large protuberance over the eyes).

To look at the end of this pencil.

Will get heavy and close.

Or if I close them for you.

Allow them to remain closed.

Your head will fall to the front.

Your hands will drop to your sides.

Will say “all right” and clap my hands.

PLATE II]

Experience has taught me that the professional musician in a regular orchestra, the player of classic music; a telegrapher, a first-class stenographer, or those whose business requires concentration; and naturally slow correlators, are more readily lead into hypnosis.

Seat your subject in a chair and stand directly in front of him and repeat the following paragraph:

“Take an easy position. Put your hands together thus. (Plate II.) I am going to ask you to look at the end of this pencil. If you will do so and think of it, your eyelids will get heavy and close; or, if I close them for you, allow them to remain closed; then your head will fall to the front, your hands will drop to your sides and you will forget where you are. When I want you to awaken I will (tell you) say ALL RIGHT and clap my hands. (Suit the action to the word.) Do you understand me? At no time will you feel sleepy, but by giving me your undivided attention you will slowly forget where you are.”

If you desire to send a person to a place of which he knows nothing, as to the manner of going you must necessarily give him full directions, so nothing that is certain to occur can divert him. So it is with a subject; he must know what to expect and thus be freed of all fear that might be aroused when the attributes occur, which otherwise would cause an active mind. The falling of the eyelids, of the head and the hands should arouse no thought other than the one you are suggesting to him through his ear, i. e., the thought of sleep.

As two senses must be affected to impress a thought, great care is necessary that whatever you say you actually do, so the prospective subject can see as well as hear it.

Special attention is drawn to the sentence, “If you will do so your eyelids will get heavy and close; or, if I close them for you, allow them to remain closed.” Only three in ten will close their eyelids; the other seven after giving you the stare for some five minutes, must have their eyelids closed for them. If you will note in the foregoing sentence, I have said nothing about the eyelids “not closing,” but have made affirmations and provided for the “not closing.” When you say to him, “Your eyelids will get heavy,” you must then close your eyelids. When you say, “remain closed,” your eyelids must be closed while saying the words. When you say, “or if I close,” while uttering the words “I close,” you must with your fingers close your own eyes, taking care to immediately remove the fingers; otherwise you would convey through his eye the idea that you will hold his eyes closed (suggested to him by seeing you hold your own eyelids closed). Hence, if you close them for him, when you remove your fingers, the subject will open his eyes. When you use the words, “head falls to the front,” your head must move forward; and when you say, “hands fall to your sides,” your hands must fall.

If you will notice, there are two ways of awakening mentioned here; one is “When I tell you;” the other, “When I say ALL RIGHT and clap my hands.” (Which must be said with one breath.) You use “ALL RIGHT and clap my hands;” the doctor should use the other. The physician, desiring his patient to go away with some inspiration given him, simply says, “When you open your eyes you are awake,” and so and so is the case; for an inspiration given in hypnosis can only be responded to in hypnosis. The operator in the parlor entertainment, when he has finished the performance says, “All right,” and claps his hands.

Why do I desire the subject to put his hands together? To see them fall. The hands will unconsciously drift apart—the action will be entirely involuntary, and after a pupil has watched a dozen pairs of hands he will see that no one on earth can deceive him, as it is utterly impossible to simulate (consciously) an involuntary action. It is for the same reason that I desire the head to fall to the front—I wish to see it fall—knowing that when an action is part of a thought, to the degree that action takes place is to the extent that the thought is aroused in the “mind.” When the hands drop relaxed to the sides, I know that the subject has forgotten or lost his environment, and therefore is in hypnosis.

Now, I have told the subject exactly what would happen. If my pupil will carefully analyze the paragraph he will find that telling him to “Take an easy position” is the first attribute I desire. That to “look at the pencil,” if the operator holds it in the proper position, will force the eyes upturned, or converged; that if he thinks of the pencil he will furnish concentration. I then tell him as to the closing of the eyes; and then, if I slip into his “mind” the thought of sleep, I will have accomplished my purpose and have induced hypnosis.

Now stand to the left of your subject, holding a lead pencil or your finger as in Plate III, and repeat verbatim in a firm voice:

“Drowsy, sleepy, drowsy, sleepy, drowsy, sleepy; as you go deeper asleep your eyelids get heavy and close.” (Repeat until accomplished.)

“Drowsy, sleepy, drowsy, sleepy, drowsy, sleepy; as you go deeper asleep your head falls to the front.” (Repeat until accomplished.)

“Drowsy, sleepy, drowsy, sleepy, drowsy, sleepy; as you go deeper asleep your hands get heavy and fall to your sides.” (Repeat until accomplished.)

PLATE III]

The sentence of “Drowsy, sleepy, drowsy, sleepy, et cetera, as you go deeper asleep your eyelids get heavy and close,” seems a long one. Why not make it shorter? Why not “Drowsy, sleepy, your eyes shut”? Is not that the same thing? No! “Drowsy, sleepy, et cetera, as you go deeper asleep the eyelids get heavy and close,” makes the closing of the eyelids one of the attributes of the thought of sleep; but when you say, “Drowsy, sleepy, your eyes shut,” you are trying to force into the “mind” of the subject two separate and distinct thoughts; i. e., to sleep—to shut his eyes—which is utterly impossible. Any operator who, in giving inspirations to the subject, leaves out his “and’s,” “as’s” and “but’s,” will fail, inasmuch as the ideas must be thoroughly correlated and be one thought, because thoughts may of themselves become ideas, or ideas become thoughts.

We will assume that you held the pencil over the subject’s head for some half an hour and he failed to take on hypnosis. What is wrong? If he is not in an easy position (No. 1), that is your fault. Is his collar too high, is his head too far back, is his back too close to a radiator or fireplace, et cetera? Or, if a woman, is she laced too tight, do her shoes pinch, et cetera? Why is any easy position the first attribute of sleep? I mean by an “easy position” one in which the sense of feeling is not making discomfort a dominant idea; for if so, it is impossible to fade away the thought of the environment; therefore, before sleep can be induced, comfort through feeling must form itself into a natural attribute of sleep. The upturned eye (No. 2) is also for you to furnish. Are you holding the pencil in the proper place? If you strain the eye, you lose No. 1. Has the time come to close the eye (No. 4)? Is the subject concentrated? If not, you cannot accomplish No. 5.

It is a poor art or science if we must wait half an hour to discover whether the subject is concentrating or not.