SLEEP!

Rapid Hypnosis Exposed - How to hypnotise people in seconds

By Steven Hall

Copyright 2013 - No part of the publication may be reproduced in any way without
prior written permission from the author.

This books explains what a rapid hypnotic induction is, how to do one and what makes
it work. Once you have read this book, and put what you've learned into practise, you
will be able to hypnotise people in seconds.

If you're new to hypnosis, or have very little experience then you are probably much
more concerned with getting your subject into trance than what you do with them once
they're under. This book assumes that this is your goal... just getting a person into
hypnosis... and doing it fast.

We're not going to look at ways to utilise the trance state, although I will be giving you a
few pointers on how to correctly construct a hypnotic suggestion. We're just going to
focus on getting your subject under quickly and waking them safely.

Before we jump into the induction itself, it's important that you understand what
hypnosis is. Most people have a grossly distorted perception of hypnosis, so let's go
over the basics to ensure that we're all on the same page.

As you've probably heard many many times, trance is an altered state of consciousness.
But what does this mean?

To be honest, even though I've said this countless times I think it's a little misleading,
you see, trance is a specific state of consciousness that we often slip into without even
noticing. Granted, it is a different state to fully waking consciousness, but we are very
rarely fully awake. In fact, we probably spend more time in trance than we do out of it...
and I'm not talking about sleep here. I'm talking about that special state that we call
hypnosis.

Slipping in and out of trance sounds dangerous, but it really isn't. It's actually very good
for you. Trance helps you to relax and let go of stress. So in many ways, the trance state
is very similar to meditation.
During what we like to call 'normal' waking consciousness, our brainwaves measure in
at 13 to 40 HZ. This basically means that our brains 'pulse' from 13 to 40 times per
second. We call this state 'Beta' and it's where most active people find themselves for
most of the day.

If the brain slows down (which happens when you relax) then the pulse drops. If it
drops below 13 HZ you slip into the state that we call Alpha. Alpha is a very special
state. When you're in Alpha you become increasingly open to suggestion. Alpha spans
from 8 to 13 pulses per second.

If you slow down even further you slip into Theta. Theta spans 4 to 7 HZ and if your
brain has slowed down that much you're either meditating or falling asleep. Next we
have Delta, which is 0.5 to 4 HZ. A Delta brain is very probably in deep sleep.

As you can see, during the course of your day you go up and down this entire scale. In
fact, every night, you go all the way down into Delta and every morning you come all
the way back up into Beta. And throughout the day, depending on what you're doing you
bob around between Beta, Alpha and Theta.

Every time you pass through Alpha, you pass through the state that we call hypnosis. So,
as you can see, hypnosis is actually very very common. Everybody does it everyday at
least twice as they wake up and as they fall asleep.

When you pass through hypnosis at night on your way down to Delta we call it the
'hypnogogic state' and when you pass through it in the morning on your way up to Beta
we call it the 'hypnopompic state'. Both states are usually accompanied by sensory
perceptions, such as seeing colours, hearing sounds, or kicking your bed partner and
becoming a bit confused. Obviously, you don't need to know this to hypnotise people,
but it does illustrate how 'normal' hypnosis is. And it goes a long way to explaining how
most hypnotic inductions work.

Conventional hypnosis (that's the boring 'you are feeling sleepy' type) works because it
simply guides a person from Beta to Alpha by causing them to relax. I know, I know, it
sounds way too simple to be true, but that's really all there is to it. As the subject
relaxes, they slip into Alpha and they become increasingly suggestible. A hypnotists job
is to help a person to relax while paying close attention to clues that reveal when the
person enters alpha.

Most people are utterly useless at relaxing without a hypnotist to guide them. But
everyone can relax relatively successfully with a little direction. To give you a quick
example, a hypnotist might ask the subject to imagine that they are lying on a beach. The
imagined scenario is a relaxing experience so the subject releases some tension.

Of course, hypnosis is not only relaxation, you also need some direction and focus.
Without that, hypnosis is nothing more than meditation (which is still very beneficial but
not very entertaining).

During a relaxation style induction, as well as relaxing the subject's body you need to
engage their mind. You don't want them to fall asleep, you want them to become
increasingly focussed on your instruction.

So, if we jump back to the beach for a moment we are able to do this by describing the
scene to them in ways that encourage the internal activation of their senses. It really
helps if you can get every sense fully engaged into the experience. You might talk about
the feeling of the warmth of the sun on their skin or the sand beneath their feet. Or maybe
you'll ask them to imagine the sound of the ocean lapping against the shore.

All of this narrows their focus down to the thought that you have planted in their mind
and takes them away from whatever is happening in the outside world.

This idea of narrowing down a persons focus is a very powerful way of shifting their
state. If you think about it, when you are engrossed in a good book or concentrating on
an intricate detail, you do this naturally. We often refer to this state as being in the 'zone'.
It's a state that any athlete, author, artist or musician knows very well. We have lots of
labels for states that you can find within the Alpha range, and all of them have the
capacity to increase our potential. The hypnotic state is very similar to any other that
you'll find in Alpha, but it seems to be the most misunderstood.

Anyway, let's get back to this idea of focussing for a moment and explore a little trivia.
The idea of narrowing down the subjects focus is a foundation for many styles of
induction. It's the reason for the archetypal hypnotists swinging pocket watch, as well as
the infamous 'Look into my eyes', the spinning hypnodisc and the more recent 'Spot on
the ceiling' style inductions. Today, most hypnotists prefer to get the subject to focus on
something inside their mind, such as our beach scene, rather than something external like
a spinning disc or swinging watch.

The whole idea of focussing attention started when Scottish surgeon, James Braid,
noticed that one of his patients had gone into a trance like state in the waiting room
while gazing at the pinpoint reflections of a polished brass lamp. Braid did some tests
and the entire world of hypnosis changed forever. Before that, we had the likes of Franz
Anton Mesmer who 'Magnetised' people using iron rods and bathtubs of filings.

As I'm sure you've no doubt already realised, Mesmer's name still lives on today and the
idea of mesmerising people is strongly associated with hypnosis, albeit a little more
magical. Braid also left his mark on the hypnotic world for it was he that actually
coined the term 'hypnosis' way back in 1843. He later regretted it and tried to rename
the phenomenon 'Monoideism'. Braid thought that the word hypnosis would cause the
state to be confused with sleep... which it is. He wanted to change it to monoideism
because it means to focus the attention on a single thing... which is what a hypnotised
subject does.

Braid objected to the idea of a hypnotist having power over a subject and thought that
Magnetism as Mesmer practised implied occultist connotations that weren't appropriate.
He wanted to keep hypnosis firmly rooted in the psycho-physiological field. In my
opinion this shift sterilised hypnosis and removed a lot of its power. I'm a spiritual
healer and use energy healing with hypnosis to achieve astonishing results with my
clients. Personally, I think that some of Mesmer's work should be explored in more
detail, as combining hypnosis with healing seems to be incredibly effective... I enjoy far
more success with my clients than many of my colleagues do that confine themselves to
a single field (and that applies to psychology and spiritualism) but I digress...

What we're focussing on in this book is rapid hypnosis. And that is much more about
entertainment than it is therapy so let's get back on track.

Now that we've explored the trance state a little I'm hoping that you are beginning to see
hypnosis as being something relatively normal. The reason for this is that many people
have such a grossly distorted idea of what hypnosis is that they never expect to be able
to do it. It's almost as though people think that it requires some kind of mystical or
psychic power to put someone under. It doesn't. Anybody can become a hypnotist, and
that includes you.

If you think about it for a minute, one of the most popular hypnotic induction techniques
is the progressive relaxation induction. This is the one we've already looked at a little
and it's basically guiding a person into a state of relaxation and getting them to narrow
down their focus to a single idea while engaging all of their senses internally.

All this does is relax them to a point that their brain slows down and they shift from
Beta to Alpha. There's nothing magical or mystical about it. So... now that you know
how hypnosis works, I'm guessing that you're beginning to feel more confident about
having a go yourself.
What I'm hoping you've noticed here is the way that a hypnotist is able to exploit
something that naturally causes a person to enter a suggestible state. This is essentially
how all forms of hypnosis work. There are several natural situations that cause a person
to accept suggestions more readily, a hypnotist simply exploits these.

Before we move on to rapid inductions let's get back to this idea of focus for a moment.
When a person is hypnotised they become so focussed on one thing that nothing else
exists. OK, so that's a slight exaggeration, things do still exist, and your subject is still
aware of them to some extent but their focus is so concentrated that nothing else matters.
(Hmmm.... Nothing else matters, one, enter sandman.... Metallica are on to something
here!)

This is why hypnotic suggestions work. You give your subject a suggestion and they act
as though it is true because nothing else matters. On stage you might tell a subject that
they are a dainty ballerina and they'll happily pirouette across the stage because that's
what ballerinas do. Conflicting thoughts, such as 'I'll look like an idiot' or 'I'm not a
ballerina' simply don't get a look in. All that matters is the suggestion itself because
that's the only thing the subject is focussing on and they are focussed on it so intently that
nothing else matters.

This idea of focussing on something so intently that you filter out everything else is a
really interesting one that deserves a little more attention. I want you to cast you mind
back to a time that you lost something that was right in front of you. Maybe a pen or your
keys. We've all done this many times. We think we've lost something but we swear that it
was right in front of us. We search our desk over and over but it's just not there. After a
few minutes of frustration we give up. And then, as plain as day, there it is, slap bang in
the middle of the desk that we've just checked upteen times.

So what happened?

This odd phenomena is called negative hallucination. The pen (or keys) was there all
along but we just couldn't see it. We filtered it out. It sounds crazy because we are
conditioned to believe what we see (or don't see) is (or isn't) real. We grow up
believing that if we can see it it's there and if we can't, it's not. But sometimes things we
can't see are there, right under our nose. And other times what we think we can see isn't.

Hallucinations don't have to be visual, we can hear and feel things that aren't there too.
As well as not hear and not feel things that are. A common example of not feeling
something that is there is when someone injures themselves but doesn't notice until much
later. This kind of thing happens to builders all of the time. While they are working they
are focussed on the task in hand and a small cut can easily go unnoticed until they are
not so absorbed in their job.

As you already know, relaxation can cause your brain to slow down to such a degree
that you shift from Beta to Alpha. Concentration can do the same thing. If you're really
really concentrating on a task, such as drawing or doing math then it's very easy to slip
into a highly suggestible state. Then, if you momentarily misplace your pen and give
yourself the suggestion that you've lost it, your subconscious mind makes it so. Your
eyes can still see the pen, but your brain can't. Your brain filters the pen out of your
reality because it's obeying your command. Something that's really interesting about the
brain is that it thinks it's always right, which makes it very easy to trick.

Again, as with relaxation, a hypnotist can exploit this idea of concentration to induce a
suggestible state on cue. If a hypnotist can get you to focus on something to such a
degree that nothing else matters, you'll drift into trance.

Taoists call this kind of focus contemplation. It's a very beneficial form of focus because
it slows down the brain. When your brain slows down you are closer to your ultimate
potential. In fact, pretty much anything and everything that you do can be done much
more effectively when your brain slows down.

So... concentration, relaxation and focussed attention go a very long way to explain how
hypnosis works. We don't really know why hypnosis works. It's as though the part of our
brain that usually compares new information to what we already believe to be true is
shut down. Incidentally, this part of the brain is called the 'Critical Factor' and although
it has the very best of intentions and faithfully tries to protect us, it can cause all sorts of
problems when an undesirable suggestion accidentally slips past.

This idea of a suggestion slipping past the critical factor is very important. When it
happens people change. Leaving hypnosis aside for a moment, one of the most
incredible ways that people change because of this is when they develop a phobia.

Phobias are utterly fascinating. They really illustrate the immense power of the mind.
Think about it for a minute. A phobic never ever forgets to feel fear when faced with the
object of their phobia. It just happens. Equally astonishing is the speed at which people
can develop a phobia in the first place. A phobia can take hold almost instantly, and be
with you for your entire life.

Another really interesting thing about phobias is that they are so often completely
irrational. Most people that have a phobia know that it's utterly ridiculous but they are
powerless to do anything about it. Phobias tell us a great deal about the way the mind
works and reveal some really interesting things that help us to understand the reason that
hypnotic suggestions are effective.

To illustrate this, we're going to split the mind into three parts. This division isn't
entirely accurate, nor is it complete, but it'll help you to understand the reason that
people do what you say when they're hypnotised.

The three parts are the conscious mind, the critical factor and the subconscious mind.

The conscious mind is the part that you use to think. It's that little voice inside your head
that you use to practise what you're going to say. One of the most important things about
the conscious mind is that you can control it. Not many people actually do, but you can.
You can take complete control of that voice. You can change the way it sounds and the
things is says.

We use the conscious mind to reason and think. It's a bit like a close buddy that knows
all of our secrets. We mull things over with it and play out different ideas and scenarios.
The conscious mind is the part that most people are referring to when they say 'I'.

By comparison, the subconscious mind is kinda dumb. It doesn't reason or think and it's
not available for idle chit chat when you're bored. It just does. That said, what it does is
staggering. The subconscious mind is like an insanely powerful computer. It basically
runs an infinite number of programs that keep us alive.

Just like a computer, the subconscious mind has no idea what the programs are. It just
runs them. As I'm sure you're painfully aware, computers get viruses. A computer virus
is really just a program that does something that you don't want it to. Usually, antivirus
software protects your computer so that it doesn't get infected, but every now and then
one slips through the net and you have to take action to remove it... which isn't always
easy.

The same thing happens to the subconscious mind. Every so often a 'bad' program slips
through the net. We call them phobias, addictions and bad habits.

You're probably one step ahead of me and already guessed that the critical factor is our
subconscious minds antivirus software. It's the part of the mind that protects us from
running programs that we believe are bad for us. Please notice that I said '...protects us
from running programs that we believe are bad...' and not 'protects us from running bad
programs'. There's a big difference.

As you probably know, antivirus software has a database of known threats that it stops
from accessing your computer. This is the naughty list, and if you're on it... you ain't
gettin' in! The critical factor doesn't have a naughty list, and this causes problems. What
the critical factor does is compare the new suggestion with everything already stored in
the subconscious mind. If the new suggestion conflicts with the ones already inside it's
rejected, if it supports them it's granted access.

This is one of the reasons that change is difficult. It's also the reason that willpower is
rubbish! Willpower is a completely conscious activity. When a person tries to change
their life using nothing but willpower they are trying to feed new suggestions into a
subconscious mind that doesn't want to know. The critical factor just kicks the new
suggestions right out, even if we think they're for our greater good.

If you want to get a suggestion accepted by the subconscious mind you have to do one of
two things. You need to sneak it past the critical factor of remove the critical factor
altogether. Most hypnotic inductions aim to do the second of these. They relieve the
critical factor of its duties and pop in some new suggestions. On stage these suggestions
are usually pretty outlandish, in the clinic they're of a more therapeutic nature. Either
way it's the same process. Get rid of the guard and plant suggestions.

If you think of the critical factor as an actual guard then it's very easy to visualise
hypnosis working. If you do a progressive relaxation induction, you're lulling the guard
to sleep. As soon as he's dozing you can march your suggestions straight in through the
front door.

Other inductions take advantage of different ways of distracting the guard. One method
is to confuse the guard so that he losses concentration and your suggestions can slip
past. Another is to overwhelm the guard giving him so much to think about that he
doesn't notice your suggestions creeping in. If you suddenly shock the guard you can slip
a quick suggestion past before he has to time compose himself and last (and in this case
probably also least) you can pester the guard until he gives in.

I think now would be a good time for a quick recap on what we've discovered so far.

Relaxation, focus, shock, stress, confusion and repetition are all ways of getting a
suggestion accepted by the subconscious mind... even if it conflicts with everything else
in there. As a hypnotist, you are going to exploit the hell out of these so that you can
literally command your subject into trance.
Rapid Hypnosis

Perhaps the most notorious of all rapid inductions is the hand shake induction. This
induction is fast, easy and effective. For a stage hypnotist it's particularly handy as
volunteers are more than happy to shake your hand as you welcome them on stage.

From a spectators point of view a handshake induction looks like this. You welcome
your volunteer onto the stage and hold out your right hand for them to shake. As they
stretch out their hand you move yours away and grasp their wrist with your left hand.
You then do something unexpected and they go into trance.

This is important... What you do really doesn't matter. It just needs to be unexpected.
Most hypnotists will lift up the volunteers arm so that their hand is right in front of their
face. They will then give the volunteer a command. 9 times out of 10 this will be 'look
at your hand'. Next, they'll slowly lower the hand as they guide the volunteer deeper into
trance.

The handshake induction falls into a category of inductions that we call 'pattern
interrupts'. Pattern interrupts, as the name suggests, are inductions that interrupt
something that is usually considered to be a single action. You can execute a pattern
interrupt induction in almost any situation where a person is half way through doing
something.

Pattern interrupt inductions work because they exploit shock and confusion, allowing
them to slip a suggestion past the critical factor before it can regain its composure. But
that's just the tip of the iceberg. A lot happens during a typical handshake induction that
an untrained observer would completely miss.

We're going to pick the handshake induction apart in a moment and explore every nook
and cranny so that you completely understand how and why it works. But first I want to
give you a little metaphor.

Imagine that you are a door to door salesman. You knock on a door and a young lady
answers. Unfortunately for you, she's far too busy to hear your pitch... and not above
slamming the door in your face. As the door swings forward you instinctively thrust
your foot into the doorway and it jams against your shoe. You see, you know that you
have a cracking product and if she'll just hear you out for a few minutes you're positive
that what you're offering is really gonna make her day. So, with your foot in the door and
an increasingly agitated woman trying to remove it, you have to melt her resistance with
one hell of a benefit... fast. You've probably got no more than a couple of seconds
before she won't be interested in anything you have to say. If you manage to say the right
thing, there's a chance that she'll let down her guard. But you're still a long way from an
invite inside. If you can follow up your initial benefit with a pitch that pleases and
intrigues her, you'll get the sale. If you can't... the door will close and you'll miss your
chance.

This is a little bit like a rapid induction. Rapid inductions go through stages of
acceptance. The first step is to engage the subject. This is like our salesman knocking on
the door. For a handshake induction, this would simply be reaching out your hand. Next,
we have the interrupt. This is where you do something that breaks the norm. The intent
here is to confuse the subject. Sometimes, what you do will also shock them, which can
help, but it isn't necessary. The interrupt creates a window of opportunity. So in that
respect it's very similar to our salesman jamming his foot in the door. It gives you a few
seconds... that's all, so you need to act fast.

The next step is critical, you need to deliver your first 'official' suggestion. I'll come
back to what makes this the first official suggestion later. As already mentioned, the
most common suggestion is to tell the subject to look at their hand, but again it's
important to know that you can tell them to do anything. What you say is not as important
as the fact that you say something.

This will make more sense when you consider what's going on inside their mind. When
you engage the subject the critical factor is relatively neutral but aware. If you tried to
slip a suggestion in at this point it would easily reject it. However, as soon as you break
convention and interrupt the expected pattern, the critical factor panics. For a few
seconds it has no idea what to do. When you deliver your suggestion the critical factor
grabs on to it like a drowning man clinging to a floating branch. Your suggestion is the
only reassurance of stability in a sea of chaos. To the critical factor, your suggestion is a
lifeline, a saviour and a very very welcome friend.

However, that initial suggestion is only the start of the induction. You must follow it up
with a trance deepener if you expect to get anything out of it. Similarly, going back to
our salesman metaphor, blurting out a single benefit while your foot is still jamming the
door is not going to get you the sale. But it will give you a window of opportunity that
didn't exist before. If you do nothing, the window (or in this case door) will close. But
if you immediately flow into a decent pitch you'll probably get the sale.

Beginning to see the pattern?

Before we move on I want to share something with you, because I find this kind of stuff
fascinating. Believe it or not, a fruit machine (or 'Slot Machine' if you live in the States)
is just as susceptible to a pattern interrupt as a person.

What I'm about to share with you really does work... on almost all old machines. It
doesn't work on the video slots that you tend to see in casinos these days so don't get too
excited, but if you ever find an old fashioned (circa 1990s) type fruit machine you can
pretty much guarantee that you'll be walking away quids in.

To pattern interrupt a fruit machine you simple do something unexpected. For example,
if the machine drops in two cherries and a lime on the win line and offers you a hold,
you don't hold the cherries. Similarly, if it gives you one nudge that would clearly allow
you to set up two matching symbols on the win line (in the hope that the next spin lets
you hold them) you nudge something else.

This confuses the onboard computer and gives you the upper hand. For the computer to
reset its pattern it needs you to do something it expects, so it keeps giving you the
opportunity. Over the next 4 or 5 spins you'll notice that it keeps trying to temp you with
2 matching symbols on the win line and the opportunity to hold. If you take the bait too
soon it takes your cash, but if you sweat it out for 4 or 5 spins you are practically
guaranteed that when you do hold the 2 matching symbols it'll drop in a win.

Sounds crazy I know but it really does work. Pattern interrupts are very powerful things.

In this book we are primarily looking at using a pattern interrupt to induce a hypnotic
trance, but you can use them to get people to do things without hypnosis. Remember, a
pattern interrupt temporarily confuses the critical factor, while that's happening you can
slip a suggestion into the subconscious mind that will be obeyed. Actually... 'Will' be
obeyed is not entirely true. In the right situation with the right subject it will, but you
can't get away with doing this kind of thing with everybody. Part of your job as a
hypnotist is to be able to pick out the people that will be susceptible to the type of
induction you're using. With a little practise this is really easy to do. And there are many
ways you can prime your subject before they have any idea you're hypnotising them.
We'll be covering this in more detail later.

Right now I want to take a moment to analyse a pattern interrupt that you may have seen
Derren Brown do on his TV show. This particular show is one that people ask me about
more than any other, it's the one where he visits Walthamstow dog track and wins a very
handsome wad of cash on a losing ticket.
In the show Derren gives the losing ticket to a member of the public and has them take it
to the kiosk to collect their winnings. He instructs the guy to hand over the ticket with
complete confidence while maintaining eye contact with the cashier. The guy does as
Derren instructs but the cashier returns the ticket saying that it's not a winner. This is
where things start to get very interesting. Derren immediately bangs his hand on the side
of the kiosk as the cashier is handing the ticket back. This action is a form of pattern
interrupt, it pulls the cashier out of her monotonous routine of processing and handing
out tickets and temporarily opens up a doorway to her subconscious mind. This is very
similar to the handshake interrupt. The woman is doing something that she's done a
million times before and she expects the action to follow a set pattern. When Derren
bangs the kiosk he breaks that pattern, allowing him to quickly slip two suggestions into
her subconscious mind.

Derren's first suggestion is 'This is the dog you are looking for.' He delivers it in a
authoritative monotone with a downward inflection. This is important. Had he given the
suggestion with a rising inflection it would have sounded like a question not a
command. People are conditioned to follow orders. When you say something with a
downward inflection it sounds like an order. The authoritative monotone also adds to
this making the statement very persuasive.

In this situation Derren very quickly establishes a hierarchy of command. Previously, the
cashier had taken a dominant position over the man that had initially given her the losing
ticket, but Derren's tone, body language and actions all forced her to give him the lead.

The ambiguity of the word 'for' in Derren's command also adds to the confusion of the
interrupt. Ambiguities require additional processing and can quickly overload a persons
conscious mind. They are often used in covert hypnosis as a way of 'piggy backing' a
suggestion into the subconscious. In this case, although not intentional, the word 'for' had
an additional benefit as the dog that actually did win the race was dog number four. I
would have said that this was the reason that Derren used this particular command, but
it clearly isn't as he used the exact same command on a different cashier earlier in the
show for a race that was won by dog number 2.

As you probably noticed, Derren's command is very similar to the classic line 'These
are not the droids you are looking for.' from the Star Wars movie. If the cashier has seen
Star Wars then the line Derren used can trigger two additional patterns. First, it can
instantly regress her to when she saw the movie... just as it did for you a few seconds
ago when you read it. This causes her to go inside for a moment, which, as we already
know, causes a person to become increasingly open to suggestion. Also, the actual line
itself is used in the movie as a Jedi mind trick by Obi Wan Kenobi. So there's already an
association with mind control and persuasion.

Next, Derren pops in a rather obvious embedded command. He follows his first
suggestion with the phrase, 'That's why we came to this WINdow' with enormous
emphasis on the word WIN. As he does this he makes a gesture with his hand. You can't
really see the entire thing because of the camera angle but it appears that he gestures a
rectangle with his fingers in the air as though he is drawing a window to emphasise his
point.

Obviously, the cashiers eyes follow Derren's fingers as they trace out the rectangle. He
starts at the top, goes out, then down each side, before finally coming back in to the
center. This kind of gesture can be used in a non verbal induction as a suggestion for a
person to go down (as in deeper into trance) and narrow their focus inward. I'm not
saying that's exactly what happens here because it's impossible to see from the camera
angle but it definitely seems as though the gesture adds to the pattern.

At this point the woman rechecks the ticket and sees that it is indeed a winner. After
taking the money, and affirming that mistakes can not be rectified after leaving the kiosk
window, Derren asks the woman which dog won the race. She checks the computer and
tells him that dog number 4 won. Then he asks her to check which dog she just paid out
on and she sees that the ticket was from dog number 1, which actually came in last.

When Derren points out her mistake and asks her why she paid out you can clearly see
her battling with confusion. She later says that the computer told her to pay out and that
at one moment one dog had won and then it was another. This suggests that the winning
dog changes on the computer, not the ticket. So it's safe to assume that Derren's
suggestions caused her to see dog 1 as the winning dog on her computer when she
processed the ticket, then dog 4 later when he asked her to check it.

This comes back to our missing pen from earlier. She simply doesn't see something that
is there and instead sees something that isn't. It sounds utterly crazy, but the mind can
filter and change what the eyes see if it has been tricked into expecting to see something
else.

If you haven't seen this episode I strongly recommend that you watch it. It is episode 3
from series 4 of Derren Brown: Mind Control.

Derren often uses pattern interrupts on his show to make a subject more suggestible.
You'll notice that many of his routines include some form of handshake interrupt, even
when a handshake wouldn't be appropriate. Handshakes are very deeply ingrained in
our society, if a person offers their hand for you to shake it is very difficult to resist
even if you didn't expect the offer. Once a handshake has been initiated, regardless of
how inappropriate it might be, the subject is in a pattern. They expect to complete the
pattern and when it is suddenly interrupted it takes a few seconds for them to regain
their composure. During those precious few seconds suggestions can slip past the
critical factor and gain access to the subconscious mind, where they are processed and
obeyed just like a computer program.

Now let's take a more detailed look at the actual interrupt and initial suggestion. As
already stated, the most common thing that hypnotists do to interrupt the handshake is to
lift the subjects arm so that their hand is in front of their face. They then give the
suggestion for the subject to look at their hand. This is a really useful suggestion
because it immediately narrows the subjects focus of attention. It can also be used to
seamlessly flow into a very powerful association deepener by simply lowering the
hand. We'll come back to the deepener later, for now let's explore the transition from
interrupt to focus.

As you already know, the interrupt confuses the critical factor, which temporarily
allows you to slip a suggestion into the subconscious. In most cases, the suggestion is
used to get the subject to do something that is known to increase their suggestibility even
further. Obviously, when Derren Brown used the interrupt at the dog track he skipped
this step and went straight for the final suggestion. This is because he didn't need to
hypnotise the cashier, he simply needed to get her to comply with one command.

We are exploring ways of using pattern interrupts to get a person into hypnosis. This is
different from getting compliance on a single command. If you're doing a show, you
don't want to have to do a handshake interrupt for every routine. You use the handshake
interrupt to initiate the induction process. You then deepen the trance state and continue
with your show in the usual way. You could achieve exactly the same results with a
progressive relaxation induction, this is just quicker, so it's particularly suited to stage
and street hypnosis.

When you instruct the subject to look at their hand you are immediately giving them a
direction to follow that rescues them from the confusion of the interrupt. As already
stated this narrows their focus of attention. To narrow their focus even further you
instruct them to become increasingly aware of smaller details, such as the lines on their
palm, the ridges of their skin or the subtle variations of colour. This exploits a technique
that naturally causes trance to happen. Narrowing a persons focus of attention is a very
powerful way of inducing hypnosis, that's why it features in so many different styles of
induction. It's also one of the most common ways that we unintentionally hypnotise
ourselves without even realising. When you're doing a hand shake interrupt, having the
subject look at their hand should be done in such a way that the focus becomes more
refined over time. That's why you begin with the instruction for them to look at the hand,
then progress on to a finger and finally the ridges of their fingerprint.

Before we go on I should reiterate that you really don't have to do this exactly as
instructed here. Remember, hypnosis is a completely natural state that often happens
without any formal induction whatsoever. When you first begin learning about hypnosis
it's very easy to fall into the trap of thinking of an induction in the same way that you
might think of casting a spell. In other words, a very specific and rigid incantation that
only works if you say it in exactly the same way every time. Hypnotic inductions are not
like that, you have a great deal of flexibility. As long as you understand the intention and
purpose of each stage of the induction you can make up the actual words of induction as
you go along.

The next step is to deepen the trance. The most common trance deepener that you're
likely to encounter is to imagine that you are walking down a flight of stairs. Perhaps
second to this is to visualise yourself going down in a lift. Both of these deepeners work
by creating an association between the idea of moving down and going deeper into
trance, or becoming increasingly relaxed. I like to use a lift deepener for therapeutic
work as it's really easy to have the subject imagine the lift going down past the ground
floor all the way into the basement, which acts as a metaphor for accessing the
subconscious mind. I often use a staircase deepener for stage inductions and have the
first routine waiting for the subject behind a door at the bottom of the stairs. Again, you
really can do anything that you want, just link the download movement with the
increasing trance.

The most obvious trance deepener to use for the handshake interrupt is to connect the
position of the hand itself to the depth of trance. So, as the hand lowers the subject goes
deeper into trance. This association is very powerful, and really useful. It can be used in
three different ways. You can use it as an indicator of how deep in trance your subject is
by instructing them to only lower their hand as quickly as they can go into trance, or you
can use it to guide the depth of trance by forcefully lowering it yourself, or (or rather
and) you can use it to set up a trigger that fires when the hand comes to rest against the
thigh.

Personally, I like to take control of the hand so that I can force the subject into trance
very quickly. And then lift it to bring them back out for a second before forcing them
back down again. This technique of repeatedly waking a subject and re-inducing the
trance state very quickly creates a much more profound state than a single induction
over the same time frame. It's a bit like tempering steel by subjecting it to alternating hot
and cold temperatures, or, if you prefer, tensing your muscles before you relax them. The
effect of which is much more profound than relaxation alone.

It was Dave Elman that first explored this idea of repeatedly waking and re-inducing the
subject into hypnosis. He noticed that his clients always responded much more
favourably to his suggestions after a few sessions and postulated that it was the
accumulated experience of each induction that made the subjects more suggestible. To
test his theory he decided to try compacting several inductions into one session and
discovered that it had the same deepening effect as a series of sessions that would
normally span several weeks. This discovery really helped to speed up the hypnotic
process and goes a long way to explaining what happens during a typical stage show
where subjects repeatedly enter hypnosis between routines that become more and more
extreme as the evening unfolds.

As with any set movement that has a predetermined end point you can set up a trigger
that automatically fires when the end point is reached. In this case you can set up a
trigger for the moment that the hands comes to rest against the thigh (or in the subjects
lap if they are sitting down). It may sound crude but the most common suggestion that is
linked to the trigger in this way is simply to go deeper into trance. Some hypnotists say
twice as deep, others say ten times as deep, either way has pretty much the same result.

An interesting spin on the trigger is to tell the subject that when their hand touches yours
they will come back to normal waking consciousness and forget everything that just
happened. Then you catch their hand as it lowers, complete the handshake as though
nothing has happened and continue to welcome them onto the stage. At first glance this
might seem like a bit of a waste but it's actually a very powerful technique with three
benefits. First, it drops the subject into trance and brings them back up very quickly,
which, as we've just discovered, will increase the depth of the next trance that you'll be
doing when you officially begin your show. The other two benefits are not so obvious,
but they are equally valuable. One of the benefits is that other potential volunteers that
see the induction will be much more likely to respond when you hypnotise them. In fact,
this is the reason that many hypnotists used to use stooges in their show. Most people
think of stooges as actors that pretend they are hypnotised because hypnosis isn't real,
but that's not the case. Stooges were primarily used as the first volunteer to demonstrate
the hypnotists power. Subsequent genuine volunteers were then much more likely to go
into trance as they had already seen that the hypnotist can really hypnotise people. This
use of stooges is recommended in Ormand McGills classic work, The Essential Guide
to Stage Hypnosis. Years ago this kind of thing was very common, but today, given the
advances in genuine induction techniques and the increase in acceptability and
awareness of hypnosis, the use of stooges is very rare. I've personally never used one,
although I can definitely see the value. The final benefit of dropping a volunteer into
trance as you welcome them on to stage, only to wake them up seconds later as though it
never happened, is that it looks good. Many novice stage hypnotists are so focussed on
the actual hypnosis that they sometimes forget that the primary reason for doing a stage
show is to entertain the audience. Dropping a person into trance very quickly and
waking them a few seconds later with no apparent awareness that they've 'been under' is
a very impressive demonstration of the power of hypnosis, even if the subject doesn't
actually do anything.

The Transition

The transition between the initial command and the trance deepener is very important. It
needs to happen quickly. The easiest way to do this is to use the word 'because' and then
to immediately flow into the deepening script. So in our example of using the 'look at
your hand' command with the hand lowering deepener you might say something like this:

"Look at your hand. Notice the subtle variations of colour in your skin. Look closer now
and see the tiny ridges on the surface of your skin because as your hand begins to lower
you can go deeper into trance..."

The 'because' doesn't even have to make sense, it's just used as a way of leading the
subject in a direction and preventing them from distracting themselves out of the
experience. Linking two phases of the induction together in this way is called a
linguistic bridge. There are several strengths of bridge that can be used to link your
commands, all of which will increase the acceptance of the linked command. The
weakest linguistic bridge is the word 'and', next we have words like 'as, when and
while' and the strongest are words such as 'makes, causes and because'. A linguistic
bridge does a couple of very useful things. First, as we've already seen, it allows you to
flow into your next command very quickly, avoiding an otherwise natural pause that
could be perceived by the subject as the end of the routine and a signal to wake
themselves up. Second, it creates an association between the two commands. The idea
here is along the line of A causes B or because A we have B. The logic of the
association doesn't have to make any sense, or even be grammatically correct, it's just a
way of connecting the two statements together. I like to think of linguistic bridges as a
way of avoiding the natural pause at the end of a sentence. It's almost as though you're
bombarding the subject with an endless stream of commands that doesn't give them the
opportunity to do anything other than follow them.

If we jump back to our mini script for a moment we can add in some linguistic bridges
to make it more effective. Now we have something like this:

"Look at your hand and notice the subtle variations of colour in your skin as you look
closer now causing you to see the tiny ridges on the surface of your skin because as your
hand begins to lower you can go deeper into trance..."

As you can see, this sentence doesn't really make sense. It's definitely not grammatically
correct, but that doesn't matter. In fact, distorting the flow of the sentence can be a very
effective way of adding additional confusion to your induction. As we have already
seen, lots of induction scripts do this by including ambiguous words. Other clever little
tricks that you'll see in many inductions are to link two sentences by over lapping a
single word or hide a command by overlapping it between two sentences.

I'll explain these techniques in more detail in just a moment, but first I want to very
quickly say that I appreciate that things might seem to be getting a little bit confusing
here, but don't worry. These techniques are all very simple when you tackle them one by
one. Igor Ledochowski, an expert in covert persuasion (website http://www.hidden-
hypnosis.com) uses a fantastic analogy that beautifully describes the subtle power of
layering multiple techniques together.

He compares resisting hypnosis to snapping a pencil. Snapping one pencil is very easy,
anybody can do it. One pencil is like a very basic induction, it's easy to resist. But when
you start layering language patterns into your induction it's like adding more pencils.
Individually each pencil is very weak, but together they quickly become very strong.
Once you have four or five pencils, it's almost impossible to break them. Similarly,
when you layer four or five language patterns into your induction it's almost impossible
for your subject to resist going into hypnosis.

OK, let's take a look at these layered commands and how linking sentences in different
ways can aid the induction process. For now, don't worry too much about trying to
remember any of this, just practise a basic induction and add these techniques as you
become more comfortable.

First we'll look at merging sentences by compacting them together. When you link two
sentences in such a way that they flow into each other it temporarily overloads the
conscious mind, which, as we know, confuses the critical factor and gives us clearer
access to the subconscious. The following is an example of how you might use this
during an induction, with the merged word/s CAPITALISED for clarity.

'As you listen to THE SOUND OF MY VOICE causes you to go deeper into trance.'
Obviously, the merged sentence makes no sense. You don't want to overuse this
technique, but throwing in one or two of these can really confuse a person. The extra
processing that is required can overload the conscious mind and cause a person to
almost 'short out' into a trance state. It's almost as though the conscious mind is saying to
the subconscious mind, 'I have no idea what's going on, you take over.'

The second technique that is often used allows you to slip a command into the
subconscious mind by forming a new command that overlaps the end of one sentence
and the beginning of another. I primarily use this technique before the induction when
I'm explaining to the client how hypnosis works. This is what I was referring to earlier
when I said your first 'official' suggestion. During most hypnotic inductions the
suggestions start before the subject realises. Before any session you usually spend a few
minutes explaining to the client a little about what you're going to do, and what they can
expect as they go into trance. This is the perfect time to include these suggestions,
especially if the client is nervous about hypnosis, as their guard will be down at this
point having not yet realised that you are already directing them.

Again, here is an example of this technique in action with the overlapping command
CAPITALISED for clarity:

'You will feel be relaxed as you GO INTO TRANCE. NOW, just sit back and make
yourself comfortable.'

Another technique is to hide a command by splitting it up into several words and

embedding these into a larger sentence. This creates an embedded command that can be
presented to the subjects subconscious by subtly marking it out from the rest of the
script. You can mark out your embedded command in several ways, most people favour
a slight shift in tonality as this can be used on a subject that has already closed their
eyes. If you're working with a subject that is looking at you then you can mark out a
command with a visual cue, such as raising your eyebrows, blinking or lifting a finger
on specific words that, when tagged together, form a completely separate command. If
we quickly jump back to Derren's 'That's why we came to this WINdow' command from
earlier then you can clearly see how the word 'WIN' is picked out with a shift in tonality
that causes the subconscious mind to notice it. We can't say whether of not Derren also
included other embedded commands that he marked out visually because he has his back
to the camera, but I would guess that he also marked out the word 'we', forming the
command 'we win'.

The beauty of marking out embedded commands is that the subconscious mind will
notice the marked words and link them together to form a new sentence, and because the
new sentence is actually formed inside the subconscious mind it doesn't have to bypass
the critical factor.

Here is an example of embedding a command into a longer sentence. Again the

command is CAPITALISED for clarity. For these to work, you must mark out each
capitalised word in a way that the subjects subconscious mind will notice.

'As you GO into trance, you may notice you are breathing a little DEEPER than you
usually do.'

Embedded commands will not necessarily cause a person to blindly follow your
suggestion, but they will increase the likelihood of the person doing what you've
suggested. So if the subject doesn't immediately respond in the way that you expect it
doesn't mean that the command has failed. Think of it this way... Before the command
there was a 5% chance that the subject was going to do what you were about to suggest
anyway, after the command that percentage is pushed up, let's say to 40%. With just one
embedded command we've substantially increased the chance of the subject doing
something they otherwise wouldn't have done. A second embedded command might push
it up even higher, let's say to 80%. If we keep layering commands into our speech in this
way then we keep pushing up the possibility that the subject will obey them. This comes
back to those pencils, it only takes a few working together to make them practically
unbreakable.

Non-verbal communication

As you've no doubt realised by now, hypnotic language patterns can be very powerful.
However, you also need to consider your non-verbal communication. In fact, I would go
so far as to say that this is the most important factor of any induction. It's also the reason
that lots of people using pre-written scripts fail.

Remember, hypnotising people is nothing like casting a spell. The actual words you say
don't have some mystical power that automatically puts your subject into a trance. The
way you say the words is far more important. As is any message that you communicate
to your subject non-verbally.

Before we look at the power of non-verbal communication let's take a moment to

consider tonality. Tonality is a topic of hot debate in the hypnotic community. Most
hypnotists favour an authoritative monotone, others prefer a more dynamic delivery.
Personally, I much prefer the dynamic approach. I like to imagine that my tonality is
taking my subject on a roller-coaster ride. Sometimes I speak very quickly and build
excitement in my inductions, other times I slow it right down and induce relaxation. I
find that mixing it up a little really helps the induction process. This works in exactly the
same way as repeatedly dropping a subject into a succession of trance states during a
single induction. This can be a very valuable and powerful tool when used correctly.
When you are first starting out, you may want to stick with the monotone approach as
this gives you much more time to prepare what you're going to say during the induction.
When you feel more comfortable, you can introduce more variety to your tonality if it
suits your style.

A very powerful way to mix up your tonality is to use the meaning of the word itself.
For example, when you say the word exciting, sound excited. Likewise, if you say the
word relax, use a relaxing tonality. This may sound obvious, and easy, but it does take a
little practise to get it right. Try reading a paragraph or two of this book aloud in this
style, shifting your tone to illustrate the meaning of each word.

Body Language

The next important thing to consider is your body language. It's imperative that you
project confidence when using rapid hypnosis. Even if your volunteer knows absolutely
nothing about body language they will definitely be able to determine whether or not you
believe in your own ability to 'put them under'. If they don't think you're confident, they
will have no confidence in your ability and probably won't go into trance.

In many cases 'fake it until you make it' is enough. In other words, it doesn't really matter
what you're feeling inside, just as long as you look good on the outside. However, it's
much better, and makes much more sense, to build your confidence first. If you go into
the induction bursting with confidence then you'll naturally do everything right. You'll
say the right things, use the right tone and make the right gestures.

This is a little bit of a catch 22 situation. You'll feel much more confident when you've
hypnotised more people, and you'll hypnotise more people when you feel more
confident. Over time, as people learn that you are a hypnotist (and see or hear of you
successfully hypnotising other people) you'll find that it gets easier and easier. The more
famous you become the greater your volunteers expectation will be that they will go into
trance. There is actually a case where a very famous and well respected hypnotist was
giving a talk to some hypnosis students. As he stepped up to the podium to deliver his
speech the audience all stood up to applaud him. In response, he innocently waved his
hand, gesturing for them to sit. Several members of the audience had worked themselves
into such a state (wondering what this master was going to do to them) that they instantly
dropped into a deep trance, just from a hand gesture inviting them to sit.

Obviously, this is not going to work for you. Well... not yet anyway. Right now, nobody
knows you're a hypnotist, so the expectation to go into trance is very low. What you
need to do is present yourself in such a way that people believe that you can do it.
Talking knowledgeably about hypnosis really helps (and it gives you plenty of
opportunity to slip in some embedded commands). Acting like you've done it a million
times before also helps. And to pull that off, you must appear totally confident.

I'm going to give you a very simple confidence booster in just a second. But first I want
you to think about the people that you're going to be hypnotising. Who will you
hypnotise first? Are you going to hypnotise a friend or a stranger? This is a very
important point to consider. A friend may seem like the best option, but your friends
already know that you're not really a seasoned hypnotist with years of experience. At
best they probably know you're studying hypnosis and are happy to help you out by
being a willing guinea-pig, but they are far from the ideal subject. A stranger has no idea
how experienced you are. If you are interested in pursuing a career as a stage or street
hypnotist then you might like to take your new skills to the streets and invite total
strangers to experience hypnosis. Obviously you'll need to check with your local
authorities before you do this as the law on hypnosis changes from place to place.

Walking up to a complete stranger in the street and offering to hypnotise them is not for
everyone. It takes a certain kind of person to be able to do this, to put it bluntly... you
need balls! If you don't think that this kind of thing is for you (which is totally fine) then
you'll probably want to practise on friends... and confine your hypnotic displays to
parties and social gatherings.

If you do start out with friends, then I suggest that you approach the subject as though it's
an experiment, not a challenge. Don't allow them to drag you into a situation where they
are challenging you to put them under. Leave that kind of thing until you have a little
more experience. For now, simply play with the inductions and get plenty of feedback
from everyone you hypnotise.

Whether you start out with friends or strangers the confidence rule applies. You must
project confidence. You can fake it if you have to but ideally... you need to be feeling it.
Confidence in your ability to put someone into trance is much much more important than
any book, DVD or course on hypnosis ever gives it credit (With the possible exception
of one course called The Confident Hypnotist by Nathan Thomas - available at
http://www.nathanthomashypnosis.com)
Henry Ford once said "Whether you think you can, or you can't, you're right." This is
never more true than in hypnosis. Be confident and believe that you can do it and you
will.

So, I think you'll agree that now would be a good time to reveal that little confidence
boosting trick. This is a really simple trick that you can use in any situation that you
need to feel more confident. You can do it in seconds, you don't need to close your eyes
or anything like that and it works like magic.

All you have to do is imagine that you are really tall. And I mean really tall! Like 15 or
20ft! or more if you like. Then visualise yourself as being made of solid diamond. Take
in a nice deep breath and feel your chest expand. If you're increasing your confidence to
deal with a negative person that was bothering you, then you can imagine how
insignificant they are compared to you. You could swat them like a fly if you wanted to.
Their tiny squeaky voice can barely reach your ears and your booming confidence
blows them away like a tornado.

If you're increasing your confidence to approach somebody (such as a potential date or

business colleague) then imagine that you have a bright red cape draped over your
shoulders and as you walk toward them feel it dragging along the floor behind you. Take
confident strides like a roman emperor and imagine a fanfare of trumpets announcing
your arrival.

This simple visualisation exercise really does work. You can use it to switch your
confidence on whenever you need it and it instantly transforms your demeanour. Do this
before you approach a person that you are going to hypnotise and you're non-verbal
communication will automatically send them a very clear message that you know exactly
what you're doing.

Psychic leakage

Every book, DVD and course that I've studied on hypnosis champions the importance of
correct tonality, some go the extra mile and talk about the importance of body language
but none consider the one thing that I truly believe will give you the edge over all other
hypnotists.

This is your psychic leakage. In other words, your thoughts.

Whatever you believe about psychic communication I want you to stick with me on this.
From my own experience and experiments I am without a doubt that what you think
during a typical induction will affect the outcome of that induction.

If you do and say everything perfectly, but your internal dialogue is doubting that it'll
work, it probably won't. Now don't get me wrong, negative self talk won't sabotage
every induction, but it will hamper your success.

However, if you mess up your induction, say a few things wrong, look a little nervous
but think with complete confidence and expect success, you'll probably get it. Again, I
don't want to mislead you here, your thoughts alone aren't going to be enough but they
are far more powerful than most hypnotists realise.

If you have what's commonly known as a 'monkey mind' (lots of internal chatter) then I
suggest you keep it occupied by thinking your induction to your subject at the same time
as saying it. You can do this in several ways. You could say the actual words inside
your head as you say them out loud, or you could visualise your subject responding to
your induction in the way that you want them to, or you could simply compliment your
script with suggestions such as 'That's right, deeper and deeper" etc.

When you hypnotise somebody try to think of your communication as being in several
layers. The most obvious layer is the words of the script that you are using. This is
where many basic hypnotists stop... which is probably why they struggle so much. The
second layer is the way that you say the words. I use a little trick here that really helps
my delivery. I pretend that the person I'm hypnotising speaks a different language to the
one I am using, so they can't actually understand anything I'm saying. In order to
hypnotise them I therefor need to delivery my words in such a way that my tone, pace
and inflections guide the subject into trance. One of the easiest ways to do this is to
slow down the tempo of your voice as the trance progresses and they go deeper.

The next layer is the language patterns. This is where you make use of ambiguous words
and embedded commands. It really helps if you prepare a few of these in advance so
that you don't have to think too much during the actual induction.

Next we have your body language and general demeanour. As we've already seen,
feeling confident is the trick to this layer and a simple visualisation exercise is all that it
needed to make sure you're doing everything right. Something that we haven't really
touched on yet but also fits into this category is gestures. Gestures are a very powerful
way of influencing people. If you make a downward gesture you are subconsciously
communicating the idea of going deeper into trance. An inward gesture (such as bringing
your hands together in front of you) subconsciously communicates the idea of narrowing
ones focus.

The final layer is your psychic communication. These are the thoughts that you transmit
to your subject during the induction. Before we move on I want to take a moment to talk
about this a little more. What we are talking about here is not a conscious recognition of
your thoughts. Your subject does not have to have any psychic ability for this to matter.
We are talking about a subconscious awareness. You think something and at a
subconscious level your subject picks it up. If your thought is conducive to them going
into trance then it will help the induction, if it is not then it will hinder the induction. If
you want to experiment with this then I strongly recommend that you do so with an
animal. If you have a pet, send it thoughts and see how it responds. I know this might
sound crazy to some people and it's not the kind of thing you usually read about in a
book on hypnosis but it is definitely worth the effort. A dog is probably the easiest
animal to transmit thoughts to. With no other changes (don't move or talk) try
transmitting different things to a pet dog. Experiment with words, such as walkies or
food, then try to send mental images to your pet and see how it responds. I've been doing
this with my pets for years. If my dog whimpers I send him pictures to find out what he
wants. When I get the right picture he responds. If the picture was milk he runs to his
bowl, if it was to go out into the garden he runs to the door, if it was to go for a walk he
runs to his lead. I can't pick up on anything he's trying to communicate to me, but I am
absolutely convinced that he picks up my projected thoughts and I'm also convinced that
other people do too.

Whether you subscribe to this idea of not, I strongly recommend that you think your
subject into hypnosis while you're hypnotising them. If for no other reason than to keep
you focussed and to ensure that any negative thoughts don't taint your other non-verbal
communication.

All this may seem a little overwhelming, but just take it one step at a time. To begin,
focus solely on the actual induction process itself. Don't worry about all of the layers in
the beginning. Get comfortable doing the basics and build up gradually. Over time your
inductions will become incredibly powerful... just like those pencils!

The complete process

We're going to have a bit of a recap here and bring everything together. This is what you
might call a rapid induction recipe. All of the basic components are here, you just need
to flesh it out with your own style.

Step One: Get confident!

Step Two: (Optional) Pick somebody that looks like they would make a great hypnotic
subject. (Eye's glazed over, transfixed on what you're saying, focussing on you intently
etc)

Step Three: (Optional) Chat about hypnosis, answer questions, tell them what you're
going to do (or not do.. i.e., you won't make them strip!) Include lots of embedded
commands during this 'pre-hypnotic chat'

Step Four: Do something that causes the subject to begin a familiar pattern, such as
presenting your hand for them to shake.

Step Five: Interrupt the pattern and cause confusion by doing something unexpected.
(Such as... Grabbing their wrist, putting your hand in front of their face, lifting their arm,
holding the back of their head, asking an illogical question, saying something weird etc.)

Step Six: Give them an instruction to follow immediately! (Examples: Look at your
hand, look into my eyes, look at my finger, watch this swinging watch.. etc..) A great
instruction is to get them to take a deep breath. This works well if you do it in a slightly
unexpected way by getting them to breathe in through their mouth and out through their
nose. It's a bit different to what people expect so it further captures their focus.

Step Seven: Create an association between moving down and going deeper into trance.
(Examples: Lower their arm, their eyelids, your arm, your finger, have them imagine
walking down some stairs, go down in a lift, walk down a forest path etc... and connect
this to the idea of becoming more sleepy and relaxed.) At this point, if they haven't
already tell them to close their eyes.

Step Eight: Narrow their focus. Describe a scene incorporating all of their senses. At
this stage you can also tell them to listen only to the sound of your voice and that any
other sounds simply cause them to relax even deeper.

Step Nine: Give some simple suggestions. (We'll look at this in a moment.)

Step Ten: Wake them up. (Don't worry... we'll cover this later.)

As I've said many times, this basic recipe is not a spell. This isn't the only way to
hypnotise people and you don't have to use specific words. We've talked a lot about
interrupting a handshake, but you could skip the interrupt altogether. Another common
induction is to suddenly tilt a persons head forward, causing shock and confusion, as
you slip in a suggestion to sleep. This particular induction is one that I demonstrate on
my free hypnosis course available at http://www.freehypnosislessons.com

That's really all there is to a rapid induction. And, in fact, it sounds much more
complicated like this than it really is. Once you've memorised a few key phrases and
had a little practise you can start to include more advanced language patterns and layer
your induction so that it becomes even more powerful. When you're just starting out it's
perfectly acceptable to role-play the entire thing a few times on your own (or with a
willing friend) just to get the hang of it before doing it for real.

If you have a willing friend then have them act as though they are hypnotised when you
go through the induction and give them a few simple suggestions to follow. Even though
they are only acting this will really help to boost your skills and create a subconscious
pattern of success that will make future inductions feel more natural.

The wake up process

Some people are too scared to try hypnosis because they worry about getting stuck in
trance. I hope, by now, that you realise that this simply can not happen. Think of the
hypnotic state as being similar to meditation. It takes years of dedication to master
meditation and a tremendous amount of focus and discipline to maintain a meditative
state for any length of time. Being hypnotised is a little bit like have a meditation coach
that guides you into an altered state of consciousness. If the guide stops helping you it's
very difficult to maintain the state on your own without training.

When you hypnotise a person you are essentially acting as that guide, helping them to
achieve an altered state of consciousness. If you stop helping them, they'll very probably
wake up within a few minutes. On occasion a person may be so tired that they fall
asleep during trance, this is no different to falling asleep during a boring lecture.

Contrary to popular belief, it's impossible to become 'stuck' in hypnosis. Even if a

hypnotist tried to keep a person in a trance state for a prolonged period of time
eventually the person would fall asleep. So don't worry about not being able to wake
people up, it's actually much easier than keeping them under!

To correctly wake a subject from trance you should count upwards (usually from 1 to 3).
Most inductions count a person down into trance (usually from 10 to 1 as they walk
down imaginary stairs) so counting upwards reverses this process and brings them back.
The direction that you count is not a rule, you can actually do whatever you like. You
could put people under by saying "3, 2, 1 Sleep!" and bring them back saying "3, 2, 1
Eyes open, wide awake!". But, in my opinion, counting people down into trance and up
out of it makes much more sense.

It's good practise to change your voice and lead a person out of trance. You do this by
speaking faster and in a more conversational tone. This mirrors vocal changes that you
make during the induction to guide them into trance, where you talk slower and lower
your tone. As with the induction, deliver the wake up script in such a way that a person
that doesn't even understand English would know what is expected of them. You want
them to become increasingly alert, so make your voice increasingly alerting.

Finally, you may want to slip in a few post hypnotic suggestions as you wake your
volunteer. Usually this would be a suggestion to feel good. A very common example
might be something like this:

"On the count of 3 you will wake from this trance state feeling fantastic. You'll feel
refreshed and alert, happy and confident. 1, becoming aware of the position of your
body now. 2, your eyes beginning to open now as you recognise that you are back in the
room with me feeling wonderful and 3 eyes fully open now and wide awake! Welcome
back."

Creating Suggestions

Now that you know how to put someone into hypnosis, and wake them up. You need to
know how to create a suggestion. I'm not going to give you actual suggestions here, but I
am going to furnish you with some very simple rules that you can apply to any situation.
However, before we get to that, a word of caution. It is very possible, and very easy, to
relieve pain using hypnosis. For example, you could hypnotise a persons headache
away. But don't. Unless you are a qualified professional, never ever assume that you
know what something is, no matter how obvious it seems. Helping a person by relieving
a headache could cause them to bypass a professional diagnosis that might otherwise
have saved their life. I know it sounds a little over the top, but pain is a sign that
something is wrong, and that something could be serious. If a person is in pain and
you're not qualified to diagnose the cause, don't treat the symptom.

I don't want to get all doom and gloom here, but I have two more very serious warnings
for you. On occasion you'll have the good fortune to bump into someone that is
incredibly responsive to hypnosis. We call these people somnambulistic... And trust me,
they are amazing! These are the people that every hypnotists wants in their show. One of
the most incredible things about a somnambulistic is that they respond to your
suggestions as though they are completely real. So, if you were to say that your finger
was actually a red hot poker, then poke them with it, they will burn. They'll actually feel
genuine pain and their skin will blister.

Sounds incredible? Think about it. When you burn yourself your skin doesn't
automatically blister, a part of your mind sends a signal for it to do so in order to start
the healing process. That part of your mind sends the signal because it believes you
have been burned, whether you have really been burned or just been told that you have
by a hypnotist is completely irrelevant. The mind follows the same protocol for both.

So, here's a golden rule that you must always stick to. Only ever give suggestions that
would be OK if they were actually real. That means red hot poker fingers are out, but
eating an onion that your subject thinks is an apple is fine. After all, an evening of bad
breath isn't such a bad thing. And... Even if your subject doesn't appear to have gone into
a trance, stick to this rule. Act as though everyone you hypnotise is a somnambulistic
and only give suggestions that would be safe for everyone concerned if they were
actually real.

The next rule is equally important and can have dire consequences. When you hypnotise
a person they are very very suggestible. In fact, they are so suggestible that, it you're not
careful, it's possible that you could create a completely false memory just by asking a
leading question. So, for example, if someone had a scary dream a few days after
watching a film about aliens, then came to you asking if you could hypnotise them as
they think they may have been abducted, your questions will very very probably create a
very real memory of a very scary abduction that never actually happened.

Several years ago a group of well meaning counsellors suspected that some children
were being abused by their parents. In an attempt to uncover the truth the children were
asked lots of suggestive questions about their experience. Over time, one by one, the
children gradually recalled painful memories of abuse. The counsellors thought they'd
uncovered a paedophile ring and several of the parents were charged and sent to prison.
Later, it was discovered that the uncovered memories couldn't have been real and were
accidentally planted into the subconscious minds of the children during questioning.
This phenomena is called false memory syndrome, and it's just one of the reasons that
evidence gained during hypnosis can not be used in a court of law. This particular case
created so much unnecessary suffering, not just for the innocent parents that were
wrongly accused but also for the children who actually came out of the ordeal with
memories of being abused by their loved ones that were as real to them as any other. I
think it goes without saying that you should be very cautious of leading questions and
don't hypnotise people to try to uncover anything they may (or may not) have repressed.
Leave that to the professionals.
Our next rule isn't quite so serious, more of a guideline really. Your suggestions should
be stated in the positive. This one is very simple. The subconscious mind can't process
a negative. To give you a rather crude and overused example, if I say 'Don't think of a
pink elephant' you have to think of one in order to know what not to think about. In a
similar way, asking a person not to forget something will actually increase the chances
of them forgetting it. Instead, ask them to remember. In fact, any 'don't' command is a bad
idea. Most parents learn this the hard way. Don't stay out all night, don't get drunk, don't
forget to do your home work, don't make a mess, don't hit your brother! All of these
commands do exactly the opposite of what you actually want. And when a person is in
hypnosis this effect is magnified considerably.

By sticking to these simple rules you can create suggestions for anything. It's usually a
good idea to start with some very simple suggestions, and work up to the more
outrageous stuff later. While your practising on your friends, just give some basic
suggestions that they'll feel really good. Perhaps you can tell them that each time you
clap your hands they become more and more excited, like a child on Christmas Eve.
This creates an anchor that you can fire over and over again by clapping your hands
repeatedly. It also makes your friend feel great, making them much more willing to
volunteer for you next time. I learned the hard way that if you make a person look stupid,
they don't volunteer again and you very quickly run out of people to practise on. Be nice
to your friends and think of ways that you can use hypnosis to help them, then you'll have
lots of willing volunteers and get lots of practise.

Learning hypnosis from a book is far from ideal. The printed word can only convey so
much. To help you develop your skills as a hypnotist, and to actually see it in action, I've
created a free hypnosis course for you. The course consists of several video lessons
where I demonstrate hypnosis in action and share the secrets that I've learned over the
years. The complete course is totally free, you can get started right now at
http://www.freehypnosislessons.com

Recommended hypnosis courses for further study

The Art of Covert Hypnosis by Steven Peliari

http://steven-peliari.com

Covert Hypnosis Exposed by Igor Ledochowski

http://hidden-hypnosis.com
Free Online Hypnosis Course by Steven Hall
http://freehypnosislessons.com

To watch my in-depth review of the most popular covert and conversational hypnosis
courses please visit: http://freebookoftheday.com/coverthypnosis.php

For more information on hypnosis please visit my website at http://inducingtrance.com