HELP:Trouble Inducing Amnesia

I have been hypnotizing people for about a month now, and have never failed to hypnotize someone completely. I have always succeeded with getting someone deeper to the point where all they hear is my voice even if it is noisy in the area, and the stiff arm. For some reason, I CANNOT succeed with number amnesia. I don't know why. Basically I attempt it after doing the stiff arm. I say things such as, " Now as you go twice as deep you realize that the number 4 has been completely wiped clean from your mind. There is no number between 3 and 5, in fact when you count from 1 to 10, you count 1,2,3,5,6,7,8,9,10, because the number 4 does not exist." And then tell them I'm going to wake them up, and when they wake up, they still know the number 4 and everything is fine. The same thing happens when I tell them that they can't say their name or forget their name, the same deal takes place: they remember it just fine. What should I do? I try to get them deep before doing it and it doesn't work still!!

Favorite

0 members favorited this

▶ Reply to This

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by John Cleesattel on April 30, 2009 at 7:49am

Candin,

Also; realize that trance is when the judgmental mind (super-conscious) allows suggestions to work. When you bring people out of trance, this doesn't change right away. Fractionation takes advantage of this by teaching them to automatically react to suggestion. Each iteration, should widen the bandwidth further, and each reaction should become more and more automatic. This is what real depth of trance is, how automatically they react, not just how limp they are.

a.k.a. The difference between them lowering their arm.. and "flop".

I hope this helps
John

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Candin on April 30, 2009 at 9:37am

Outstanding, thanks.....going to give this a lot of thought.

Candin

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Roy Hunter on April 30, 2009 at 2:32pm

It would definitely be wise to avoid regression unless you are trained in it.

Roy Hunter

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Thal on April 30, 2009 at 7:06pm

OK First a qualifying statement. As a hypnotist, I have never attempted to induce 'amnesia' in a subject on stage. Thus, I defer to all the hypnotists here who are far far more experienced than I on the "how to" methods of doing this stage technique.

As a subject, I said somewhat in jest, in another discussion: "I can not recall one time, when I was given a successful suggestion of amnesia." Please notice the logical inconsistency of this statement. :-) However, I am serious too.

What follows is my opinion about the technique and what "really" happens when you suggest amnesia to a subject, from a logical, psychological and perhaps metaphysical point of view. (BTW- for "creds" here my graduate work was in Experimental Psychology- Learning and Memory).

Logically you can not make a person forget anything! This is not in the capability of the brain to delete an experience from perception. If the memory was actually deleted, then there would be NO way to recover it. Furhthermore, logically you could not undo the command of the first instruction by giving a second countermanding instruction.

Now, however poor the analogy between human memory and learning, and the computer memory (since computers don't quite learn yet), lets explain the "suggestion of amnesia" phenomena this way. First, grant me that when you give a subject a "command" to FORGET their name or a number they can not do it!

What happens is the subject wishing to comply with the hypnotist's instruction, suppresses the RECALL of the designated memory. This is sort of like when a computer deletes a file, the FAT (file allocation table) changes the name of the file by adding a new character to the file name. Then when instructed to produce the original file name, it can not find it! Restoring a file, is checking a list of files in your Recycle Bin to see what the original file was renamed and restoring the original name back to the file. When you Empty the Recycle Bin, you delete the file rename list and the file is lost (almost) forever. The data is still out there (until is is written over) and you can't get at it easily.

Like this, a subject performs a similar mental trick internally. When you give the instruction like "forget your name", they recode the instruction to "do not recall my name" and thus appear to comply with the instruction. In fact the subject, to play the game with the hypnotist, LIES to the audience about the ability to recall their name, or number, or color... whatever it may be.

The fact is, to succeed in following the direction, logically you have to keep in memory the item of knowledge you are to suppress, otherwise you might accidentally say the forbidden thought!

When the hypnotist gives the instruction "to remember" your name again, the direction to suppress the item of knowledge is canceled and the memory is magically restored, to the great amusement of the audience, and hopefully the subject.

When the subject fails to play the hypnosis amnesia game, then somewhere in your directions is a logical inconsistency, that prevents them from succeeding in following your instruction. OR perhaps they are consciously resisting you for some unknown psychological reason, that they perceive is in their best interest. So don't push it. You need to develop a fall back position to make even failure look like success to the audience.

Also, how deep a subject reports being, has no bearing what-so-ever, on their ability to comply with your hypnotic instructions. (Sorry I can't site research to support this, but it is out there.) Depth is a SUBJECTIVE psychological measurement. It does not be correlate well with any physiological measures you might take, like alpha waves or blood pressure and stuff like that. Do not count on the fact that a subject who reports they are very deep, will respond better to suggestions than one who is not so deep!

That said, any actor without hypnosis, could do all the things a hypnotic stage subject is asked do without a trance!

A better instruction is "When I say the word "petunias" you will not be able to recall your name." That way a willing subject, at any depth level can easily comply.

Thal

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Candin on April 30, 2009 at 8:23pm

WOW, good post Thai. This seems like a controversial topic for sure. It may be a long time before I get my feelings hurt (and confidence) on trying this again until much more experience.

Candin

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Blankfrost on April 30, 2009 at 8:32pm

i havn't had time to read all the threads in this disscusstion yet so i may be repeating what has already been said i also don't know if my input will be useful anywaybut maybe if you find something of use that would be good.

i thought it might be useful to focus more on what they will remember rather then what they might forget as you might know from the law of dominant effect (if thats the right one) like if you want them to forget the number 4 don't mention it just say more of what you said above "in a moment you will forget the number between 3 and 5" and even bringing them out of the state even count back from 10,9,7,6,5,3,2,1,0 and also get them very abosorbed on there experience out of hypnosis the more abosorbed they are coming out the more they are likly to forget your seggestion naturally so say something like "10 becomes more and more awake you can just picture that 10 in your head vividly and colourally leaving everything behind you.. (which indirectly seggests that he forgets as well)

also i think it might be good to reference it to real life experiences so they believe unconciously and conciously that they will forget the number and also maybe sandwich the seggestion for the number with another seggestion to forget that you seggested like maybe.

"in a moment i will ask you to forget what i say and forgetting is a perfectly natural thing its fine just like when you forget a phone number and that number is just missing from your head and when you try to remember what you did on monday two weeks ago who cares its natural to forget numbers and dates...{then give your forgetting number seggestion}....and like i said you can forget to remember or remeber to forget what i just said its natural to forget dates and numbers like what you did on monday two weeks ago and like when you forget a phone number and that number is just missing from your head forgetting is a perfectly natural thing its all right"....(then absorb them in their experience out og hypnosis).

hpe this gives you some ideas

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by little subii on April 30, 2009 at 10:51pm

number amnesia work PERFECTLY :) .... as a matter of fact , i just forgot the number 3 under hypnosis & trust me mate , i was not playing along .... once a person becomes a bit skilles in planting suggestion like , i guess it will work ... have an awesome day xxx

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by John Cleesattel on April 30, 2009 at 11:28pm

I will agree. As I recall, I do say: "will not remember" or "will go away, or will be gone (like on vacation) for a short time" not "Forget". Semantics is everything in this business.

John

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Fable Goodman on April 30, 2009 at 11:52pm

Thanks Thai,

That is all very clear and makes sense to me.

"When you give the instruction like "forget your name", they recode the instruction to "do not recall my name" and thus appear to comply with the instruction. In fact the subject, to play the game with the hypnotist, LIES to the audience about the ability to recall their name, or number, or color... whatever it may be."

Yes, another way of looking at this, is the subject recodes (reinterprets) the instruction as "for the purpose of this demonstration, 'act convincingly as is you have forgoton your name' "

The more clearly they are given the script to work from, the easier it is to act it out.

Although having said that, many people are such good improvisational actors in hypnosis, that the breifest sketchy outline of what you want, can be enough for them to work with, and elaborate on in their own unique way.

Now, I must go and defragment my hard drive.

Love and hugs,

Fable

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Candin on May 1, 2009 at 11:07am

Is it better to suggest "when you awake, you will not be able to SAY your name" instead of not be able to REMEMBER your name? I would think this would bypass the conscious (or at least have a better chance of bypassing it).

Thanks

Candin

▶ Reply

Permalink Reply by Tranzkey on May 1, 2009 at 3:41pm

Some people do not respond to every test.

Maybe you should ignore it, and move on to the next test.

If you keep trying what does not work, and it keeps on not working, the person will eventually begin to think that maybe you are incompetent,

I do not know if you are incompetent.

But you should be able to ignore a failure, and suavely keep the flow moving into the next step of your planned routine.

Just my opinion, but your focus on this is probably no help to your client...