(classical music)
- Close your eyes.
Breathe in, and out.
Slowly.
Picture yourself by the ocean.
It's warm.
You can hear waves.
You're completely at ease.
When I count backwards from three,
yada yada yada yada yada,
and ta-da!
That's the Hollywood version of hypnosis.
Luckily it is bunk.
But what is hypnosis?
Is it real?
The short answer is, yeah.
But maybe not the way you think.
Hypnosis is a trance state,
characterized by suggestibility,
relaxation, and heightened imagination.
Kind of like day dreaming.
Think of losing yourself
in a book or in a movie.
You're conscious, but
you tune out stimuli.
Including your own worries and doubts.
This happens more often
than you might think.
In fact, by that definition,
you've probably accidentally
hypnotized yourself before.
You're highly suggestible when in trance,
so when a hypnotist tells
you to do something,
you are more likely to do it.
Hence the whole
cluck-like-a-chicken bit, right?
Fear of embarrassment
flies out the window,
but not a sense of safety and morality.
That's reassuring when you think about it.
I mean, at least stage
magicians are churning out
temporary chickens, instead
of winter soldiers, right?
Hypnosis is often described as a way
to access the subconscious,
that's the part of your brain
that does all of the
behind-the-scenes thinking.
This is the unsung hero in your head.
It's solving problems.
It's finding your stuff.
It's giving you those out
of the blue eureka moments,
and all that jazz.
Psychiatrists think that
hypnosis partially subdues
the conscious mind.
Think of your conscious
mind as an inhibitive force.
It's the thing that hits the brakes.
Your subconscious mind, on the other hand,
is the seat of imagination and impulse.
If that's the case, then of
course you become suggestible
when the conscious part of you gets put
on the cognitive back-burner.
The subconscious also regulates
sensations and emotions.
So if you're in trance, a
hypnosis can trigger feelings
and senses via suggestion.
You know, warmth, ocean waves.
This part of your brain
also helps store memories,
meaning hypnotized people can access
otherwise lost memories.
But this also implies that it's possible
to create false memories.
Spooky stuff, right?
And, to be fair, skeptics
have another explanation
for this state.
Social pressure.
Their idea is that insecure
people can be convinced
that they should act a certain way.
And when they do they think,
oh, I must be in a trance.
Kind of a, self-fulfilling
prophecy, or a placebo effect.
This is just scratching the surface.
I mean, we haven't even talked about
how to actually hypnotize people
and whether that whole
pendulum thing is real.
Spoiler alert, yes, it's
meant to induce a state
of suggestibility by making
you focus on one object
with such intensity that you lose track
of all the other external stimuli.
But, enough about all of that.
What do you think?
Are people really being hypnotized?
Have you, yourself, been put under?
Let me know in the comments,
and subscribe to BrainStuff
so that you don't miss a thing.
That's it.
Have a good day.
Oh, wait.
Yeah, sorry.
Three,
two,
one.
