I Can't Be Hypnotized... and Other Hypnosis Myths
I have never been hypnotized, I’m afraid I can’t be hypnotized.
You actually probably spend a good portion of your day in a light trance state! When you are driving a familiar route in your car, riding the train looking out the window, taking a leisurely shower, watching a great movie, reading a book in which you are totally engrossed, all of these things and more are commonly experienced in an alpha brain-wave state, which is considered a light trance.
But I don’t feel hypnotized when I am driving a car!
Have you ever gotten in a car and driven that familiar 20-minute route to a familiar place and it felt more like 5 minutes? This is an indication of a light trance. Think of the phrase we use, “My mind was a million miles away.” This is a trance state and what we are looking to achieve in hypnosis or in the experience of having a Past Life Regression.
Why would anyone want to have a Past Life Regression anyway?
There is a myriad of reasons to explore your own consciousness in depth. Just a few reasons include health concerns, relationship issues, life path planning, deep spiritual exploration, or even to solve some sort of mystery such as missing time, possible ET contact, or ancestral mysteries.
What does a regression feel like?
Years ago I began to tell my clients that having a regression is very much like participating in a long, very detailed, and involved daydream. When it is over, you may really feel as if you have just returned from an amazing journey, having visited other worlds and lifetimes and, in fact, you will have done just exactly that! This is why it is best to have some time to process your experience and give yourself an opportunity to fully return to your regular conscious day-to-day reality before attempting any complex mental tasks or strenuous physical activity. I suggest clearing your day completely for a regression session.
I’ve tried hypnosis before. It didn’t work. The practitioner couldn’t put me under.
Although it may be considered somewhat simplistic to make the following statements they are helpful when discussing regression work and what to expect.
Here is one: ALL hypnosis is self-hypnosis.
You have to genuinely want to have a regression and participate, not so much by trying and effort, but by relaxation and allowing and these two things are vastly different. Trying is more of a thinking state and allowing is more of a feeling state. You also have to feel safe and trust your practitioner and yourself to participate. If you have doubts, fears, questions, or feel uneasy, you won’t feel comfortable enough to have the experience you might have had.
The second helpful statement is: Hypnosis is not anesthesia.
Forget what you have seen in the movies with swinging watches and what you have might have seen with those who do “stage” hypnosis. Being hypnotized is best described in this way: Your body will feel very relaxed and your mind will feel very focused. Just like that long and involved daydream described above. Outside noises or other normal distractions don’t interfere when you are focused in this way.
I did a regression before, but I just made up a story, so it didn’t really work.
Dolores Cannon, my beautiful teacher, used to say this about that statement. “Well, you ‘made it up from somewhere.” Deep within yourself, even a “made up” story is created from information that is relevant to you and your life in some way.
One of my own favorite things to say in response is this, “Yes, you made it up. You also “made up” your entire life, and God (or Source) made you and all of creation up!”
I’ve come to believe that this aversion to “making it up” is one we have been programmed to avoid since childhood, and we have been programmed very well, unfortunately. Sayings like, “Get your head out of the clouds,” and “That was only your imagination,” have done, I believe, a disservice to all humans. The greatest creative power we have is in our imagination and we have been taught to dismiss, ignore and belittle that great force within us.
Long ago I experienced a group regression as a lark and a way to have a short afternoon break away from caring for my two young children. When it was over I remember laughing at the story “I made up” about the middle-eastern woman and her family and thinking that it was a fun distraction but that “I wasn’t really hypnotized” and my experience wasn’t really valid or profound. I have since very much changed my mind about that experience. As brief as it was, it contained information for me that to this day provides a context and perspective valid to my current life.
But I can’t visualize. I can’t see anything. So, I can’t be hypnotized.
Some people, it is true, are highly visual and can easily visualize images or even full-blown moving stories in their minds. Most people can’t do this, and it is not required. Can you “imagine” what the front door of your home looks like right now even without “seeing” an image of it floating in front of you? Congratulations! This is seeing something in “your mind’s eye” or imagining it. Can you imagine what wood smoke from a fire smells like even without one burning in front of you? Can you imagine the taste of a lemon without putting one in your mouth? Of course, you can.
Information can come to you in many, many ways. It can come visually, auditorily, in a feeling or sensing state and it can also come by a “knowingness” which is valid, too! Some people have a combination of two or more of these information streams, and some people even have information come to them by smell or taste, but that is more rare.
How can I best prepare for a QHHT (Quantum Healing Hypnosis Technique) or past life or any type of regression session?
Practice daydreaming and making up stories in your mind with as much detail as possible. Put your head back in that cloud, in other words, trust yourself and let your mind roam far and free! Relaxation and allowance are the gateway actions to ensure that you have the experience you were meant to have. Imagine away!
Copyright 2017 Candace Craw-Goldman at CandaceCrawGoldman.com