Last night I went to an off-Broadway show called Hyprov where I, along with several other audience volunteers, was hypnotized on stage in front of a huge crowd of people.
The conceit of Hyprov is that the hypnotist whittles down the initial big group of volunteers to a smaller group of the 5 most “suggestible” people, who are then coached by an improvisor into doing various improv scenarios while in trance. I made it through some initial rounds but didn’t get into the final 5, which was fine with me as I wanted to watch the show just as much as I wanted to be in it, and you can’t really do both.
I thought it would be nervewracking to run on stage, sit down shoulder-to-shoulder with a bunch of strangers and be brought into trance by a hypnotist I’d never met or seen before, in front of so many people. But it actually didn’t make me nervous at all. Trance is such a familiar sensation to me, after doing so much of it with my partner over the past five years, that I felt immediately at home when the hypnotist’s voice started talking us down into that feeling. I had an advantage, nervousness-wise, in that I already knew the answer to a question many of my fellow volunteers were no doubt wondering about before the process began: What does hypnosis feel like?
Imagine what it would be like if you could experience all of these feelings at the same time, or combine them all into one:
the deep, heavy sleepiness that sets in as you’re lying in bed trying to fall asleep
the autopilot flow state you go into when driving/walking along a route you’ve navigated hundreds of times before
the profound focused attention you feel when watching a compelling movie or sports game
the calm, quiet relaxation you feel when sliding into a warm bath at the end of a well-spent day
the comforting sense, when you’re in the passenger seat of a loved one’s car as they’re driving, that you’re in good hands and everything is going as it should
But on top of all of that, there is also suggestibility, one of the calling cards of trance. When you’re in a suggestible state, someone can conjure physical and emotional feelings in you just by describing them; you may be able to see visuals clearly upon hearing them described, or “hallucinate” sounds that aren’t there if you’re told that they are; you might be easily triggered into giggling or crying or relaxing, just by hearing someone tell you to react in those ways. The only other feelings I can think to compare to hypnotic suggestibility are 1) being on certain drugs and 2) the nearly automatic physical and mental obedience that can set in when you’ve been playing a game like “Simon Says” for a few minutes and are so used to following directions immediately that it’s almost hard to stop.
Part of why I wanted to volunteer for the Hyprov show was that hypnosis is an enjoyable feeling for me: relaxing, peaceful, familiar and safe. Naturally that won’t be the case for everyone, especially people who haven’t experienced it much (if at all) before, people who need to cling to a sensation of being in control to feel safe, or people who’ve had bad experiences with unethical or careless hypnotists. I was half-wondering, as I sat there listening to the stage hypnotist working his magic, whether the hypno newbies around me were enjoying this new feeling, were scared of it, or perhaps were having trouble going into trance at all. Like many other focused headspaces, I find that hypnotic trance is much easier to access when you’ve already experienced it – like your brain has left a trail of breadcrumbs for you to follow to a familiar destination.
In any case, I’m glad that stage hypnosis was not my first experience of hypnosis. I think if it had been, I’d’ve spent those minutes on stage desperately wondering if I was “doing it right,” if the people around me were judging my level of responsiveness, if something bad might happen if I let myself go too deep.
Instead, I just got to luxuriate in that comfortable trancey feeling I know so well, enjoying the experience of it in a new context, until the hypnotist snapped me awake and sent me back to my seat to watch the rest of the show.