Hypnosis With a Yo-Yo?

[Fargo]

I have seen this in many movies and it has dawned on me since. Since I am surrounded by professional hypnotherapists and experienced people in hypnosis, I thought I would get this straight. Like in the movies, you would see a man holding a yo-yo which will be swinging side to side like a pendulum. He would say, "You are very sleepy.. very sleepy" and then the patient would go to sleep. Is this possible? If it is.. please show me the secrets

[hypno-therapist]

Hi Fargo,

This could be a hypnotic induction, however it is not often used nowadays, because of the stigma that Hollywood has given it. However I have used it a few times as that is what the client expected!

[Fargo]

Wow, I am quite surprised to hear this. I have always thought that it is a Hollywood effect or something made up for the movies. How would you do this? Do you need to be a professional?

[hypno-therapist]

HI Fargo,

It comes under the 'Eye Fixation' inductions. To help someone go into trance, a Hypnotist will usually use an 'induction' and then a 'deepener' - so the swinging watch or yo-yo is only half of the process.

Hope this helps.

[Rick_Lefever]

Dave Elman, in his classic 'Hypnotherapy' spends a bit of time explaining how eye fixation works as a 'wedge' into hypnosis. In a nutshell, our visual habits usually have our eyes darting around to supply data to our brain to create our visual field. At any given time (I read somewhere, sorry I can't remember where) our experience of our visual field is less than 50% real data gathered from our eyes, and the rest is built from memory and imagination. In order to accomplish this our eyes have to keep moving rapidly.
Any method of getting the eyes to focus on one point (like a spot on the wall, a fingertip, or a swinging watch) violates the mind/body's normal visual processing and provides a door way into hypnosis. George Kappas would say that fixating the eyes begins to built an unmanageable surplus of message units, that eventually requires escape into trance.
Whatever your favorite theory is, eye fixation has been a resident rabit in the hypnotist's hat for generations.

[Jonrhodesuk]

It will probably work on some, but many may think it is daft, or as already discussed, a bit cliche. I would only use it personally if someone asked for it!