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:BUT THREE years ago, when I began
hearing statements that certain techpiques of Scientology were actually
procedures for the covert induction of
psis, I set out to find out the facts. Not
facts about Scientology, of which I had enough
already, but about hypnosis.
There were two things I wished to ascertain: First, what IS hypnosis? and, secondly,
what are the bad and the good aspects of hypnosis?
These facts, which are very briefly presented herein, were not obtained through further
investigating of pettifogging fakirs. This
data has been evolved first through thoroughly
learning the views and the techniques of leading ethical hypnotherapists.
By "ethical totherapist" is meant a
therapist who plainly and honestly states that
he IS a practitioner in hypnotherapy or hypnoanalysis. He is an accredited specialist who
receives all or most of his practice through
referals from medical doctors or clinics. Some
ethical hypnotherapists frankly employ hypnosis as an adjuvant to their main occupation
as top-flight dentists, to control pain, anxiety, and hemorrhaging. Others hold diplomas in
medicine, sometimes specializing in neurology,
obstetrics, and surgery.
The first thing discovered was that it is
NOT the publicity-seeking charlatans of cults
and fake-science racketeers who have developed
and advanced the practice of the phenomena of
hypnosis, but sincere, hard-working, medically
trained investigators who are intensely seeking to perfect hypnosis as a short-cut to
effective and relatively less expensive psychosomatic medicine.
The next and rather astonishing thing I encountered was that among ethical workers,
"hypnosis" is considered as yet to be undefinable. Not one doctor that I worked with could
technically define hypnosis or clearly say
what it actually is. One professional book
says vaguely that hypnosis is a special sort
of conditioned reflex. This is erroneous,
since the best subjects are hypnotizable on
the first try, without conditioning. Another
writer says that hypnosis is a condition
wherein the inductee fancies that he is a
child and that on this basis, he identifies
the operator with his parents. This formulation evidently is based on some specific experience with some particular patients. This
is merely an exposition of certain effects in
certain cases
