A Brief History of Hypnosis
08.24.08 (12:29 pm) [edit]A detailed history of hypnosis and its uses through the ages would be very lenghty as it is one of the oldest therapies used by Man. Its origin goes back many millenia ago; indeed many ancient cultures and civilisations knew of hypnosis and used it as a therapeutic device. Documents from the Ancient Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, Indians, Chinese, Persians and Sumerians show extensive studies in hypnosis, altered states of consciousness and parasychology. Hypnosis was considered as a cure for many physical and emotional ailments and disorders. cave painting In other words hypnosis is at least more than 6,000 years old; some scholars claim that it could be as old as Prehistory as certain cave paintings show priests apparently in state of trance as well as geometrical designs thought to depict visions seen in an altered level of consciousness. Although there was some use of Hypnosis by the Druids in Ancient Britain and Gaul, the development and introduction of Hypnosis to the modern world is attributable to Islamic scientists of the Middle Ages. Between the 9th and 14th centuries there was a great flowering of civilisation in the Mediterranean and Middle East which laid the foundations of modern science as we know it; medical and philosophical knowledge from Ancient Greece, Egypt and early Eastern civilisations was revitalised. During that revival a deep understanding of human psychology was achieved and therapeutic processes such as analysis, altered states of consciousness and hypnosis were used to alleviate emotional distress and sufferings; thus preceding psychotherapy and hypnotherapy as we know them today by quite a few centuries. From the 15th and 16th centuries onwards physicians from many nations developed further and refined the concept of hypnosis and its uses. Even though this knowledge spread throughout the European continent and to the British Isles it remained mostly confined to scientists, physicians and Universities and never quite reached the attention of the less educated people. It was "reintroduced" to the West in the 18th century when Western explorers got in contact with the practice of hypnotism in the Middle East and the Far East. Dr Frantz Anton Mesmer In the 18th century the most influential figure in the development of hypnosis was Dr Frantz Anton Mesmer, an Austrian physician who was a charismatic and at times controversial personality. He used magnets and metal frames to perform "passes" over the patient to remove "blockages" (ie: the causes of diseases) in the magnetic forces in the body - nowadays we call such forces "life energy" - and to induce a trance-like state. He soon discovered that he could reach equally successful results by passing his hands over the patient which he did for hours at times. He named this method "animal magnetism". He worked in Austria, Switzerland and Germany before settling in France; although he achieved many successes he was soon derided and ostracised by the medical community; it is generally thought that his healing sessions held in front of the public and medical practitioners were such theatrical performances that the excessive showmanship displayed led to his work being ridiculed and his tangible results scorned at. Another contributing factor to his discredit is believed to be plain and simple jealousy from his medical colleagues as he achieved results with rather unorthodox methods. However his name survived the passing of time and was immortalised in our vocabulary by the verb "mesmerise", which means to hold someone's attention to the exclusion of anything else so as to create a trance state, in other words to hypnotise that person. Not only his name survived in our vocabulary, so did his method which was named mesmerism. After Mesmers' death in 1815 one of his disciples, Armand de Puysegur, carried on his work and took it one step further. He discovered that the spoken word and direct commands induced trance easily and noticeably faster than "mesmeric passes" and that a person could be operated upon without pain and anaesthesia when in trance. This technique was used for many following decades by surgeons in France: Dr Recamier who performed the first recorded operation without anaesthesia in 1821 and Dr Cloquet, and in England: Dr Elliotson and Dr Parker who was nicknamed "Painless Parker" !. However the record for surgery under trance belongs to Dr James Esdaile, an English physician, who performed his first operation without anaesthetic in India and reached an incredible tally of 300 major operations and a thousand minor operations using hypnosis or mesmerism as it was still called at the time. Soon after, chloroform was discovered and mesmerism dropped out of favour as an anaesthetic, it was much faster to inject a patient than induce a state of trance ! [Dr James Braid] The next impulse in the history of hypnosis was given by the Scottish optometrist, Dr James Braid who discovered by accident that a person fixating an object could easily reach a trance state without the help of the mesmeric passes advocated by Dr Mesmer. In 1841 he published his findings, refuted Mesmer's work and inaccurately named his discovery "hypnotism" based on the Greek word "hypnos" which means "sleep"; it was a total misnomer as hypnosis is not sleep; yet the name remained and mesmerism became hypnotism. Another page was turned in the history of hypnosis. By the 1870's two schools of hypnosis were created in France, one by Dr Jean-Martin Charcot, in Paris, and the other one in Nancy by Dr Benheim and Dr Liebault. Further progresses were made in refining the concept of hypnosis however it was not without heated debates and arguments ! Dr Charcot stated that hypnosis could only be the result of physical or neurological stimulation while the Nancy school's view was that hypnosis is a natural state available to everyone using free will. Present days use of hypnosis follows the latter belief. Some twenty years later in 1891, the British Medical Association drafted a resolution in favour of the use of hypnosis in medicine but it was not approved until 1955, 64 years later ! [Dr Emile Coue] Another precursor of modern hypnosis and self development was Dr Emile Coue who, at the end of the 19th century, was a believer in auto-suggestion and in the role of the hypnotist as a facilitator of changes/healing in the client's condition by involving the total participation of the client in the hypnosis process. His well known self-help statement: "Day by day in every way I am getting better and better", is still used in most self improvement therapies. [Sigmund Freud] Around the same period Sigmund Freud, the father of psycho-analysis, used hypnosis in his early work but soon became disillusioned by the concept. It is believed he did not have the patience necessary for hypnosis and was not a good hypnotist !. As we know he focused his attention on analysis and free association. In many ways his "defection" was damaging to hypnosis particularly in the context of psychology as it created enduring prejudices and misconceptions which have only started to fade in recent times.
History of hypnosis
08.24.08 (12:27 pm) [edit]Franz Anton Mesmer was born in Vienna. Mesmer is considered the father of hypnosis. He is remembered for the term Mesmerism which described a process of inducing trance through a series of passes he made with his hands and/or magnets over people. He worked with a person's animal magnetism (psychic and electromagnetic energies). The medical community eventually discredited him despite his considerable success treating a variety of ailments. 1795-1860 James Braid, an English physician, originally opposed mesmerism (as it became to be known) but then became interested.He said that cures were not due to animal magnetism however but to suggestion.He developed the eye fixation technique (also know as Braidism) of inducing relaxation and called it hypnosis (after Hypnos, the Greek god of sleep)as he thought the phenomenon was a form of sleep. Later, realizing his error,he tried to change the name to monoeidism (meaning, influence of a singleidea) however, the original name stuck. Jean Marie Charcot, a French neurologist, disagreed with the Nancy School of Hypnotism and contended that hypnosis was simply a manifestation of hysteria. There was bitter rivalry between Charcot and the Nancy group (Liebault and Bernheim). He revived Mesmer's theory of Animal Magnetismand identified the three stages of trance; lethargy, catalepsy and somnambulism. 1845 - 1947 Pierre Janet was a French neurologist and psychologist who was, initially, opposed to the use of hypnosis until he discovered its relaxing effects and promotion of healing. Janet was one of the few people who continued to show an interest in hypnosis during the psychoanalyitic rage. 1849-1936 Ivan Petrovich Pavlov - Russian physiologist who actually was more focused on the study of the digestive process. He is known primarily for his development of the concept of the conditioned reflex (or Stimulus Response Theory). In his classic experiment, he trained hungry dogs to salivate at the sound of a bell, which was previously associated with the sight of food. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physiology in 1904 for his work on digestive secretions. Though he had nothing to do with hypnosis his Stimulus Response Theory is a cornerstone in linking and anchoring behaviors, particularly in NLP. 1857 - 1926 Emile Coue`, a physician formulated the Laws of Suggestion. He is also known for encouraging his patients to say to themselves 20-30 times each night before going to sleep, "Everyday in every way,I am getting better and better." He also discovered that delivering positive suggestions when prescribing medication proved to be a more effective cure than prescribing medications alone. He eventually abandoned the conc ept of hypnosis in favor of just using suggestion, feeling hypnosis and the hypnotic state impaired the efficiency of the suggestion. Coue's Laws of Suggestion 1856-1939 - Sigmund Freud traveled to Nancy and studied with Liebault and Bernheim, and then did additional study with Charcot. Freud did not incorporate hypnosis in his therapeutic work however because he felt he could not hypnotize patients to a sufficient depth, felt that the cures were temporary, and that hypnosis stripped patients of their defenses. Freud was considered a poor hypnotist given his paternal. However, his clients often went into trance and he often, unknowingly performed non-verbal inductions when he would place his hand on his patient's head to signify the Doctor dominant, patient submissive roles. Because of his early dismissal of hypnosis in favor of psychoanalysis, hypnosis was almost totally ignored. 1875-1961 - Carl Jung, a student and colleague of Freud's,rejected Freud's psychoanalytical approach and developed his own interests.He developed the concept of the collective unconscious and archetypes. Though he did not actively use hypnosis he encouraged his patients to use active imagination to change old memories. He often used the concept of the innerguide, in the healing work. He believed that the inner mind could be accessed through tools like the I Ching and astrology. He was rejected by the conservative medical community as a mystic. However, many of his ideas and theories are actively embraced by healers to this day. 1932-1974 - Milton Erickson, a psychologist and psychiatrist pioneered the art of indirect suggestion in hypnosis. He is considered the father of modern hypnosis. His methods by passed the conscious mind through the use of both verbal and nonverbal pacing techniques including metaphor, confusion, and many others. He was a colorful character and has immensely influenced the practice of contemporary hypnotherapy,and its official acceptance by the AMA. His work, combined with the workof Satir and Perls, was the basis for Bandler and Grinder's Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP).