Frivolous Friday

May11,2012

                                                               Hypnosis                                                                  

 

After recently attending an entertaining evening  of stage hypnosis, I thought that would be a good topic for the Frivolous Friday post.  Like many people, I have over the years, been to a few such shows and found them quite entertaining  and a bit frivolous and just left it at that. After checking a bit, it is worth noting that  there are some beneficial results from hypnotherapy that are used in the medical field.  It is important to be aware of the difference in the two terms, however.

Wikipedia describes "hypnosis" as  "a trance state characterized by extreme suggestibility, relaxation and heightened imagination."The use of hypnotism for therapeutic purposes is referred to as "hypnotherapy", while its use as a form of entertainment for an audience is known as "stage hypnosis"
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Mayo Clinic describes this procedure as "Hypnosis, also referred to as hypnotherapy or hypnotic suggestion, is a trance-like state in which you have heightened focus, concentration and inner absorption. When you're under hypnosis, you usually feel calm and relaxed, and you can concentrate intensely on a specific thought, memory, feeling or sensation while blocking out distractions." Hypnotism is used for a number of reasons intended to help you gain more control over undesired behaviors or emotions or to help you cope better with a wide range of medical conditions. Hypnosis isn't considered a treatment or a type of psychotherapy. Rather, it's a procedure typically used along with certain treatments and therapies to help a wide variety of conditions.Some of these include pain control, smoking cessation, allergies, asthma .Skin conditions and Gastrointestinal problems are also among the areas that benefit from hypnosis.
Hypnosis that's conducted under the care of a trained therapist or health care professional is considered a safe complementary and alternative medicine treatment.                 





Stage hypnosis is  performed in front of an audience for the purposes of entertainment, usually in a theatre or club. Expert opinion is divided over whether participants' responses are best explained as being due to an altered state of consciousness ("hypnotic trance") or by a combination of deliberate deception and ordinary social psychological factors such as disorientation, compliance, peer pressure, and ordinary suggestion.
A modern stage hypnosis performance regularly delivers a comedic performance rather than trying to impress and audience with the powers of persuasion. Stage hypnosis performances often encourage
audience members to further look into the benefits of mind powers.

It was the latter that I attended and had a wonderful evening out and certainly had a lot of laughs, but am I a "believer"....... well, let's say that it has indeed encouraged me to delve more into the amazing power of our mind.       Close your eyes......you are getting sleepy!!!!!   ;-)






  Information found at www.mayoclinic.com/health/hypnosis/MY01020   and  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypnosis