I always wanted to try hypnosis.

But I’ve never done it professionally because, well, that’s a lot of effing trust in a person. A person like you or me capable of beauty and evil alike. And you don’t know which one they’ll do to you once given total dominion over your mind and body. But with the advent of Youtube, self-hypnosis with the help of pre-recorded narrations made that problem a thing of the past. Much like binaural beats, isochronic tones, and (shudder) ASMR, I’m kinda tip-toeing through this world of suggestion through sound in the form of hypnosis.

Today I’ll cover a couple I’ve tried and one I won’t (but you can, if you like):

1. Self-belief

I’m so lucky I’m a chick.

Because when I resort to things like “self-belief” hypnosis videos, you can say something like, “Well… you have a vagina. So, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.” But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t laugh a little to myself at myself the first time I played it. I resorted these means when I was going through a bout of self-doubt about everything I was doing – from my social world to work. After a next-level panic attack ensued and I came to with a weapon in my hand, I decided I might be open to some innovative measures after all. While it helped a bit, I attribute most of that to the chick’s voice. Go ahead. Click play and listen to her liquid intonation for a few seconds. If she was your roommate, just kinda hanging around and saying everything in that voice – you’d totally feel toasty and at home in your own skin. Maybe. I think. (“Kim, where’s my leftovers?”… “It’s in this beeeautiful ebony coloured baaag – just beyond that golden handled entryway, there.”… “Bish, you mean the trash?”)

2. Non-attachment



(Ugh. This video is not the droid I was looking for.
But it’s pretty close.
Forewarning: Don’t be fooled by the soothing voice. You’re whole world’s about to get a mace to it’s face.)

The idea here is detachment or “non-attachment”.

Some people get riled up about calling it “cord cutting”, but basically the overall idea is something I’ve heard Buddhist followers and hardcore meditators talk about repeatedly (while I throw shade from my shade of ignorance since I dunno how to do it myself). I get stuck – attached – to my thoughts. And so long as I’m not sitting closed-eyed, I’ll stay stuck on them and even use them as my parachute from the entire ride outta my brain airplane as I plummet to earth and ultimately explode into a plume of crashing panic. This is a trip I repeatedly make, like someone who really sucks at a video game but doesn’t bother practicing to be good because they know they won’t really die and can start all over again. The difference back here IRL? Suffering. We suffer. And it ages us (not cute). Enter non-attachment. The idea with detaching from thoughts is that you can observe a thought happen as you go about your day – good or bad – and not have a reaction to it. That’s (presumably) good, because these thoughts are what cause you stress followed by atom bomb level anxiety. If you’re me.

Needless to say (but I’m gonna), I didn’t think this would work.

And when it 100% did the next day, I….didn’t know how to feel about it. Because that’s the nature of detaching from thoughts – it’s like a self-induced lobotomy. The bad doesn’t drag you down anymore – sure. But then the good doesn’t elevate you either. Yet – you’re aware of all around you. The best way I can describe it isn’t “numb”. Rather, I went through my whole day feeling everything – yet feeling nothing about it. It was literally the strangest mental state I’ve ever experienced. I’d jokingly say “aside from ketamine”, but you can’t even compare the experience to drug induced states. I think it might be what some real spiritual people call “Zen” or “Nirvana”.

Personally, I’d call it a personality-ectomy.

I think I’ll wait to play this one again until something bad enough happen to require a “Click” level autopilot setting.

Finally, one I haven’t tried yet:

3. Lucid Dreaming

This hypnosis and its contribution to everyday life is up for debate.

As I said, I haven’t done it yet. But some people claim it accomplishes something similar to what you achieve during a near death experience or really good DMT trip. All I know is that ever since seeing “Waking Life”, I’ve wanted to give it a go. What’s stopped me? I haven’t tried. Why? For once the answer’s not becuzza lazy (and there is a little prep work involved – like focusing on a digital watch several times a day when you’re definitely awake to repeat in your dream – where you shouldn’t be able to read it). The idea – if you’re wondering WTF lucid dreaming even is – is that you make yourself aware that you’re dreaming while you’re dreaming. People report leaving their bodies, whereupon you can subsequently do anything you want to while you’re in that dream. Yes, most people use this time to have sex of epic proportions. With whoever they want. But you can also fly. Or even meet a “higher self” that gifts you with priceless wisdom to take back with you.

Sounds pretty cool.

So what – if not laziness – has stopped me? Well, when you’re entering into this state, you have to bypass a kinda dangerous pre-lucid dreamy state first. You can accidentally enter this unpleasant state called sleep paralysis if you start to wake up as you’re becoming aware of dreaming. Your eyes are open, but you’re frozen, and your mind plays frightening tricks on you. Before you know it, you’re the star of “Waking Nightmare” instead of the fun, floaty cartoon world destination on your ticket stubs. (Hey, that’d actually be a really great rotoscope sequel. Let’s get on that, stat.) For me, I’ve had those experiences involuntarily. They ain’t fun. To be fair, I could blame myself partially for being full of pharmaceuticals during those events. But even more recently (and soberly), I awoke from a me-leaving-my-body-and-sneaking-back-in kinda experience. It was too weird to handle (much less attempt intentionally again). So I don’t see myself doing this one. Between that last thing and having the really bad sleep paralysis events before, I don’t think anything that might help ‘em happen is worth it.

No matter how epic the outta body sex is.

In the end, I can’t say what the effects of hypnosis are on other people. But if I had to guess, it’s probably less powerful than a swinging pocket watch or spinning spiral doing all the work. Nor is it like some brain blowjob you get while you keep purposely overeating or being lazy or doing whatever bad habits you want ultimately broken via guided meditation. Instead, I think it rests on two crucial ingredients: power of suggestion and a willing mind. It’s likely one of those helpful tools that are super effective only when you’ve decided that you really wanna change. You’ve made the mental contract with yourself. But just don’t know how to get there … or what mindset to install that’ll help keep you there once you do.

If that sounds like you, before you do one of these, I’d say, take these steps.

* Ask yourself what you want to alter about yourself.

* Decide if you’re actually willing to change or just like talking about it.

* If you do, then plug in your answer to number 1 to Youtube. Plus the word “hypnosis”.

* When you find a good video, listen to the words they say while you’re still awake (to make sure they don’t ask you to like, email your credit card info and SSN to them halfway through. Call me paranoid. But it could totally be a thing. If I’ve thought of it, you know someone else has: (“After adding the three digits on the back…press send… return to this video… press the “like” button. And leave a lovely comment about how well it worked… You’ll recall none of thissss…”)

* Try out your pre-screened hypnosis and report back to me.

Unless you’ve died from night terrors or something.

Seriously, somebody try that Buddhist un-attachment one.

I dare you not to feel like Paul Giamatti’s character in “Cold Souls” the next day.