SLEEP: TRANSITIONAL HYPNOTIC STATE (THS).MESMERISM.
A magician, complete with top hat and tails, was swinging a pocket watch in front of a well-dressed lady. Her eyes were following intensely the to and fro movement of the pocket watch. She could hear nothing but the voice of the magician murmuring repeatedly, ‘Go to sleep. Go to sleep’. A moment later, the lady closed her eyes as though she had fallen asleep.
I saw this performed many years ago and it was how I first came into contact with hypnosis, and I suppose this is probably what most of you know about hypnosis. Many people would ask if the lady really did fall asleep, and whether she remembered anything afterwards. Some would suggest that there is no such thing as hypnosis and that the lady was just a partner of the magician and it was all an act.
I have practised medical hypnosis for years and find it very useful in the treatment of many medical problems, including insomnia, anxiety, phobia, and smoking. Now, what is hypnosis? The story of hypnosis started a few hundred years ago. The first record of the use of hypnosis on patients has to be that of Dr Franz Mesmer. He graduated from medical school with honours in 1765. He practiced first in Vienna and later in Paris. Pierre Janet, in his book Psychological Healing, gave the following description of Mesmer’s method of practice. Mesmer used an elaborate apparatus. In the centre of a hall, which was filled with the sound of ceremonial music, he placed a large oak tub, Mesmers famous ‘baquet’. This was filled with water, iron filings, and powdered glass. It had a lid pierced with holes and coming up through the holes were iron rods. The patients, who were completely silent and expected something to happen, would join hands and apply the iron rods to those parts of their bodies afflicted with the ailment. Mesmer, the great magnetizer, in a silken robe of lilac colour, would then appear with a long iron wand in his hand. He would pass slowly in front of his patients, fixing his eyes on them and passing his hands on their bodies or touching them with his magnetic wand. These patients, because of his great name, were expecting something to happen. Some did not feel anything, but some felt uneasy, some went into a trance, and some, especially young women, fell down on the ground and went into convulsion. This was supposed to be therapeutic, and after a few of these ceremonies, and payment of enormous fees, many patients declared that they had been cured of many of their ailments.
Magnets were supposed to be full of supernatural power in those days, and the ceremony provided the suitable environment for most of these patients to go into a trance state. Mesmer knew nothing about hypnosis, nor did he know why some of his patients got better. It was later discovered that patients with hysterical or psychosomatic symptoms would improve if they went through cathartic experiences or acted out some of their buried, unconscious, primitive wishes. We now describe a person in a trance as a person being mesmerized, and mesmerism is somehow equated to hypnotism.
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