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                      CONTRASTING HYPNOSIS AND NLP

There is a large overlap between hypnosis and the practice of Neuro-
Linguistic Programming (NLP), but there appears to be only one really 
essential difference between the two, and that is in the management of 
states of consciousness.  Except for that (significant) difference, the 
skills of hypnosis are applicable to NLP, and vice versa.


States of Consciousness
-----------------------

When the Mind is engaged in a particular kind of processing, we call that a 
"state of consciousness."  For example, when a person is angry they have a 
certain appearance and demeanor which is (for virtually all people) 
discretely different from the appearance and demeanor they exhibit while 
joyous.  The pensive person is obviously different from the same person in 
the state of enthusiasm.  The states of consciousness are infinitely many, 
and each person's own exhibition of a particular state is likely different 
from the exhibition of a different person.

In general, external stimuli perceived by someone sets of a complex chain 
of (internal) events that results in some externally observable behavioral 
change.  The internal state associated with that resultant behavior is what 
I call the unique (and associated) state of consciousness.

Learning can be defined as the variety and subtlety of distinctions one can 
make.  Certainly, a cardiac surgeon can notice many, many more things than 
can I about patients with heart diseases, and can point out subtle 
differences that the untrained eye will miss.  When you focus on making 
fine behavioral distinctions, you learn how to separate one subtle behavior 
pattern from another.  You can learn to notice, for example, subtle changes 
in movement, changes in pupilary diameter of the eye, changes in skin tone 
and color.  (When you learn to make fine enough distinctions, fine enough 
to be missed by the average person, you may be considered more "highly 
intuitive.)

The fact is that if you notice a particular constellation of behavioral 
features and/or changes, you are noticing the byproduct of an internal 
state of consciousness.  You will not know (unless you elicit that 
information from the person observed...and then you can't be sure they 
aren't concealing something from you) what specific label they might put on 
it, but you can notice that a change has occurred.  Furthermore, if you see 
that same constellation in the future, you can be confident that they are 
in the same state of consciousness.


Hypnosis
--------

In conventional hypnosis (without countervening post-hypnotic suggestions, 
which I will ignore here), the conscious mind is largely disengaged by 
encouraging it to become a passive participant in the on-going behavioral 
process.  As a consequence, the hypnotist can engage the unconscious mind 
directly, without intervention, "editing" or "censoring" from the conscious 
mind.  The entire induction process is largely a way to so fascinate the 
conscious mind that it becomes a willing, passive observer to the 
process...and we may even encourage the conscious mind to engage in amnesia 
for the entire event.

Often, hypnosis proceeds to "deeper and deeper levels," which to my mind 
means the further detachment of the conscious mind from the on-going 
events.

What the successful hypnotist observes with the subject in hypnosis, then, 
is the unimpeded actions of the unconscious mind.  Because the unconscious 
mind can control all of the bodily functions, the hypnotist must observe 
the non-verbal behaviors quite carefully.  And they can be used as a 
communications tool:  "I wonder which finger will lift first to indicate 
that the unconscious mind is willing to proceed...and how soon...and how 
high."  In fact, the directed movement may be very, very small; merely a 
muscle-twitch on the back of the hand; to the subject, it often feels like 
a rather large and gross movement.  I'm not sure at all of the source of 
this attenuation of the perceived action to the observed action.

I believe that this disengagement of the conscious mind is what causes the 
oft-noted lack of affect in the hypnotized subject, in combination with the 
attenuation noted above.  The placid, affect-free, eyes-closed, relaxed 
neck posture of early hypnosis is so common as to be an objective indicator 
of mid-level hypnotic trance to most hypnotists.

Doing personal change work in hypnosis often requires gathering information 
from the subject.  The hypnotist may set up yes/no signals with finger 
movements, eyebrow movements, simple sounds, foot taps, etc.  This process 
of information gathering can be rather slow, and questions must be phrased 
quite carefully to elicit appropriate answers (it is generally a good idea 
to set up a minimum of four signals:  Yes, No, I Don't Know, and I Don't 
Understand).  For more advanced work, the subject can be taken deeper, and 
the unconscious trained to take over full control of behaviors; when half-
done, the person may be able to speak or move (perhaps slowly), or eye 
movements may be restricted.  When properly done in the extreme, the 
hypnotized person can demonstrate a full range of apparent behaviors that 
others might not be able to distinguish from the unhypnotized state.  
(Useful when, for example, learning a behavior from a teacher.  I've found 
it useful in learning tennis from a good, cooperative coach.)


NLP's Use of States of Consciousness
------------------------------------

In NLP (when not combined with hypnosis), Practitioners (a.k.a. NLPers) do 
not attempt to disengage the unconscious mind, but rather they engage the 
whole mind on both levels.  Furthermore, because they do not move the 
subject into the hypnotic trance state, they utilize the sequence of states 
of consciousness as they appear...and they can stimulate them to appear.  
Otherwise, many of the actions are similar to hypnosis.  NLP is often 
called a form a "waking hypnosis" as a consequence.  In fact, when a person 
is fully-engaged in a particular state of consciousness, some NLPers refer 
to that as just another "trance."  Here, I will refer to the states of 
consciousness without trying to confuse the issue by calling them trances.

During information gathering phases, NLPers are trained to notice distinct 
states of consciousness, and to deduce what stimuli (actions or words) they 
must product to elicit that unique state.  Often, they temporarily attach 
stimuli to a particular state so that it is easy to recall (an "anchor," in 
which pressure on particular site on the subject's body, or a particular 
word, or a particular tonality is used to temporarily provide a quick 
access to the state of consciousness).

NLP is (at least, in part) about learning new patterns of behavior that can 
be exercised under specific circumstances.  A NLPer may assist the subject 
in creating new states of consciousness from prior experience, and provide 
a stimulus-response chain such that when the original stimuli is noticed, 
the new state of consciousness (and consequent behavior) will spontaneously 
appear.  For example, the sensation of itching experienced by cast wearers 
often causes significant discomfort, and consequent (and oft-times bizarre) 
behaviors to relieve that itching.  A simple intervention may involve 
creating a "chain" of states of consciousness, starting with itching, 
through (perhaps) curiosity, then through acceptance of healing taking 
place, and finally to a profound sense of satisfaction and pleasure 
(perhaps borrowed from some other context).  This method (called 
"collapsing of anchors") is carried out by stepping the subject through the 
selected sequence of states of consciousness, progressively faster, until 
the total time from noticing of the sensation of itching to the achievement 
of the sense of satisfaction and pleasure takes less than one-tenth of a 
second.  At no time is the subject's conscious mind disengaged from the 
process, and the actions taken by the NLPer appear to engage in the 
conscious mind in the sequential rehearsal activity that trains the 
unconscious mind to exhibit the desired response.

Introductory levels of NLP is focused on these kinds of individual 
enhancements of discrete parts of behavior; more advanced NLP methods are 
available that can have more dramatic effects by manipulating general 
patterns of beliefs, and these can have changes that continue to generate 
changes in behavior in the future.  NLP seems to be built upon principles 
of step-wise refinement, whereas hypnosis can be used for wholesale 
changes.

This material is Copyright, 1992, 1993 by Carol Anne Ogdin, Santa Clara, CA
95051; all rights reserved.  Distributed through alt.hypnosis newsgroup of
Usenet (Internet), and paper copies may be made for personal use.  Any
other distribution of this material must include this copyright and contact
notice.  The author may be reached as     friday@well.sf.ca.us   
(permanent) or      friday@netcom.com   (so long as I reside in Northern
California).
-- 
--Friday                                    "Knowledge is guesswork
   Carol Anne Ogdin, Principal Designer         disciplined by 
   Deep Woods Technology                        rational criticism." 
     friday@netcom.com                                 --Karl Popper