Subjects need to be protected al all times as personalities possessed of rights, privileges, and privacies and recognized as being placed in a seemingly vulner- able position in the hypnotic situation.
Regardless of how well informed and intelligent subjects may be, there always exists, whether recognized or not, a general questioning uncertainty about what will happen or what may or may not be said or done. Even subjects who have unburdened themselves freely and without inhibition to the author as a psychi- atrist have manifested this need to protect the self and to put their best feet forward no matter how freely the wrong foot had been exposed.
This protection should properly be given subjects in both the waking and the trance states, ft is best given in an indirect way in the waking state and more directly in the trance state.
To illustrate, a 20-year-old girl volunteered as an experimental subject but always reported for work in the company of a tactless, sharp-tongued associate who constituted a serious obstacle to hypnotic work. After a considerable amount
150 Nature of Hypnosis & Suggestion of work the subject began reporting alone. Some time later she explained with mixed amusemeni and embarrassment, "I used lo bring Ruth with me because she is so awfully catty that 1 knew I wouldn't do or say anything I didn'l want t o . " She then told of her desire for therapy for some concealed phobic reactions. Her experimental work both before and after iherapy was excellent.
In working with new subjects, and always when planning to induce deep trances, a systematic effort is made to demonslrate to the subjects that ihey are in a fully protected situation. Measures to this end are relatively simple and seemingly absurdly inadequate. Nevertheless, personality reactions make them effective. For example, a psychology graduate volunteered as a demonstration iubject for a seminar group. A light trance was induced with some difficulty, and her behavior suggested her need for assurance of protection. Under the pretext of teaching her automatic writing, she was instructed to write some interesting sentence and, having written it, not to show it until after automatic writing as a topic had been discussed. Hesitantly, she wrote briefly. She wi told to turn the paper face down so that not even she could read it. Handed a new iheet of paper, she was asked to write automatically her conscious and unconscious answers to the question, "'Are you willing to have me read what you wrote?" Both written replies were " y e s , " to which was automatically added, '•anybody.
The suggestion was offered that there was no urgency about reading her sentence since it was her first effort at automatic writing, that it might be more interesting to fold it up and put it away in her purse and at some later time compare the script with further automatic writing she might do. Following thi a deep trance was easily induced.
Some time later she explained, "I really wanted to go into a trance but I didn't know if I could trust you, which was silly because everything was being done in front of the whole class. When you asked me to write, my hand just impulsively wrote, 'Do I love Jerry?' and then I wrote that you or anybody else vould read it. But when you told me to put it away and later just examine it for the handwriting, without even hinting about a possible meaning of the writing, I knew then that I had no reason whatever for any hesitation. And 1 also knew that 1 could answer my own question later instead of doing it all at once and wondering if I was right."
Such behavior has been encountered many times, and this general method of handling the need for ego protection has been found remarkably effective in securing deep, unconscious cooperation toward inducing deep trances.
Another measure frequently employed in this same connection is that of in- structing subjects in a light trance to dream a very vivid, pleasing dream, to enjoy it, and, upon its completion, to forget it and not to recall it until so desired at some later date in a suitable situation. Such instruction is manifold in its effects: It gives the subjects a sense of liberty which is entirely safe and yet can be in accord with any unconscious ideas of license and freedom in hypnosis. It utilizes familiar experiences in forgetting and repression. It gives a sense of
Deep Hypnosis 181 security and confidence in the self, and it also constitutes a posthypnotic sug- gestion to be executed only at the subjects' desire. A broad foundation is thus laid conducive to the development of profound trance
This type of comprehensive suggestion is employed extensively by the author, since it serves to initiate a wealth of hypnotic responses pleasing to the subjects and constructive for the hypnotist, in a fashion fully protective of the subjects and thereby insuring cooperation.
Another measure of a somewhat negative character is that of instructing lightly hypnotized subjects to withhold some item of information from the hypnotist. This item should, preferably, be one of a definitely personal character not fully recognized by the subjects as such. It might be their middle name, what member of the family they resemble most, or the first name of their best friend when they were children. Thus the subjects discover by actual experience that they are not helpless automatons, that they can actually enjoy cooperating with the hypnotist, that they can succeed in executing hypnotic suggestions, and that it is their behavior rather than the hypnotist's that leads to success. All of these reactions are essential in securing deep trances. Also, subjects leam unwittingly that, if they can acl successfully upon a negative suggestion, the converse is Another frequently overlooked form of protection for the subjects is the expression of appreciation for their services. Full regard must be given to the human need lo succeed and to the desire for recognition by the self and others of that success. Depriving the subjects of this constitutes a failure to protect them as sentient beings. Such failure may imperil the validity of hypnotic work, since the subjects may feel that their efforts are not appreciated, and this may result in lesser degrees of cooperation. Even more can this be recognized when it is realized that emotional reactions are not necessarily rational, especially at an unconscious level of reaction. Experience has shown that appreciation must be definitely expressed in some manner, preferably first in the trance state and later in the ordinary waking state. In projects where expressed appreciation is precluded, the subjects can receive in other situations the hypnotist's apprecia- tion of services rendered. In any hypnotic work careful attention must be given to the full protection of the subjects' ego by meeting readily their needs as individuals.