03 - After The Session

Okay - there’s a few tips I’m going to sneak in here about having a good time doing hypnosis that aren’t objectively about maximizing your response. But, the more fun you have doing this, the more experience you’ll get, the more cognitive flexibility you’ll build, and the more likely you are to hit new highs. It’s simple math!

More(Fun) = More(Better)

See? And before you think more about how crap that example is, let’s just move on to the next point…

Immediately After - Checking In

While this doesn’t have anything to do with improving your response - take a minute to make sure you’re both okay. It’s tempting for both of you to dig in and analyze - but in the hobbyist space, we’re doing this for fun. Our emotional wellbeing supersedes some sexy parlor tricks.

This can look like a lot of things:

• Everything went smooth, and you’ve done a lot together? Snuggle up and watch some Summoning Salt.
• Just did a hand stick and not much more? “Ah cool, thanks! You all good?”
• Long session? Check in with your partner - are they a nervous wreck? Do they need support? Even if they did a spicy session, playing the ‘big bad hypnotist’ can take a lot of energy.
• Do you need some support? Take a minute to breathe and chat.
• If there were D/s components, give folks a bit to come out of role.

Unless you both are burning to pull things apart immediately - write down some notes for later if you need them, and just do what you can to reinforce that you had a good time together. (Or if it’s just a hand-stick, high five with a chuckle and get on with your day.)

Don’t Forget To Say Thanks!

Please thank your hypnotist! Unless they made you to put on a maid outfit and clean their house, they probably wanted to give you a treat to enjoy. Every single (decent) hypnotist I’ve talked to has either felt overwhelmed with the number of subjects contacting them, or has taken careful precautions to prevent that from happening. (Or hell, they’ve even started charging for sessions.)

Not to say this is a totally selfless endeavor. They enjoyed your company, pushing your buttons, and generally had a good time. But it’s still good to say thanks.

(Unless their kitchen is spotless, your arms are tired, and trying to remember the last two hours just doesn’t seem all that important. In which case they probably owe you a mind-melting thank-you session.)

Productive Retrospective

Wow that’s a boring ass way to put it.

Fuck it.

Let’s say your hypnotist’s style isn’t conversational, so you weren’t able to give live feedback on following their suggestions. In the pre-talk, you covered some of your darkest desires - experiencing hypnotic amnesia and forgetting there was a Backstreet Boys CD in your boombox, and you and your hypnotist had set up some sort of Manchurian Candidate style trigger to have you push play with the volume cranked.

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Truly devious! I’m impressed!

You do the session - but when push comes to play, you remember everything, and it’s all kind of a letdown.

Here’s what’s not useful:

• “It didn’t work.”
• “It didn’t feel like I was automatically compelled to push the button.”
• “I started playing Meat Beat Manifesto with myself instead of being engaged with the session.”

Here’s what’s useful:

• I tried to think of something other than what was in the boombox, but the the awareness kept coming back.
• I didn’t feel comfortable letting go of knowing what was in the boombox.
• I was so excited to play out my dark fantasy that I couldn’t stop thinking of it.
• I would’ve had more fun pushing the button if it felt like I was trying to fight the urge - and then lost.

It’s all right if it doesn’t hit the spot the first time you try something. You can always tinker with suggestions and try again. Maybe you could use some more practice with amnesia suggestions outside of the scene, or you could build up some playful feelings of resistance.

It’s also easy to see things in black and white. Feeling like something “didn’t work” can really be “it could have worked better.” Say it felt like a 2 out of 10 on a scale of it seeming automatic. That’s shitty - but why wasn’t that a 1? What worked? Hone in and maximize it.

Write a few of these things down, but maybe hang on to those thoughts for later after you’ve expressed your gratitude. (Respectfully wanting more mind-melting is a nice feeling from the hypnotist’s side.)

Savoring Success

Also - there’s things that did work! Maybe you switched N-SYNC and Backstreet Boys in your mind when you tried to remember what was in there, and your body did seem like it could have moved on it’s own to push the button. These are all things we can enjoy.

Just like arm levitation if that feels automatic, It’s easier to build the feelings that we’re noticing.

For example - if you focus on how lame a suggestion is - it’s going to feel more lame. If you focus on how dissociated you feel from your hand moving up - that might feel fun and impressive. This is where you can team up with your hypnotist to have a better time.

…But I don’t think I was hypnotized?

A lot of subjects screw themselves out of a good time by experiencing phenomena, then immediately go to questioning whether or not it it’s happening because of hypnosis. They’ve put all this work into enjoying this experience, are part of a community that regularly experiences hypnosis, may have even read academic literature on hypnosis, and then put that same energy into ruining their automatic response.

Not to mention - their hypnotist was there to show them a good time, not to console their insecurities that hypnosis actually worked on them.

None of us here here to convince them that it worked. If they hopped on to the finest mind control machine available at Disneyland, they’d be convinced it was just role-play, that all the ideas were their own, that they were just playing along, all while five minutes ago their hypnotist watched them struggle to move their body against mere words.

The biggest irony is they could still enjoy the ride while convincing themselves later that it didn’t work. Unfortunately, the only way to convince someone that it “worked” is by forcing them to do something they didn’t want to - that’s an inch away from abusing them. So - I leave to individuals to analyze their experience without trying to color it - it’s more ethical than the alternative.

So please. If you don’t think it worked - that’s OK. But if your hypnotist just watched you literally experience strong phenomena - expect some salt. Your mind is irrevocably yours - and that’s definitely a good thing. “I would like to experience stronger phenomena” is a much more comfortable thing to hear than “I think I was roleplaying.” (And - spoiler - hypnosis is collaborative, if you want stronger phenomena, you’ll have to put some work in.)