Hypnosis, Finally explained | Ben Cale | TEDxTechnion

[Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Applause] [Music] hi my name is Ben and they travel around the world with a show called hypno magic at the show that mixes two enormous passions of mine hypnosis and magic and they'd like to begin the talk was a wonderfully embarrassing video of myself from when I was 5 years old walking around the house trying to hypnotize people thank you for not laughing that is the beginning of my journey and 22 years later I've arguably achieved my childhood dream this is what people experience when they join me on stage [Music] I train your eyes you seem completely petrified I'd like to use this TED talk as opportunity to finally explain what's happening to someone who is hypnotized and actually I think that the process is such a ridiculously misunderstood concept that the vast majority of hypnotists don't actually understand what they are doing and what I began I was none the wiser I want to honestly share the story of the first time I ever successfully hypnotized someone it was a small family event it was invited to do my magic show we invited a woman to join me on stage and just for fun I repeated the empanada conduction that I literally heard the night before from a lecture just say that word for word I told her the two legs are now completely stuck to the ground and for some weird reason it work I really want you to try and imagine the scene a woman is now apparently stuck to the ground well I'm standing there trying to act confident while I'm trying to figure out if she's pretending or not the crowd is obviously amazed but for change so am i I have no idea why this is happening and this looks ridiculous to be from my point of view this is real magic there's no way that the words I just said actually made that happened and that's how my obsession began let's bring maybe you're next to the aisle may I what's your name Sheila can I bring onstage please Gabriel our children Oh applause yeah okay you look nervous okay me too please face front take a deep breath in her victims on the breath out close your eyes and remain with your eyes closed by the way he lie you're wide awake you're listening to me if you weren't awake you wouldn't hear me and what wig is very simple I'm touching on your forehead please look forcefully up up up without opening your eyes as up as you possibly can and begin feeling pressure building and accumulating in your eyes more and more pressure building in your eyes so much so that your eyes begin locking it begins feeling as if your eyelids are made of concrete is if your eyelashes are glowing to each other exactly keep looking up up up up up and realize it's a fact the more you try the more your eyes lock and at this point I want you to try and see that your eyes won't open please try try and see that the more you try the more exactly your eyes look the more you try the more your eyes look and that's weird because usually it's so easy to blink keep trying trying trying until I will let go and three two one and you guys can open source on a roller coaster in love please take your right foot and just slide a little bit forwards as it is maybe not so much perfect right hand forwards deep breath in breath out close your eyes deep breath in and on the breath out just begin realizing that your right foot just becomes a little bit heavier than it usually is all of the right side of my body is just becoming hard and glued to the ground you could imagine that the floor is made of concrete sticking your foot and gluing again and as you do this you want to take another deep breath in deep breath out you foot glues to the ground that he wants you to gently try and see if your right foot cannot move the more you try the more clocks the more you try the more it locks exactly that's not only right foot that's your left foot as well try picking up and see what you can't pick up your feet thank you guys good night no no no no no no nope I'm gonna count to three under count of three few things will happen one you will be completely free to you'll get a spontaneous round of applause from everyone in TEDx Technion one two three two like this what's happening here people use hypnosis to describe a huge variety of things but it looks like people are actually experiencing something so dramatic that we can't easily explain it with things like relaxation or focus or guided imagery what's the secret that's giving these notic inductions that seemingly magic mind-control power over people I think I figured it out and if I'm right then hypnosis is deceptively simple I think hypnosis is primarily about one thing convincing the subject that the hypnotist has control over him that's it I want to paraphrase to really clarify my point I'm arguing that a hypnotic trance is nothing more that a person holding the belief that he or she is being controlled by the hypnotist if that's true it means that hypnosis is just a persuasion process and that the reason that these periodic inductions are working is because they look convincing enough to work so I think the best way to make this abstract point real to you is to walk you through what I just did with HeLa so he lamb may I bring you one more time on stage thank you very very very much Alya I can stand over here my only focus is to persuade HeLa that I have control over her eyes and over her legs once I'm done game over so the first thing I did was I asked her to close her eyes asked her to look up and realize that her eyes are beginning to lock just a little bit now that's just a no one magician's trick would you have your eyes closed you look up it's just kind of harder to open your eyes I want you to all try everybody close your eyes for a moment without moving your head look up up up up up and realize that it's just a little bit harder to open your eyes at this point open your eyes the interesting point is what he loved things to herself ah I can't open my eyes because of Ben the words he said made this happen from that point on it doesn't matter if she look forwards or anything she believes that her eyes need to remain shut and with the legs I also did some subtle magician trickery just as a convinced er but again the interesting thing is making her believe I still have to stand with the feet shoulder-width apart perfect and slide the right foot like that a little bit forwards now we all know how to walk we know that in order to lift your leg you have to shift your way to the other foot so that you can lift that one I asked HeLa to take a deep breath in and how that kind of looks relevant but what I really did was he put her weight on her right foot here kind of hard to pick it up especially when I have my hand on her back not letting her lean back now you feel that I'm blocking you so what I did so that you won't feel it again it's a subtle little magician trick it's not the point of the metal is they slowly slid my hand up your back doesn't that feel as if I'm letting you lean back try leaning back now and doesn't that feel as if I let you and then he lies like ah I tried picking up my leg just like I always do and I didn't manage it must be been and when I see the moment the moment of belief I've been looking at her face throughout the prosecutor put your hand down just looks weird I've been looking at a face throughout the process and the moment I see her going ah I can't do it that's what I can lean her on other leg let go and her feet are gonna remain stuck to the ground so again another huge huge round of applause for Allah thank you very much this simple idea could explain everything that happens uh so doing if it want to convince you that they have control over you I might choose to talk in weird speech patterns or wear a suit or hang diplomas all over my walls or make you breathe irregularly or claim that your eyes are getting tired because of the words that I'm saying and not because you've been staring at a pendulum growing up I thought that the Prosis must be one of two things either it's nothing everyone uh pretending this is a mass delusion not worth looking into or this is some complicated version of mind control that stage hypnotist and psychiatrist somehow figured out now I think it's none of the above I think that everything anyone has ever experienced under hypnosis where the on stage or in hypnotherapy whether he's acted more courageously than he usually does or quit smoking in an instant or even dealt with difficult traumas or memories from the past he really just did it to himself there's no big secret people are just exploiting the belief that they're being controlled by someone or something else to give themselves the legitimacy to do what they already wanted to do and be who they already wanted to be thank you very much [Applause] [Music]

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 334,829

Rating: 4.659039 out of 5

Keywords: TEDxTalks, English, Social Science, Brain, Communication, Entertainment, Magic, Motivation, Psychology

Id: tXIRq6LxYFk

Length: 11min 20sec (680 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 23 2019