How To Wake A Subject From Hypnotic Sleep

This is comparatively easy in moot cases. Most persons will awake

naturally at the end of a few minutes, or will fall into a natural sleep

from which in an hour or two they will awake refreshed. Usually the

operator simply says to the subject, All right, wake up now, and claps

his hands or makes some other decided noise. In some cases it is

sufficient to say, You will wake up in five minutes; or tell a subject

to count twelve and when he gets to ten say, Wake up.



Persons in the lethargic state are not susceptible to verbal

suggestions, but may be awakened by lifting both eyelids.



It is said that pressure on certain regions will wake the subject, just

as pressure in certain other places will put the subject to sleep. Among

these places for awakening are the ovarian regions.



Some writers recommend the application of cold water to awaken subjects,

but this is rarely necessary. In olden times a burning coal was brought

near.



If hypnotism was produced by passes, then wakening may be brought about

by passes in the opposite direction, or with the back of the hand toward

the subject.



The only danger is likely to be found in hysterical persons. They will,

if aroused, often fall off again into a helpless state, and continue to

do so for some time to come. It is dangerous to hypnotize such subjects.



Care should be taken to awaken the subject very thoroughly before

leaving him, else headache, nausea, or the like may follow, with other

unpleasant effects. In all cases subjects should be treated gently and

with the utmost consideration, as if the subject and operator were the

most intimate friends.



It is better that the person who induces hypnotic sleep should awaken

the subject. Others cannot do it so easily, though as we have said,

subjects usually awaken themselves after a short time.



Further description of the method of producing hypnotism need not be

given; but it is proper to add that in addition to the fact that not

more than one person out of three can be hypnotized at all, even by an

experienced operator, to effect hypnotization except in a few cases

requires a great deal of patience, both on the part of the operator and

of the subject. It may require half a dozen or more trials before any

effect at all can be produced, although in some cases the effect will

come within a minute or two. After a person has been once hypnotized,

hypnotization is much easier. The most startling results are to be

obtained only after a long process of training on the part of the

subject. Public hypnotic entertainments, and even those given at the

hospitals in Paris, would be quite impossible if trained subjects were

not at hand; and in the case of the public hypnotizer, the proper

subjects are hired and placed in the audience for the express purpose of

coming forward when called for. The success of such an entertainment

could not otherwise be guaranteed. In many cases, also, this training of

subjects makes them deceivers. They learn to imitate what they see, and

since their living depends upon it, they must prove hypnotic subjects

who can always be depended upon to do just what is wanted. We may add,

however, that what they do is no more than an imitation of the real

thing. There is no grotesque manifestation on the stage, even if it is a

pure fake, which could not be matched by more startling facts taken from

undoubted scientific experience.