How To Lock Your Volunteers Hands Together............

'Try' not to read this section, try harder, and the more you try, the more your mind will wonder about the amazing secrets that you could miss if you didn't, wouldn't it'?

"When the imagination and will are in conflict, the imagination will always win"

The law of reversed effort means that any conscious effort that is used is reversed into the exact opposite. This comes from the French physician Emile Coue, made famous by his positive thinking affirmation "every day in every way I'm getting better and better". Coue teaches us that no matter how hard we try to consciously stop something from happening, whenever the imagination grasps hold of an idea, then 'will power' alone will stand no chance whatsoever of exerting any control over the situation.

To explain this a little more simply; I remember Paul McKenna talking about the stage shows he used to perform. He stated that the simplest trick he would use on his volunteers was laced into the main suggestibility test that is the handlock. Paul would lead the volunteers to imagine their hands were stuck together with superglue and becoming tighter constantly. He would suggest more things like this and at the end of the test would say something to the effect of "as you feel your hands becoming even tighter, try to take your hands apart".

Have you spotted the linguistic wizardry in this sentence? The first part states: "as you feel your hands becoming tighter", so straight away there is a command to continue making them feel tighter. The second parts states: "try to take your hands apart". Now let's consider the word 'try' for a moment. If I said to you, "I tried to open the door", this would presuppose that I wasn't able to. 'Try' presupposes failure. So in looking at the whole sentence, its meaning is simple, make your hands tighter as you fail to take them apart.

Let's think about this on a logical level. It is physically impossible to part your hands through trying - while you imagine your hands becoming even tighter at the same time. It's a catch, and is perfect for this suggestibility test as the people who are listening on the level you want them to will respond in the way you suggest. The people who do not respond to this clearly haven't been listening literally and are probably not going to be the best candidates to be hypnotised. Of course the people this has been effective with rarely pick up on the wording, and in fact believe that their hands are stuck together through some kind of hypnotic magic which builds on their belief and expectancy, enabling you to hypnotise them. Really, it's a mixture of your wording, their beliefs, and the very fact that they have been squeezing their hands together for the last few minutes so physically their hands are overcome by a numb sensation and can actually feel like they are stuck.

The next part of the sentence is as follows, joined to the first part:

"As you feel your hands becoming even tighter, try to take your hands apart, and the harder you try - the tighter they'll become"

I always leave a few seconds between this first part of this sentence and the second, it adds more to the effect. When you think of these words, it is a major suggestion and proof of the law of reversed effort in action.

I invite you right now as you read this to try. Place your hands together, now as you imagine them becoming tighter, and squeeze them tighter together, try to part your hands. The two things cannot exist at the same time (squeezing them whilst trying to separate them).

Inside the book (The Art of Stage Hypnosis), you will find a word-for-word example of the handlock test, attached to the word-for-word induction used to hypnotise people rapidly on stage.

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