The Principles of Hypnosis (I)

Now let us talk about the principles of hypnosis, using the three hypnosis cases from yesterday. In the first case, as soon as the hypnosis master gave the command to sleep, the hypnotized subjects immediately fell asleep leaning against one another. Afterwards, the master gave the command to wake up, and all of them woke up from deep sleep. After waking up, they had no knowledge of how they had leaned against one another while asleep.

Why does this happen? When we are normally awake, the mind consciousness and the manas are able to rely on each other, depend on each other, and guide each other. Normally, the manas follows the guidance or control of the mind consciousness, obeys the mind consciousness's commands, and is influenced by it. Now the manas is no longer influenced by its own mind consciousness—by whom is it influenced? By the hypnosis master. The hypnosis master's role is equivalent to the role of the hypnotized person's mind consciousness; the manas completely obeys and completely trusts all the hypnosis master's commands—whatever he says, it believes—100% obedience, exceeding its trust in its own mind consciousness. The hypnotist's commands override the commands of one's own mind consciousness.

Therefore, whatever the hypnotist says, the hypnotized person's manas believes, and as soon as it believes, it can immediately accomplish it. Why can it be accomplished as soon as it is believed? Because the manas is the consciousness that makes decisions and is powerful; whatever it wants to do, as long as there are no factors obstructing it, it can accomplish. When the hypnosis master tells it to sleep, because there is no mind consciousness to control and guide the manas, the manas obeys, immediately decides to sleep, and thus lets go of all conditions. With no mind consciousness participating, it instantly falls asleep. In the state of sleep there are neither the five sense consciousnesses nor the mind consciousness, so when these people leaned against one another in sleep, their own mind consciousnesses did not know it; of course, even after the mind consciousness woke up, it still did not know. During sleep the mind consciousness ceases, so it does not know what its own sleeping state was like during sleep.

Why can one fall asleep so quickly under hypnosis, while normally falling asleep is not so fast? Because when preparing to sleep normally, one must first extinguish the discernment of the five sense consciousnesses, and then extinguish the discernment and mental activity of the mind consciousness; extinguishing the mind consciousness is somewhat more difficult. Under hypnosis, however, the mind consciousness simply ceases to function directly, and so one falls asleep the moment sleep is called for.

From this principle we can see: as long as the manas believes something—and this belief is not ordinary belief, but an extremely, extremely deep belief, believing without doubt, taking whatever is said as what it is, without any deliberation (manana) in one's own mind, without considering right or wrong, with no mind consciousness to control it—the manas's own ability to discern the six sense objects is rather weak, and it does not discriminate. As long as it believes the hypnotist, whatever the hypnotist says is what it is, and whatever he tells it to do it does. The inferiority of the manas's wisdom lies precisely here. If there is a mind consciousness, the mind consciousness can think, can discern right from wrong and true from false, can take measures, and can control the manas. Now the manas has no six consciousnesses as helpers, no mind consciousness as helper, and does not itself possess such strong discerning ability; when the hypnotist tells it to sleep, the manas does not need to deliberate at all and can fall asleep immediately.

If each of us cultivates meditation and enters deep meditative concentration (samādhi), the manas will discover the realms of the six sense objects, discover its own physical body, and discover that all realms feel different from before. Because in deep dhyāna the manas's mind is highly concentrated and wisdom is developed, it knows that the physical body can be controlled by itself; it knows that realms are illusory and not so real, or it no longer takes the realms seriously. Because in deep dhyāna there is no control by the mind consciousness, whatever the manas wants to do, it can accomplish; if it wants to manifest supernatural powers, it can bring forth the wondrous functions of those powers.

For example, in the fourth dhyāna, if the manas thinks: "I want to fly into the sky"—at this time there is no interference from the six consciousnesses, the mind consciousness does not disturb it, it has no concept of the sky and no hindrance from the physical body, and it can immediately fly into the sky, passing through mountains and over ridges. If the manas thinks: "I want to hear distant sounds, or sounds in the heavens," because there is no mind consciousness interfering, as soon as it thinks it, it can hear sounds from extremely far away. How does the mind consciousness interfere? The mind consciousness keeps telling it that this is impossible and that is impossible; once it is said to be impossible, the manas feels it is truly impossible, and the matter cannot be accomplished.

Without the mind consciousness's interference, when the manas says "I want to do such-and-such," it immediately goes and does it; when it does so, the boss behind the scenes helps it accomplish it, and thus boundless supernatural powers are developed in this way. When there is the mind consciousness's interference, the mind consciousness influences it through its own life experience and worldly habits, saying this cannot be done and that cannot be done. Because the mind consciousness has never seen the true reality, all its ideas and thinking are incorrect, and its interference with the manas is very great. Without the mind consciousness's interference, everyone's potential for supernatural powers can be developed.

Now the role of the hypnotist replaces the role of the mind consciousness: whatever the hypnotist says, the manas believes, and whatever it believes, it can accomplish. Supernatural powers arise in this way, and the principle of hypnosis is also like this.