Live 1800’s Old Hypnosis Training Demos
Part 2
By Adriana James with Dr. Thomas Schroeck – Austria
Thomas demonstrated an induction from Ambroise-Auguste Liébeault 1870 as quoted by John Milne Bramwell
The name Ambroise-Auguste Liébeault (1823-1904) is mostly connected with the establishment of the Nancy School of Hypnosis (also known as the “Suggestion school”) in which he worked in collaboration with Hippolyte Bernheim. His contribution to the field of hypnosis was centered around the idea that trance was a normal and natural phenomenon and that consequently hypnosis was induced by suggestion and not by magnetism, hysteria or other type of psycho-physiological phenomenon1.
Two famous personalities were influenced directly or indirectly by Liébeault : Sigmund Freud and Émile Coué.
“Whilst Coué studied quite extensively with Liébeault (and Bernheim) at Nancy, over an extended period of time, Freud simply visited Nancy and observed Bernheim at his work.”2
Thomas was kind enough to write a short article describing the induction he used (see below).
1 “Psychophisiology is concerned with the relationship between the mind and brain.[…] Thoughts and feelings are chemical and electrical actions that may have influences on the rest of the organism as well as the social dynamics of the situation“. Spurce: http://catdir.loc.gov/catdir/samples/cam032/99036718.pdf
2 “According to Baudouin and Lestchinsky (1924, p.153) — Baudouin was also a significant “Nancy School” figure — Freud, “who was to be the leader of the new school [of psychoanalysis], had worked at the Salpêtrière under Charcot [and] had witnessed some of Bernheim’s experiments at Nancy” (p.153, emphasis added).”
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeault#cite_note-3
Induction Following Ambroise Liebeault (1823 – 1904)
By Dr. Thomas Schroeck
Hypnosis Master Trainer, NLP-Trainer, Time Line Therapy® Master Trainer
Background:
Ambroise Liebeault was a French physician and is known as the founder of the so called „school of Nancy” around 1860/70. The school of Nancy regarded hypnotic trance (following James Braid) as produced by suggestions and not, like followers of Franz Anton Mesmer, as a reaction to magnetism or passes over the body of the subject. Liebeault argued that hypnotic sleep is similar to natural sleep and put high emphasis on the relationship (or rapport) between the operator and the subject.
Liebeault was influenced by the works of James Braid and Abe Faria and he himself influenced Hippolyte Bernheim who joined Liebeault around 1882; Bernheim and Liebeault are said to have treated together more the 20,000 patients. An other student at the school of was Sigmund Freud. After the death of Liebeault in 1904 Nancy became the predominant school of hypnotism.
Working methode:
Most of the inductions of the school of Nancy have in common that the subject shall focus on a point or a shining object or the eyes of the operator. The point of focus shall be higher than the subjects regular eye height.
An other common point of most inductions of the school of Nancy is a command like „do not think anything” or „empty your head”.
The induction I used is described in „John Bramwell: Hypnotism: Its History, Practice and Theory”, 1906.
Induction used during the Master Hypnosis Training in August 2012 in Las Vegas:
„Please sit down and relax. Please empty your head and do not think of anything and look into my eyes.
Your eyes are getting heavy, your limbs feel numb, you are becoming more and more drowsy … (up to 5 min).
Suggestions:
You will remember everything you have learned during the hypnosis trainers training, everything you learned will integrate easily, you will be a great hypnotic operator, you will get the best students, will make a lot of money, will always have fun on stage and you will assist your clients to there highest benefit.
After some time I will count from 5 to 1 and with each number you will come out of trance more and more. When you come out you feel completely awake, relaxed and you will be sure that you are an excellent hypnotic operator.
5 … 4 … 3 … 2 … 1 …”