Self hypnosis

I've just had quite an interesting experience that I thought I'd write about.

This evening I decided that I'd give self hypnosis a bit of a try. By now I'm used to progressive relaxation inductions and deepeners and their associated patter, so I decided to just sit down, relax and go through that sort of thing in my own head.

So, sitting in my favourite Poäng (thankyou IKEA) I just concentrated on feeling relaxed, let my breathing become regular, and tried to access the relaxed state I'd been in a couple of times on Sunday. Then I concentrated on just imagining my right hand getting lighter and lifting up.

Breathe in - hand feeling lighter, breathe out - going deeper, breathe in - hand feeling lighter, breathe out - going deeper...

I was very quickly aware of my hand actually feeling lighter, but it was only after what felt like a couple of minutes when I first noticed a twitch in my fingertips. They were lifting! This continued for another minute or so with my fingers moving upward with little jerks of movement that told me that I'd actually made my hand cataleptic. It was a weird sensation too, as though my joints were actually creaking.

By the time I felt I'd had enough my fingers had only moved a few millimetres but the actual distance was irrelevant. It was enough to convince me that something was happening.

I'm going to have to try this self hypnosis thing a bit more often. Perhaps I should see if I can raise my hand above my head sometime.