History of Hypnosis

Human mind has always stimulated my curiosity but more than that the ways of Psychoanalysis that extract the secrets of mind have seemed intriguing throughout these years probably because it is when the secrets of the mind come to light, there is this realization about the vastness of human mind. In the early days it was considered that any kind of disease was a punishment from the divine masters. So whenever an individual suffered form some kind of ailment the priests and the healers would try ways to get rid of the evil that has got into the body of the individual due to which he or she has become the subject of wrath of Gods.

So they would induce such a state for the patients with the help of prayers, hymns, chants, drums and dancing that their conscious and subconscious would merge and they would start believing that they were being healed since the conscious and subconscious merged. Thus the healer would take help of the patient mental strength to heal him or her. So the human has such strength that if it believes in a thing it can actually happen so. There are numerous incidents that show the strength of human mind but here that would be digression. So lets start with discussion of the History of hypnosis, which would help us to know about the development of Hypnosis.

Gradual Development of Hypnosis

The healers and priests of early days established these "sleeping temples" which were especially popular in Egypt, Greece and India. There was a similar concept in Persian culture wherein there was Avicenna who was one of the famous psychologists and he was the one who said that the state of Hypnosis is different from the state of sleep. Then came Paracelsus who propagated a theory that stated that heavenly bodies in the universe actually had some kind of influence on human disease and healing which was dependent on the magnetic fluid theory. Then at the turn of eighteenth century came Mesmer who reemphasized on the theory propounded by Paracelsus and said that magnets can have healing effects on people as they act on the magnetic fluids inside the body. His method of treatment came to be known as Mesmerism.

Then came several people who opposed the theory and some accepted and further improved and improvised various theories but Hypnotism was established. James braid was the person who baptized Mesmerism and called it Hypnotism. "Hypnos" means "sleep" and braid discovered later that Hypnotism wasn’t actually true sleep but a state of drowsiness wherein the mind moves beyond consciousness since it reaches a higher level of concentration. Then came the next biggest name in the field of Psychology, Sigmund Freud who believed in reaching the root of the ailments and he used the method of Hypnotism to get rid of the causes instead of the symptoms. He believed in having a ling conversation with the patient so that the patient can vent out his feelings and called it "talking cure" which is till one of the popular methods. Freud kept on looking for various theories apart from enhancing the method of Hypnosis but his look out was the reason that hypnosis was required. He wanted to know why some parts of the human minds are hidden.

Hypnosis was gradually becoming serious science and it achieved the last bit of acknowledgment when the Pope approved of it in 1956 and permitted doctors to use it. It was used as a proper method of treatment during the American Civil War. Hypnosis has many achievements and it plays a major role in Psychoanalytical healing.