Interesting discoveries this week in regards to the possibility and limitations of hypnotic suggestion.

In one instance I auto-suggested that I no longer be angry. Well, then, in a dream this older lady, something of a nag, confronted me on it and asked if the Subconscious Mind was to tape my mouth shut and tie my hands behind my back to prevent my negative mode swings. Well, chased her out of the room telling her that she better hope so!

But it did give me a clue that perhaps I should suggest that some psychological dynamics should be addressed in order to get the the basis of my anger issues. It struck me that it might be good to go back into a lifetime of memories, and on the Subconscious Level, even past lifetimes (though not believing in Reincarnation, it would offer a good subconscious construct) and re-configure my memory structures to reinforce a less confrontational personality. But that did not work either. In one dream, which I did not get at the time, I was backing up in a car, at night, in a forest. Of course, I felt anxious that I would eventually hit some trees. Then the next night I dreamt of backing up in these huge vehicles which strained and lurched when going backwards, but which went forward just fine. Then I got it. There is no going back.

So, I decided to speak to the Subconscious in the Subconscious Mind's own language, and suggested to myself that I be in control of the vehicles I would drive through life. By now we should know that the Subconscious Mind is no grovelling slave, and that the Subconscious Mind has quite a mind of its own. The Dream in response to the Vehicle in Control Suggestion was that I was given this wonderfully luxurious SUV, which I instantly had plans for and took it for some destination, starting by driving down some river bank where I instantly found trouble I immediately regretted. The bank was much steeper than I thought and the vehicle slid sideways down into the water. I thought I was sunk, but then noticed I had a companion (probably an angel) who assured me gruffly not to worry and told me to 'punch the accelerator' and steer for the other bank which was not nearly so steep. Well, we got out of the river no worse for wear. What does this tell me? The Subconscious was saying that Life does not so much need to be Controlled as it needs to be well executed. For instance, look at the Vehicle that was given to me -- a SUV. The Subconscious Mind was telling me that sometimes we must leave the roads, and that good control may consist in trusting in good saves from disaster.

I started dropping the introductory relaxation phases of some of my hypnotic tapes. Why bother? I leave them play while I sleep. I would have thought that some of the language would cross over into my dreams, but actually I have found that the Subconscious Mind takes its own shot at the concepts and improves the language -- presenting catchier phrases and more intriquing concepts. For instance, I suggested that I become more spiritual, and the Dream turned that into a Clint Eastwood figure telling me that our duty was to become "Superconscious Transcendental Men". so I included that phrase in my next suggestion tape -- using the Subconscious Mind's own language.

Oh, and a technical word about the Fonix ISpeak software I've been using. Sometimes the ennunciation of words is to good. As for instance the word 'Transcendental' the word came out sounding odd. But you can get into the User Dictionary function and adjust the pronounciations. I took the second 't' sound out of 'Transcendental' to make it sound like
'transcendenal' and sounded much more natural. I've 'fixed' a number of words. At first it is quite mysterious -- sometime adding a consonant between syllables, to end the first syllable in the same consonant that begins the second syllable will fix the sound, or moving the consonant from the beginning of the second syllable to the end of the first. One needs to play around a bit. Then there is the matter of the narrative flow. Sometimes you simply need to re-write your sentenses so the program will have something that it can get right. Luckily, that once you can get the Reader Program to read a text smoothly and convincingly, it is also more hypnotic.