I've been wondering if hypnosis actually works. I always assumed it was some new-agey self-help thing that doesn't actually work except maybe on a placebo level. Maybe it could help relax you, just as calm music might, but any of that stage-hypnosis in which the subject is actually convinced that something obviously untrue is true or is made to do something must be an act. Or it's genuine, but only because the person is lying to himself. He never truly believes it; he just acts like he does for attention or something.
So I listened to some hypnosis YouTube videos and they actually do seem to work better than I thought. The effect is nothing magical, but it put me into an almost meditative state in which I was only listening to the voice. It was like my mind began running on a new simple program: Listen to the voice and do whatever it says. I won't go into detail but one of the strangest things was that I couldn't move. I watched a 40 minute one earlier today that was supposed to be listened to before sleeping, but it was daytime and so I didn't plan to sleep. Because it was intended for sleep, there was no 'wakeup' thing at the end to remove you from the trance like the others had. At one point the voice tried to make me believe my body was too heavy to move, and I imagined this to be so, although I knew of course that it was just a mental exercise. When the recording was finished with and I'd almost forgotten about this, I tried to get up but realized I actually couldn't move for about 30 seconds. I tried to lift my arm and then my leg and I just couldn't. I was telling the muscles to move and they weren't. It wasn't sleep paralysis - I used to get that often and this was different. For about half an hour afterward I continued to feel this trance-like state in which I felt really suggestible and happy.
What I think happened is that I could move but convinced myself that I couldn't. It was more than simply pretending that I couldn't move though. Right now I can 'try' to move my arm but not actually move it, just some of the muscles so that it feels like I'm trying to move it, but I'm consciously controlling whether I really move it or not. But it was more than that. It was similar, but the knowledge that I was tricking myself was ingrained more subconsciously, so that consciously I was really, genuinely trying to move. So, if I was doing it right, in a way hypnosis is what I originally thought it to be. It doesn't actually make you fall asleep and you're still aware of the truth about anything you're lied to about on some level. But it did put me in a suggestible state in which information I was told really seeped into my consciousness so that I sincerely believed it a bit. Which is different from what I thought, that you never sincerely believe it at all and that you're really just pretending to yourself and others.