Priming Yourself: Hypnotize Yourself in a Good Day

Priming is a term from psychology that deals with how quickly you show certain behaviors following a cue you received earlier. It is actually very similar to the Pavlov theory where the dog starts drooling after hearing a bell because it knows food will come. In the case of priming, it's actually about how quickly you would then start drooling

What is priming?

In priming, then, you respond to certain information from your environment. It's about the connections you make to certain cues in your long-term memory, and through those connections you can change your behavior.

For example, this is why you may suddenly act differently when you become a father or mother, because somewhere in your long-term memory you make the connection that a parent displays certain behaviors. Maybe you suddenly stop swearing 😊.

Priming, therefore, involves influencing the beliefs stored in your long-term memory that have a significant impact on your behavior. Parents spend your entire childhood priming you to become a “good adult.” That “good adult” is, of course, their version of one. This doesn’t have to be your version of a “good adult.”

The great thing is, when you are aware of this. You can also prime yourself to show certain behaviors and you can prime other people very unconsciously.

Can you primp other people?

It is certainly possible to primp other people. This is something I am working on with hypnosis, for example, but it can be even more subtle.

For example, students were studied how they would react if the words "being old" stood out. To do this, they had to look at a series of words and indicate which words or combinations did not belong among them. So this was "beïng old." One group of students was confronted with this word and the other word was not. The group that was confronted with this word then walked out of the lab more slowly than the group that did not have to identify "beïng old"[1].

So this word primed them on being old, and as a result they started acting "older," because older people tend to move slower.

This priming can happen consciously and unconsciously allowing you to demonstrate all kinds of "different" behaviors.

It's not just seeing words that creates different behavior through priming. In a study in which the aforementioned research was repeated, it was also found that the behavior of the researchers affected the behavior of the participants. The participants started mimicking the researchers. The researchers did everything faster if they thought the subjects were not primed and slower if they thought the subjects were primed. This again affected the subjects' behavior[2].

So what you say and do can certainly signal other people to change their behavior.

You've probably also heard that television hypnotizes you, and research shows that television can indeed prim other people. In fact, depending on what kind of programs you watch, you can gain a certain belief about how social reality is[3]. So how a society works, how you treat family, how you are with friends and even how you treat enemies.

For example, reading information that is negative, such as "on sunny days you are grumpier than on cloudy days," can actually cause you to become more aggressive[4].

As a hypnotist, you also spend a lot of time priming people.

How do you prime yourself?

Language and what you do is incredibly important in priming, and so priming can be done consciously. You can use language in yet another way to primp yourself. For example, you can read something or write something down consciously.

Priming can help you improve your performance throughout the day.

Sports in the morning, for better sports in the afternoon

This is a handy one for the athletes among us who have games in the afternoon.

In rugby players, for example, it was studied whether a workout in the morning improved their performance in the afternoon. This was the case[5]. So to increase the chances of winning, it was also recommended to have another workout in the morning to improve performance during the match in the afternoon.

So in this case, it's about a physical performance for which you were primed. The exercises of the morning, especially if they were relevant to the game, helped the players in the afternoon to be faster and more technical.

So doing something in the morning has an effect for the whole day (or at least the whole working day).

Keep a prime book

For example, many people keep a journal at the end of the day to just sort of summarize their doing and thinking things. What you can also do is keep a prime book.

In that book, you can write down a particular intention, such as:

Today I am social.

Today I have focus on my work.

Today I eat healthy.

Today I move whenever possible.

By writing down these kinds of intentions, you can consciously and subconsciously incorporate them into the rest of your day, which can help you, for example, be more sociable, make healthier choices, and stay more focused at work.

Surround yourself with prime messages

As mentioned, what you do, say, hear, and read can all serve as priming. When you have a specific goal, you can prime yourself to achieve that goal or to take the actions necessary to achieve it.

Say you once wrote down an intention at the beginning of the day. Then you can stick that on your mirror in the bathroom, for example, so that you read that intention again in the morning and primed yourself as a result.

Are you into healthy eating? If so, you can also stick a primer on your refrigerator.

You can also use self-hypnosis in the morning and repeating a hypnotic suggestion you use to primed yourself, like a mantra.

"Today I do ....."

At work, you can set a prime message on your desktop background that you see when you turn on your PC, or set up a picture frame with an inspirational message.

Listen to inspiring podcasts (like mine)

Another fun way to primp yourself is by listening to podcasts. There are podcasts to listen to about anything and everything, lifestyle, health, science, politics, business, whatever you find interesting there is a podcast for it.

So if you’re stuck in traffic on your way to work, you can use the podcast to prime yourself for a positive mindset for the day, rather than arriving in a bad mood. Driving is actually a time when you naturally enter a hypnotic state, allowing you to take everything in effectively.

For example, you can listen to my podcast 😉.

So priming is something you can experience consciously and unconsciously. Other people's behavior, what you hear, read, see, and do can cause your behavior to be changed.

If you know how hypnosis works, you can prim other people to change their behavior, and self-hypnosis is also great for this purpose.

Would you like to know if you can hypnotize people and what it feels like to be under hypnosis yourself? Then come to the hypnosis workshop in Wormerveer or Zwolle.

Do you feel the need to learn more right away to help yourself or others? Then come to a seminar or sign up for one of the courses offered by the Hypnosis Institute of the Netherlands. Ask about the online options if that suits you better.

[1] https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037/0022-3514.71.2.230

[2] https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0029081

[3] https://academic.oup.com/jcr/article-abstract/24/4/447/1797983

[4] https://guilfordjournals.com/doi/abs/10.1521/soco.1987.5.2.131

[5] https://journals.humankinetics.com/view/journals/ijspp/11/6/article-p763.xml