Somnambulism and Mental Relaxation is a prerequisite for lasting change

There are quite a few different opinions about somnambulism and I will share my opinion about it in this article. It literally means sleepwalking, but in hypnosis this state is also known and is known as the "deep hypnosis. To achieve it, you have to go through a number of steps.

Somnambulism and Mental Relaxation

In hypnosis, you have different degrees that you can talk about. You can roughly distinguish it into 4 stages, but between those stages there are also a number of different stages.

I personally differentiate it into 4 stages and when you go through the different stages step by step you can get into even the deepest state of hypnosis. Anyone can get into it and when you get into the deep hypnosis then you can also easily create changes that are permanent. Often when it doesn't work you see that the hypnosis was not deep enough.

The stages for hypnosis are:

1. Light trance/hypnosis
2. Somnambulism (deep hypnosis)
3. State for ERT
4. Hypnotic Coma

One by one I will describe them briefly so you can get an idea of what I mean by them.

At stage 1) you are in mild hypnosis, or nice and relaxed. The brain waves are approximately in the Alpha state (around 7-14 Hz). This hypnosis is great for working with NLP, visualizations and teaching someone to relax. Most problems can be addressed fine in phase 1) already although that would not be my choice.

To get into Stage 1) you must be able to get someone to physically relax. This is a prerequisite and also important to move to stage 2).

You enter phase 2) when you are not only physically relaxed, but also mentally relaxed. You achieve this by forgetting something. For example, when you have lost all the numbers and cannot recall them, you are in a state of mental relaxation, also called the somnambulistic state.

In phase 2), you can work best as a hypnotherapist when you want lasting results with few sessions. When you have someone in somnambulism, you can easily do a regression and suggestions will arrive and stick very quickly. Also, this is the state to create anesthesia, such as for at the dentist, for childbirth or for surgery.

Stage 3) is the stage where you need to go a little deeper than somnambulism because you need to eliminate the emotions. With ERT, you want someone not to feel the emotion and therefore you have to go even deeper. When you are in that stage, ERT is the technique you should then really always use when it comes to fears, phobias or any other negative emotion.

In stage 4) we talk about the hypnotic coma. A state in which suggestions such as "move your arm" are not followed because a person cannot and will not even move. It is the state in which someone can also come spontaneously and not wake up when you want them to. You can also induce it by deepening even more from stage 3). It is the deepest state of hypnosis in which you can come and still be consciously present even though you cannot move anything.

How to reach these stages:

1. To get into Stage 1, you first need to relax and make sure all muscles are wonderfully relaxed. You can test this by having someone relax their eyes so that they can no longer open them.
2. To get to Stage 2, you have to make someone forget something like all the numbers or their name. In fact, when that happens there is immediate mental relaxation and a person will be in somnambulism.
3. You get to Stage 3 by getting into an elevator from Stage 2 and going down.
4. Get to Stage 4 by going through the elevator to the basement of relaxation.

To address problems, phases 2 and 3 are essential in my opinion. You can also very well then address problems in yourself from phase 2 although it requires some training.

Test it out and I'd love to hear what you think!