Suspension of disbelief, Emergency Festival Geneva , Geneva, Switzerland, 2014
Hypnosis induction for ‘Suspension of Disbelief’:
Whenever you are ready now just take a deep breath and sit back in the arm chair and
relax. In the olden times people had the ambition of building a ‘tower that would reach to
the stars’ but nowadays we can simply use a mechanical lift. If at any time you feel
uncomfortable during this safe voyage just raise your left hand and the operator will be
glad to bring you back to this starting point. If you like you can keep your eyes open the
whole time or you can let your eyes close and then open them as you wish, but in general
until I say ‘wake up’ you may find yourself in a deep state of trance whether you have your
eyes open or closed as different layers of reality present themselves to you deep inside.
(scissor lift begins to go up 35 secs)
And so, whenever you are ready now we are going to slowly begin the journey upwards if
we haven’t already done so and as we begin to ascend I’d like your body to begin to feel
heavier and heavier just allowing yourself to sink more and more and deeper and deeper
into this very comfortable and almost completely familiar armchair. Maybe it’s an armchair
that your grandparents may once have had, so very comfortable and so very safe on the
inside, from such a long time ago. I’d like you now to pay attention to your hands as they
are resting there, so heavy and so relaxed and as you focus all your attention now on your
hands, and just how incredibly heavy they are, I’m going to count down from 10 to 1 and
with every number I’d like you to feel more and more comfortable and more and more
relaxed and more focused on the inside. And when I reach 1 you will be more relaxed than
you have ever been and even though you may be unusually high, and certain parts of your
mind may be unusually stimulated by the exhilaration of being elevated, at the same time
you may like to remain in a very deep state of relaxation. After all, a perfect trance state is
actually a heightened sense of awareness, which is where you are at now. And so… 10,
sensing the heaviness in the tips of your fingers as if they were made of lead or stone, 9
feeling how heavy and relaxed your hands are , so heavy that even if you tried to move
them you couldn’t , 8 feeling how that heaviness is extending up your arms so incredibly
heavy and so relaxed, 7 taking another deep breath and with every breath its as if you are
feeling so elated and yet relaxed, on top of the world as it were, at the height of your goals
so to speak, 6 feeling that incredible heaviness extending over your shoulders, so safe and
so relaxed, 5 your head, your neck, your back, all the way back now feeling so incredibly
heavy and relaxed, 4 dreaming and drifting , 3 heaviness all the way down to your hips and
legs and down to your knees, 2 down to your feet as they are resting there and 1 all the way
in such a relaxed and heavy state. And as you are resting and relaxing there just listening to
the sound of my voice, dreaming and drifting, and as your hands are so incredibly concrete,
solid and heavy, I’d like your head to feel lighter and lighter almost as if it were a red
balloon, and with every breath I’d like you to imagine it feeling so incredibly light, light and
airy as if it could just begin to float just a little higher off your shoulders, perhaps you could
begin to feel your neck getting a little bit thinner and thinner as your head begins to feel
lighter and lighter as it begins to lift off , lighter and lighter, just beginning to float off
through the space away from the chair, and you can begin to tell how far it has begun to
float away by how incredibly far and heavy your hands now feel, so heavy and so relaxed
‘in their proper place, the depths’, while your head feels so light and airy, dreaming and
drifting off and your neck so thin like a long, long piece of string…further and further,
floating and drifting, perhaps that’s what people mean when they say ‘airy headed’?
And somewhere in between the two parts your heavy, heavy hands in the depths and the
mind that is floating and dreaming and drifting, lighter and lighter, you may begin to
remember the role of the mediator deep inside. Perhaps it was a long time ago, many, many
years ago and I’m going to begin to count backwards from 20 to 1 and with every number
the mediator is going to take us further back in time. And when we reach 1 we will be in a
deep state of synchronization with this building, with its rules, with its rhythms, with its
plans and structures and pathways, cannons, codes and regulations as it was designed to be
and still embodies deep inside. And whenever you are ready now, 20 allowing yourself to
drift backwards in time now, a week, a month, a year, feeling the rhythm deep inside,
stronger and stronger, 19 just relaxing back in the seat as it takes you all the way back
another few years, several years or more, beginning to sense the sound of the motors
coming to life, 18 dreaming and drifting back further now, the machines just beginning to
come back to life their rhythms merging with your own, 17 even further back now, the
flywheels spinning just a little bit faster now, 16 the boilers just beginning to heat up so
incredibly hot and steaming, the blast furnaces coming on line the temperature rising all
around, 15 dreaming and drifting backwards now, the reciprocating pumps and the steam
condenser chambers starting to increase in intensity deep inside, 14 the structure of the
building is resonating again with all the sounds and smells and heat, the overwhelming
heat as it courses through the agglomeration of conduits and pipes and hoses and tubes
and arteries. 13 falling even further back in time, the piston rods and the connecting rods
compounding, line-shafting, countershafting, 12 rope drives, leather belting, metal gearing
11 wire drawing, hammering, rotating cogs, sub-divided power, speed control, 10 inverters
DC AC inverters DC AC alternating direct alternating direct direct, 9 silicon control
rectifiers, variable frequency drives, 8 roller bearings, spinning, turning, drifting, Timken
tapered roller bearings, magnetic bearings, flexure bearings, jewel bearings, fluid bearings,
7 pistons stiff pistons pushing and pulling, pushing and pulling, feeling your body getting
stiffer and stiffer more and more rigid as if your body was a metal piston, so incredibly stiff
and rigid, your arms your legs your hips your neck muscles so stiff and rigid, 6 so incredibly
stiff and rigid all over, as if you had become a metal component inside and outside, shiny,
hard steel inside and out: stiff and rigid, 5 stiff and rigid, every nerve and muscle and fiber ,
4 so incredible stiff and rigid 3 made of steel made of metal 2 the rhythm the pulse on the
inside and 1 the heart of the building, as self ,as factory, as component, as rhythm, as
rule…as a mediator between the hands and the head. And the 10 clock-hours of work that
need to be calibrated at every instant with the hands chasing the impulse of the lights with
the big stiff hands, turning stiffly, exhausted, tired, sweating, overwhelmed, feeling so
incredibly exhausted and tired and heavy at the end of such a long day of a long week of a
long month of a long decade and on and on..so heavy …so tired …so exhausted. And the
head is dreaming and drifting lost in the rafters and the roof spaces dreaming and drifting
while the hands are so heavy and tired and exhausted…
And in a few moments I’d like you to signal which hand, your right or your left hand is
going to open the tap and release the pressure. You can signal this with just the slightest
twitch of your right or left thumb and then we will know which hand will open the tap to
release the pressure. And whenever you are ready now I am going to count down from 3 to
1 and when I reach 1 I would like you to turn the tap with that hand and allow the water to
flood through the factory floor and reverse all the compounding and the countershafting
we have been going through. 3 focusing all your attention on your hand now, the hand you
have decided to use to open the tap, 2 beginning open the tap and 1 just releasing the
pressure now, releasing the pressure now, dreaming and drifting …
(scissor lift begins to go down 40 secs )
and in a few moments I am going to count up from 1 to 10 and when I reach 10 you will be
wide awake:
1 coming back slowly in your own time, 2 feeling a normal state coming back in to every
part of your body, 3 feeling your hands coming back to a normal state, 4 your head feels
perfectly balanced now, 5 feeling time coming back to its normal pace in the here and now,
6 stretching and yawning, 7 opening your eyes, 8 feeling very refreshed, 9 very present
now and 10 wide awake!