The Hypnotic World of Words

By guest author Jamie Smart

I was doing some research the other day for the e-book I’m writing, so I turned to my PC, and typed the term “superorganism” into Google. In 0.15 of a second, the search engine found 6200 references to the term. Some of them were entire documents, some of them were photos. Some of them were more relevant than others. But it got me thinking about how human beings process language.

When a person reads or hears a word, the unconscious mind sorts through the internal references they have for that word, in order to make meaning of it. The unconscious does this very quickly; so quickly in fact that we’re usually not aware of the process taking place. For example, take the sentence:

The tree swayed in the breeze.

In order to make sense of this sentence, you must have an internal reference for tree, breeze, and swayed. If the sentence made sense to you, then you probably weren’t even aware of the search taking place (the lookup on these sorts of words typically takes less than 0.1 of a second per word). You may even find that you can gather information about your internal reference (Eg. by asking yourself “What colour is the tree?”) The following sentence may be trickier:

The polf bagglimed in the hoojar.

Most English-speakers don’t have an internal reference for these words – “Your search has returned no matches”, to quote my favourite search engine.

This principle of internal searches is the basis of how verbal hypnosis works, and it’s an important part of how Milton Erickson (aka “The World’s Greatest Hypnotist”, “The Miracle Worker”) got the amazing results he did. In the 1970s, Richard Bandler and John Grinder (co-developers of Neuro-linguistic Programming, or NLP) spent eleven months modelling Erickson. One of the outputs of this process was “The Milton Model”, a kind of ‘how-to’ guide for using language to get the same kinds of results (linguistically) as Erickson.

Artfully Vague

Part of Erickson’s approach was that he spoke in an ‘artfully vague’ fashion. For example, if I say “Your arms feel relaxed”, you can say “No they don’t”. But if I say, “You may be starting to notice certain sensations somewhere in your body”, the chances are that you will start to notice them. Artfully vague language can be very useful for all sorts of things, including:

• Pacing a persons experience and leading them in a new direction
• Gathering resources
• Covertly getting them to do things that they would resist if you told them to do it overtly
• Getting access to the extraordinary power of the unconscious mind

Look at it this way. You’re reading this article, and you’re reading it for a reason, because you have certain things that you want to learn, so you may be interested in discovering how you can put these new learnings into practice.

If you re-read that sentence, it sounds specific, but it is in fact very vague. All the things I’ve said in that sentence are guesses about your experience, but they are vague enough to be true for almost anyone. Let’s take it step by step:

• You’re reading this article

OK, that’s definitely true.

• and you’re reading it for a reason

Well, that’s probably true to. Plus, the ‘and’ makes this statement flow nicely on from the previous one

• because you have certain things that you want to learn

Which things? Certain things. Oh, those ones! Well, you didn’t tell me that, but I’m guessing it. And the ‘because’ makes the previous statement even more plausible, because people like there to be reasons for things. It makes the world seem, somehow, more certain!

• so you may be interested in discovering how you can put these new learnings into practice.

Well, this is just made up. I don’t know this at all, at all. But if I’ve managed to get you to say ‘yes’ to the previous few statements, you probably said yes to this one too. This sentence is super-vague, yet it’s the sort of thing that people will agree to, because it sounds specific. In my experience, people will always try to make sense of the things you say to them. This means that the more you are able to use language in this ‘hypnotic’ way, the more influential you will be (whether you’re doing formal hypnosis or not). This is one of the keys to effective influence in any field.

On my training courses, we help people to ‘hard-wire’ the ability to use hypnotic language patterns is by using hypnotic playing cards. Sounds crazy, right? But the results are awesome. We have packs of 52 playing cards, and each card has a hypnotic language pattern on it. As you play the card game, you use the language patterns, and you develop unconscious competence quickly. One of the great things people get by using this approach is a really fun learning experience. So I thought I’d give you some of the card patterns to play with:

What you do with each of these patterns is read the examples, then make up a few sentences of your own using the same pattern.

Pattern 1: The fact that [fact] means ____.

The fact that you’re here means?well logically it means that you’re here. But hypnotic logic is a bit different. You can state a fact, then say what it means. The fact that you’re here means you can make whatever changes you desire. The fact that you’ve learned to write means you can master any complex skill. The fact that you’re playing this game means you’ll wire these patterns in at a deep level.

The fact that you’re reading this tip means that you can find practical ways to use these patterns!

Pattern 2: You may already have started to become aware of ____.

You may already have started, or you may be about to, and having started, it’s presumed you’ll continue. You may already have started to become aware of certain changes in your moment-to-moment perception. You may already have started to become aware of the slowing and deepening of your breathing. You may already have started to become aware of the increasing of your skill in these patternings.

You may already have started to become aware of a desire to learn these patterns in some more depth!

Pattern 3: What happens when you ____?

I’m only asking. But to find out what happens, you have to do it. What happens when you imagine yourself enjoying all the benefits of having made this change? What happens when you imagine being able to use the patterns effortlessly?

What happens when you imagine having been able to get these patterns integrated into your everyday behaviour?

Pattern 4: ____ because…

People are much more likely to do things when you say ‘because’, because they like to have reasons for things. You can learn to go into a trance easily, because you have an unconscious mind. You can start to make those changes, because you’ve waited for long enough. You can enjoy learning these patterns easily, because you learned to speak and you don’t even know how you did it.

You can get a deck of these cards for yourself, because it’s good to be able to have fun while you learn!

OK, I may not have been that artfully vague on the last one, but you get the idea!

Business Essentials

Modern business is ‘hypnosis central’. Take any list of corporate values, and I’ll show you a list of deeply hypnotic terms, eg:

• Honesty
• Integrity
• Innovation
• Leadership
• Creativity
• Diversity
• etc

These words are called nominalisations, and they have an interesting effect. When your unconscious goes to do a “tree swayed in the breeze” on them, it takes a lot longer to make sense of them. Try this sentence:

Our commitment to innovation is the source of our effectiveness.

When people hear these kinds of sentences, they tend to get spaced out. The sentence means something totally different to each person who hears it. I remember hearing a motivational speech from the head of a multi-billion dollar company, and it was packed with this sort of stuff: his audience was totally hypnotised.

Is this a good thing or not? I don’t know, but I do know that it works, so the key is to be able to use language with skillfully and with intention.

So what does all this have to do with lean marketing? Well, speaking to you as a marketer, words are your principle tool for communicating with your customers. You need to do this in a way that makes them motivated to by the products and services that are offered. Your ability to learn hypnotic language and use it effectively is one of the most powerful ways you can do this.

Making a decision to learn to use language in this way is one of the best business decisions you’ll ever make, because words are the currency of communication.

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