What Are Post-Hypnotic Suggestions?
There's an idea that a hypnotist can put you in a trance, then give you a suggestion to cluck like a chicken, forget a number when counting your fingers, or orgasm when they say the word.
These are things that can and do happen, but such suggestions are not as mysterious or magical as they seem.
Imagine you have a friend over. You are eating together and they say "pass the salt". You then realise you have passed them the salt without thinking about it.
Or you are watching TV and your dad says, "Give me the remote," and you think, "Not this time! I'm going to change the channel dammit" and after a little internal struggle, you reluctantly pass them the remote.
In both of these cases, and countless others, you responded to a suggestion.
You might reject this idea - "These aren't suggestions, I did what I wanted to do!" There are at least two misunderstandings in this statement. First, the easy one:
Whenever you respond to a suggestion, you are doing what you want to do. When a hypnotist gives you the suggestion to cluck like a chicken, at that moment you wanted to please them or the audience, and accepted the suggestion.
This opens the question of what does you mean in the statement, "what you wanted to do". It's really not as straightfoward as it appears, but just accept it for now. (That might be a suggestion.)
Authority and Suggestions
Secondly, a suggestion is not some magical command (well, at least it doesn't have to be). It can be something extremely mundane. There's a statement: "Hypnosis cannot make you do anything that you would not already do through persuasion."
Remember that statement, and think about what it means. It appears to be talking about hypnosis, but it is also talking about persuasion and everything associated with it, and also of free will.
When Suggestions Don't Work
You can refuse a suggestion. Many people think post-hypnotic suggestions don't work on them because it doesn't feel like that are being forced to do something. They think the suggestion hasn't worked, so they unconsciously refuse it, and it doesn't work. This is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Suggestions can be that fragile.
Suggestions can look magical (having a trigger to orgasm on command can feel pretty magical!) but they really aren't - they are just the normal functioning of the brain.
Here's another slightly esoteric example. Imagine you are in a BDSM relationship and are out to lunch with your dominant. While eating, they tell you, "Go to the restroom, take off your panties, and when you return, hand them over to me, my pet".
You might decide, "I'm not doing that, that's kind of sexual and we agreed not to do anythign sexual."
Or you might find yourself doing it, and feeling embarrassed about it, but you have agreed to obey, and feel kinda compelled to do it.
Or you might do it because you have an exhibitionist streak, and you really didn't need the dominant to instruct you - you love it anyway.
Now imagine that dominant was also a hypnotist and earlier gave you the post-hypnotic suggestion, "When I give you a command ending with the word pet, you will be unable to resist. You will obey."
With all these in mind, which of the above responses was an appropriate response to this post-hypnotic suggestion: 1, 2, or 3 ?
The correct answer is all of them.
Take #2 for example. You might respond because the post-hypnotic suggestion is that strong, or you might respond because you have accepted the dominant's authority over you and don't want to displease them - their authority compels you.
But also look at #1: refusing a suggestion is a perfectly valid response to a suggestion. We might sometimes wish otherwise, but hypnosis is not mind-control.
And for #3, the dominant's suggestion might just give you permission to do what you wanted to do anyway. Perhaps you felt inhibitions were stopping you, but now you are unleashed.
Also, imagine: if you do as commanded, how do you know you were not following a suggestion?
The Limits of a Suggestion
Whenever you accept a suggestion, you are accepting the authority of someone else in a context where it's appropriate to accept that suggestion.
Look again at the moment where you are enjoying a meal with a friend and they ask you to pass the salt. In that context, you might pass them the salt without thinking about it. Because that's a situation where you are already conditioned to do that kind of thing, so you don't think about it.
In another situation, you might look at them weirdly and say, "What?"
Your mind is full of suggestions that you just aren't aware of, that are triggered under certain situations and in certain context. You can always refuse them, but you may feel it's wrong to do so without really understanding why (that example of giving the remote to a parent who is overbearing about the TV remote highlights this sense of wrongness perfectly).
When a hypnotist gives you a hypnotic suggestion, all they are doing is adding to the suggestions you already have in your mind. The trance creates a context for you to accept such suggestions, so you do - if you are so inclined.
Lots of things can interfere with this process. First, you have to believe that it's possible. And you also need to trust the hypnotist. (This might exist in different degrees: you might trust a hypnotist to give you suggestions regrding what you wear or whether you do acceptable things in front of a live audience, but you might not trust them - or yourself - to do "naughty" things with you in private).
There's a lot more that can be said about suggestions, like how and why reinforcement is sometimes necessary, and when it isn't, and what shape it takes.
But this post is already long enough for now. The main point is, suggestions are not as strange as you might think. They are a natural part of life, and hypnosis is simply hijacking a very normal behaviour.
