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Hypnotic
Complexes
Paul Budding
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Key words: hypnotic/hypnotism/hypnosis/hypnotised,
complex/complexes, fixed idea, possession, participation
mystique/projective identification, stimulus/response,
dissociation/dissociated, consciousness/
conscious/unconscious/unconsciousness, power, control, Jung,
Janet, psychology/psychological, neurosis, psychosis.
Introduction
This essay focuses on dissociated conscious mindstates. These
mindstates are not within our conscious control precisely
because consciousness is what has been dissociated. If they are
not within our conscious control then they can all be regarded as
a mindstate that is hypnotised. These mindstates are often (not
always) unhealthy. They seem to be something that we have
failed to overcome. This is no surprise in the area of trauma. But
(as we shall see in this paper) in other areas of psychological life
it is a result of faulty thinking. (e.g., hysteria as a result of
power and control psychology). The psychological pain that
results equates to the loss of psychological freedom and harms
the balance of the conscious mind. It’s a modern day form of
psychological possession. And therefore I propose that we
preface the word ‘Complex’ with the word ‘Hypnotic’.
Clarity can be brought to the confused world of dissociation
simply by prefacing the word ‘complex[es]’ with the familiar
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word ‘hypnotic’. That is what this paper does… and in its
conclusion some useful advice is offered to people who suffer
from hypnotic complexes.
The Hypnotic Complex: Hypnosis and
Neurosis
Jung approvingly quoted Moll’s definition of suggestion as “a
process whereby under inadequate conditions, an effect is
obtained by evoking the idea that such an effect will be
obtained.”
(Jung in a review of a book by Moll, CW 18, 1907, par. 893)
In neurosis it is like you are hypnotised. Indeed when
experiencing neurosis you are partially hypnotised. You have to
fight for consciousness otherwise it would slip away and you
would fall into complete hypnosis/psychosis. In neurosis you
realise that you have no choice but to think, feel and react the
way that you do. Moreover a hypnotic stimulus can
automatically trigger an instant response (the triggering of the
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hypnotic complex that painfully dissociates the conscious
psyche).
Hysteria is an example of Hypnotic Complex Psychology. Often
the hysteric is seeking power and control over others. When this
fails then the hysteric involves others in their neurosis because
hysteria is an extraverted condition. Therefore the hysterics
internal mindstate is projected out onto the external world. And
although the hysteric experiences and re-experiences the
surfacing of the hypnotic complex into their conscious mind (so
clear that others can see it in the hysterics face as it goes blood-
shot red)… there is still nothing that the hysteric can do about
it. That is clearly an hypnotic complex. Hysteria, as a neurosis,
means that there is some conscious fight. But let’s be clear. This
is relative hypnosis because it involves so much psychology that
the individual desperately wants to vanquish but is powerless to
vanquish. The mind is conditioned to explode at the slightest
stimulus hence the hysterics healthy conscious mind only has
wafer thin separation from their unconscious hypnotic
complexes. Outside help is difficult if not impossible because the
projection onto the outer world (involving everyone else in their
problems) ensures that everyone is perceived by the hysteric as
being against him or her. They want love but they want it in an
undeveloped childish and immature way.
Hysteria is a very good example as it fits well with what I have
long regarded as ‘Complex Psychology’ (now prefaced with the
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word ‘Hypnotic’). Hysteria fits with stimulus-response and with
power and control psychology that cannot tolerate opposition.
Indeed the opposition forms hypnotic complexes. Hypnotic
Complex Psychology also includes (as part of its ingredients)
paranoid projection/projective identification whereby what is in
you (but is denied by you as psychological poison) is projected
onto someone else. That someone else is now experienced as
‘poison’ when they link to the poison. Thus they trigger the
hypnotic complex in you. Worse still, if they realise that they can
do this then they could potentially trigger the stimulus on
purpose thus becoming manipulators.
In the book ‘A Critical Dictionary of Jungian Analysis’ the
authors say the following about ‘Possession’: “Because of the
strength and obstinacy of the neurotic or psychotic symptom, a
person is deprived of choice and is powerless to dispose of his
will. A restraining effect is placed on consciousness proportional
to the strength of the invading autonomous psychic content and
an acute one-sidedness results. This imperils not only conscious
freedom but also psychic equilibrium. Individual aims are
falsified in favour of the possessing psychic agent […] In an
article written for the Basle newspaper at the time of the death
of Freud […] Jung gives a concise explication of the development
of Analytical Psychology, linking it historically with Charcot’s
discovery ‘that hysterical symptoms were the consequence of
certain ideas that had taken possession of the person’s brain.”
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(Samuels, Plaut, Shorter, 1986, p110). Note that the authors
said “A restraining effect is placed on consciousness proportional
to the strength of the invading autonomous psychic content” The
stronger the strength of the hypnotic complex = the more that
the individual is hypnotised by the hypnotic complex. The
weaker the strength of the hypnotic complex = the greater the
ability of consciousness to resist and re-establish ego
consciousness.
Jung, Janet… Hypnotic Complex and
Fixed Idea
“Much of Jungian Psychology and Freudian Psychoanalysis
derives from hypnotic psychotherapies that were commonplace
in Europe and America at the end of the 19th century”
(Shamdasani, 2001)
Pierre Janet (1859 -1947) coined the term ‘Idee fixe’ (fixed idea).
And in a paper for the International Journal of Jungian Studies,
Paula Monahan quotes Henri Ellenberger who wrote “What
Jung called ‘Complex’ was originally nothing but the equivalent
of Janet’s subconscious fixed idea”. (2009, p33) Monahan’s paper
is entirely in-tune with what I am writing in this paper. Janet
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realised that the fixed idea and its linked dissociation of the
psyche, was highly common-place in neurosis and psychosis.
Indeed, for Janet this was everything from the psychological and
mental illness perspective. As Monahan writes “Janet’s interest
turned more and more to the ‘economics’ of psychopathology
whereby ‘psychological force’ and ‘psychological tension’ – and
their relative strength or weakness – were to become the
‘Archimedean point’ of the whole of his […] thought. In this
perspective, it is not the content of the ‘idee fixe’ that is crucial
but merely the energic effects upon primary consciousness of
these split-off psychological systems.” (2009, p35)
Janet was well-aware that these fixed ideas equated to hypnotic
psychology. I will quote Monahan at length here as she
articulates this point well. She writes that “Post-hypnotic
suggestion was a particularly fascinating phenomenon and
perhaps the most conclusive ‘proof’ of Janet’s conclusion that, if
truly ‘psychological’ phenomena did not emanate from ordinary
consciousness, there must be some manner of ‘subconscious’
psychological awareness to account for such behaviour. How else
could a person hypnotised and instructed to carry out certain
actions after being woken from the hypnotic state, possibly
‘remember’ to carry out the given instructions? The information
had to be stored somewhere in the person’s psyche and yet Janet
and all the early magnetizers and hypnotists agreed that a
hypnotised person was absolutely unable to recall what had
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happened whilst under hypnosis once roused from that
‘somnambulisitc’ state. Instructions given under hypnosis would
be duly carried out (even days later) without the previously
hypnotised subject having any idea as to why he or she felt
impelled to perform the action in question. Again, where was the
memory of the order lodged until the action could be carried out
at the time prescribed, and why was it absent from normal
consciousness? The answer, Janet reasoned, was that there was
another area of consciousness outside and apart from normal
waking consciousness, and for which waking consciousness was
amnesic. These extraordinary ‘splits’ (scissions) between normal
conscious behaviour and actions of which the person’s normal
consciousness had neither awareness at the time nor any
recollection afterwards, were the sort of clinical phenomena
which led Janet to focus upon the concept of ‘dissociation’: ‘the
exaggerated development of an idea, of a feeling, of a
psychological state, in a word, of a system of thoughts, which
takes place outside of the memory and the normal consciousness’
(Janet in Monahan, 2009, p39). Monahan continues “The
manifestation of ‘dissociated states’ could be fairly rudimentary
and involve only one particular aspect of the person’s life or
behaviour (as for instance some compulsive activity that
interferes with normal life but does not take it over entirely), or
it could develop to such an extent that the person alternated
between completely different personalities” (Monahan, 2009,
p39)
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Monahan quotes two contemporary clinicians who work within
the context of Janetian dissociation psychology. The clinicians
(Van der Hart and Friedman) define the term ‘Fixed Idea’ as
follows:
“Fixed ideas (idees fixes) are thoughts or mental images which
take on exaggerated proportions, have a high emotional charge,
and in, hysterical patients, become isolated from the habitual
personality, or personal consciousness… when dominating
consciousness, they serve as the basis for behaviour. These ideas
also manifest themselves in what we now term flashbacks or
intrusive thoughts. Janet considered them dissociative
phenomena.” (Van der Hart and Friedman in Monahan, 2009,
p40)
In order to demonstrate similarity, Monahan then compares
Janet’s fixed idea to Jung’s complex. She quotes Jung defining
complex as follows:
“What then, scientifically speaking, is a “feeling-toned complex”?
It is the image of a certain psychic situation which is strongly
accentuated emotionally and is, moreover, incompatible with the
habitual attitude of consciousness. This image has a powerful
inner coherence, it has its own wholeness and, in addition, a
relatively high degree of autonomy, so that it is subject to the
control of the conscious mind to only a limited extent, and there
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behaves like an animated foreign body in the sphere of
consciousness.” (Jung in Monahan, 2009, p41)
So, if the unconscious complex impacts on our psychology and
behaviour… and we have little conscious control over it… then
it’s relatively hypnotic in those cases proportional to the
strength of the complex.
So the continuity of consciousness in modern man and woman…
is still fragile. In the neurotic the continuity of consciousness
often has to be fought for. In the psychotic, the hypnotic complex
wins and the continuity of consciousness is completely
destroyed. I will now quote Jung at length. Keep in-mind that
the complexes that Jung refers to are all the more precisely
defined if we label them ‘HYPNOTIC COMPLEXES’… and that
the strength of the hypnosis and/or weakness of consciousness is
determined by the strength of the complex and whether we are
referring to neurotics or psychotics.
Extracted from Jung, 1939b, ‘The Psychogenesis of
Schizophrenia’
Par 510: “The abaissement
(1) Causes the loss of whole regions of normally controlled
contents.
(2) Produces split-off fragments of the personality.
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(3) Hinders normal trains of thought from being consistently
carried through and completed.
(4) Decreases the responsibility and the adequate reaction of the
ego.
(5) Causes incomplete realizations and thus gives rise to
insufficient and inadequate emotional reactions.
(6) Lowers the threshold of consciousness, thereby allowing
normally inhibited contents of the unconscious to enter
consciousness in the form of autonomous invasions”.
Jung explains the difference between neurotic and psychotic
dissociation:
Par 516: “Now there is no doubt that an abaissement which
leads to a neurosis is produced either by exclusively
psychological factors or by these in conjunction with other,
perhaps more physical, conditions. Any abaissement,
particularly one that leads to a neurosis, means in itself that
there is a weakening of the supreme control. A neurosis is a
relative dissociation, [My bolding] a conflict between the ego and
a resistant force based upon unconscious contents. These
contents have more or less lost their connection with the psychic
totality. They form themselves into fragments, and the loss of
them means the depotentiation of the conscious personality. The
intense conflict, on the other hand, expresses an equally intense
desire to re-establish the severed connection. There is no co-
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operation, but at least there is a violent conflict, which functions
instead of a positive connection. Every neurotic fights for the
maintenance and supremacy of his ego-consciousness and for the
subjugation of the resistant unconscious forces. But a patient
who allows himself to be swayed by the intrusion of strange
contents from the unconscious, a patient who does not fight, who
even identifies with the morbid elements, immediately exposes
himself to the suspicion of schizophrenia. His abaissement has
reached a fatal, extreme degree, when the ego loses all power to
resist the onslaught of an apparently more powerful
unconscious.”
Par 579: “whereas, in the normal and neurotic, the acute affect
passes comparatively quickly, and the chronic affect impairs the
general orientation of consciousness and its adaptability in ways
that are barely perceptible, the schizophrenic complex has an
incomparably more powerful effect. Its expressions become fixed,
its relative autonomy becomes absolute, and it takes possession
of the conscious mind so completely that it alienates and
destroys the personality.”
And here is a Jung quote that all but says that complexes are
hypnotic:
Par 200: Jung, 1934/1948: From A Review of the Complex
Theory:
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“Everyone knows nowadays that people "have complexes." What
is not so well known, though far more important theoretically, is
that complexes can have us.”
Jung, 1935, extracts from the Tavistock Lectures: On the Theory
and Practice of Analytical Psychology
Par 149: The complex “has a sort of body, a certain amount of its
own physiology. It can upset the stomach. It upsets the
breathing, it disturbs the heart – in short, it behaves like a
partial personality. For instance, when you want to say or do
something and unfortunately a complex interferes with this
intention, then you say or do something different from what you
intended. You are simply interrupted, and your best intention
gets upset by the complex, exactly as if you had been interfered
with by a human being or by circumstances from outside.”
Jung was able to hypnotise patients himself. However, he
preferred people to find their own way to health… with mere
guidance from the analyst. Nevertheless the following extract
from a paper by Sonu Shamdasani demonstrates that Jung did
practice hypnosis on a patient. Shamdasani quotes Jung as
saying: “You can hypnotize suitable subjects to such an extent
that they lose the sensation of the body completely. I made an
experiment once with a young girl at the Polyclinic. She was a
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bit hysterical, and I told one of my assistants to entangle her in
an interesting conversation. He was a nice young man and it
went beautifully, and then I went up behind her and pushed a
needle into her neck about a centimeter deep. It would naturally
be painful and she did not even wince, but her pupils contracted.
The physiological person felt the pain, but her whole libido was
in the man and withdrawn from the surface of the body, so she
felt nothing seriously.” (Jung in Shamdasani, 2001)
Hypnotic Complex Psychology works the same way that Pavlov’s
Stimulus Response works. Pavlov’s dogs with its bells and dogs
is clearly visible to the external observer whereas much Complex
Psychology is invisible relative to Pavlovs stimulus response
psychology. However, in ‘all’ cases of Hypnotic Complex
Psychology the inner world is changed. We can outline some
more examples of the ‘changed’ inner world starting with PTSD.
In PTSD, a person traumatised by the memory of a bus crash
may be watching TV with a friend when (innocently) a bus is
seen on the TV show. The friend may think nothing of it but the
mind of the PTSD sufferer may have been entirely dissociated
due to the traumatic stimulus that is the bus. Even less
predictable is the simple over-emphasis on consciousness that
results in addiction to a mind-set. This gives birth to an hypnotic
opposition complex (or hypnotic opposition complexes) that can
be triggered by various stimulus resulting in an automatic
dissociation of the conscious psyche. (i.e., a dissociation of the
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addictive mindset). If introverted this will result in listlessness,
depression. If extraverted it will result in an hysterical outburst.
In cases of neurosis as opposed to psychosis the dissociation is
temporary and that means that ego consciousness is able to be
re-established.
Dreams
Dreams are another psychological experience that usually lack
conscious control. Thus they are hypnotic. Of course, the deeper
the dream, the more realistic it is, the more hypnotised you are.
People who suffer nightmares following PTSD experience
horrifically realistic flashback dreams… that force the sufferer
to re-live the trauma.
Sonu Shamdasani, the forementioned historian of Jungian
psychology and psychoanalysis writes that “August Forel (1848 –
1931), who played a pivotal role in introducing hypnotic
suggestion into Switzerland claimed that the characteristics of
the dream were the same as those experienced under hypnosis.”
(Shamdasani, 2003, p111)
Projective Identification
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“Jung used the term [participation mystique] from 1912 onwards
to refer to relations between people in which the subject, or part
of him, attains an influence over the other, or vice versa. In more
modern psychoanalytic language, Jung was describing projective
identification in which a part of the personality is projected into
the object, and the object is then experienced as if it were the
projected content.
Participation mystique or projective identification are early
defences which also appear in adult pathology. They enable the
subject to control the external object or ‘colour’ it according to an
inner world-view.” (Samuels, Shorter, Plaut, 1986, p106)
Projective identification is a term accepted by modern
psychoanalysis. It is entirely consistent with the emphasis in
this paper on the ‘hypnotic’ side of psychology. The common-
place psychological tactic of striving for power and control occurs
through projective identification. A tight linkage is made
between one’s internal world and the outer object. The problem
of course, is that due to the value placed on the object, it can be
painfully dissociated by the hypnotic opposition complexes. I
recommend a way of overcoming this problem in the conclusion
to this paper. (see below).
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Conclusion
“The unity and continuity of consciousness are such late
acquisitions that there is still a fear that they might get lost
again”
(Jung, CW 10, 1958a, par 386)
The problem of the discontinuity of consciousness cries out for an
answer… how can we attain continuity of consciousness? I am
(thankfully) not grandiose or delusional so do not claim to be
able to write an answer on the collective side of this. I do not
know how (collectively) humanity will overcome the problem of
the discontinuity of consciousness. Technological innovation will
help with PTSD due to harm to our physical integrity being
reduced or vanquished thanks to technological progress.
However, that is no use to the individual suffering today who
wants an answer today. I do offer a view of how the individual
that strives for more consciousness yet suffers from hypnotic
complexes that dissociate his or her conscious mind can heal.
You see, such a person probably began striving for more
conscious power and control due to a belief that they previously
lacked power and control and had suffered because of it. Little
wonder then that they opted for power and control psychology.
He or she will have unknowingly used ‘projective identification’
in order to attain psychological power and control. However, as
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we have seen this results in hypnotic opposition complexes that
dissociate the conscious psyche. Thus the poor sufferer thinks
that (s)he suffers no matter what (s)he does. Such a person
(given that their psychological approach is still failing) should be
open to what I will recommend here: Conscious freedom yes, but
calmer, less value placed on whatever it is that you originally
attached too for power and control. Be less interested in that
thing so that you can be psychologically balanced and
psychologically free. This will dilute or vanquish the power of
the hypnotic complexes to the degree that you lessen your
interest in whatever it is that you attach too for power and
control. Once you are balanced and psychologically free you will
feel less anxiously vigilant concerning falling back into the
distressing hypnotic-state of mind. Also, recognise others
psychological errors as educative (as opposed to offensive) so
that you do not make those errors yourself. Or so that you
correct those errors in yourself.
Bibliography
Jung, C, G. (1907) Reviews of Psychiatric Literature In Collected
Works, vol. 18, The Symbolic Life. London: Routledge & Kegan
Paul, 1977.
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Jung, C. G. (1934/1948) A Review of the Complex theory. In
Collected Works, vol. 8, The Structure and Dynamics of the
Psyche. Pantheon Books: 1960.
Jung, C. G. (1935) The Tavistock Lectures: The Theory and
Practice of Analytical Psychology. In Collected Works, vol. 18,
The Symbolic Life. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1977.
Jung, C. G. (1939b) The Psychogenesis of Schizophrenia. In
Collected Works, vol. 3, The Psychogenesis of Mental Disease.
Princeton University Press, 1960.
Jung, C. G., (1958a) A Psychological view of Conscience. In
Collected Works, vol. 10, Civilisation in Transition. New Jersey:
Princeton University Press.
Monahan, P, (2009) C. G. Jung: Freud’s Heir or Janet’s? The
influence upon Jung of Janet’s dissociationism International
Journal of Jungian Studies, p33-49.
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Samuels, A, Shorter, B, & Plaut, F, (1986) A Critical Dictionary
of Jungian Analysis (Routledge& Kegan Paul Ltd)
Shamdasani, S, (2001) The Magical Method that works in the
dark: C. G. Jung, hypnosis and suggestion. Journal of Jungian
Practice and Theory, 3: 5-18.
Shamdasani, S, (2003) Jung and the making of Modern
Psychology: The Dream of a Science (Cambridge University
Press)
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