“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

There is no magic in hypnosis. Each of you utilize it constantly. (See the 620th session in Chapter Four.) Only when particular procedures are assigned to it, and when it is set aside from normal life, does hypnotic suggestion seem so esoteric. Structured hypnosis merely allows the subject to utilize full powers of concentration, thereby activating unconscious mechanisms.

(Long pause at 9:54.) Your beliefs act like a hypnotist, then. As long as the particular directions are given, so will your “automatic” experience conform. The one suggestion that can break through is this: “I create my reality, and the present is my point of power.” If you do not like the effects of a belief you must alter it, for no manipulation of the exterior conditions themselves will release you. If you truly understand your power of action and decision in the present, then you will not be hypnotized by past events.

It is of greatest importance that you realize several points before you try the method I suggest.

First of all, the unconscious is not a sponge, indiscriminately accepting material regardless of the considerations of your conscious self. All beliefs or suggestions are first sifted through your conscious mind, and only those that you accept are then permitted their penetration into the other areas of the self.

You may have accepted some of these ideas from your parents. Their effects may have surrounded you, or you may have switched beliefs in one particular area of your life; but each can be changed if you utilize the power of action in the present. I am not saying that every one of you must or should be healthy, wealthy and wise. I am only addressing those here now who have effects in their lives with which they are dissatisfied. In one manner of speaking, then, the suggestions you give yourselves constantly operate overall as beliefs that are reflected in your experience.

Some of you are simply mentally lazy. You do not consciously examine the data that you receive. Many who make a practice of “denying” negative suggestions from others, asserting positive affirmations instead, actually do so because they are so fully convinced that the power of negative beliefs is stronger than that of beneficial ones.

Whenever you have your own undivided attention you act as hypnotist and subject simultaneously. You give yourselves post-hypnotic suggestions all the time, particularly when you project present conditions into the future. I want to impress upon you the fact that all of this simply follows the natural function of the mind, and to dispel any ideas that you have about the “magical” aspects of hypnosis.