Happy Holidays Corfu Magazine
Articles and Features (published quarterly) about Corfu and its many attractions
Hypnotist Derek Stone...
Is putting audiences to sleep...
Vol. 2, No. 1; September 15, 2006
© 2005-2006 Happy Holidays Corfu
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A certain mystique has surrounded the technique of
hypnotism since it was first demonstrated by Doctor
Mesmerin the 1800's, and the mystery continues to
this day.
Doctor Mesmer's technique was originally dismissed by
the medical establishment as pure quackery, but slowly
its benefits in treating any number of psychological and
behavior oriented problems became known and accepted
amongst the medical profession at large. Today, hypnosis
is employed in traditional psychotherapy, as well as an aid
in treating eating disorders, smokers wishing to stop smok-
ing, phobias, split personalities, anxiety disorders, and
even past life regression (although the that technique is
still widely debated amongst professionals).
Because hypnotism is also fascinating to watch, it was
quickly incorporated into circus and carnival sideshows,
its practitioners often being self-taught or outright frauds.
Still, crowds always seemed to gather when a travelling
hypnotist came to town, and it seemed that everybody
was more or less willing to see their uncle or brother
made to cluck like a chicken or hop about like a kanga-
roo. It was all good fun, and remains so to this day.
Hypnotist and entertainer Derek Stone
Derek Stone, a native of Western Ireland, has travelled and lived all over the world. Working with American Airlines for twenty-two years afforded him the opportunity to see far-away places and experience things far out of the ordinary. Today, Derek practises his new trade, that of a modern- day, licensed hypnotherapist in a variety of settings, which include the many bars and nightclubs where he stages his "Theatre of the Mind" show to the delight and amazement of audiences from Europe to the Americas, from Thailand and China to the South Pacific.
We recently met Derek when he played to a packed house at Irish Knights Bar in Gouvia one night in August. "Hypnosis is a perfectly natural state of mind," he told us, "one that every person experiences at least twenty-five times a day, even though he doesn' know it." Derek was prepared to back up what he said as he called for eight volunteers from the audience to use as his subjects for the show that evening.
Subject under hypnosis during show
Derek's subjects enter the first stage of hypnotic sleep
The man on the floor is convinced he has just had a baby and reaches out to Derek to receive the child.
The woman pictured is convinced that she is a mid-wife
and is assisting with the birth.
After hypnotising all eight subject simultaneously (it was obvious to most in the audience that some of the subjects were in a deeper state of trance than others), and after giving the subjects time to adjust to the state of hypnosis - all the while implanting subliminal suggestions to them, and even using the natural sounds of the room such as the clinking of glasses, audience chit-chat, and applause to enhance the hypnotic transe - the hypnotist then began the entertainment part of the show. It was obvious to Derek, as well as to the audience, that one of the subjects, a young girl, was in perhaps the deepest trance of any onstage. To her he suggested that she was a dancer in a discoteque, and a moment later she was out of her chair and dancing feverishly in front of the hundreds of onlookers. To a young boy he suggested that he was a surfer in Hawaii, and the lad was at once riding the waves over Irish Knights' floorboards. But the best was still to come!
Playing the Elvis card, Derek had one rather round fellow up and singing the Presley signature song, "You Ain't Nothin' But a Houndog!" Later, the same man was convinced that he was the first man in history to become pregnant, and at Derek's direction he lay on the floor to birth his baby assisted by a girl was was likewise convinced that she was a mid-wife whose job it was to assist in the birthing.
I
In the end, the hypnotist brought all the subjects out of transe and released him or her into the Gouvia night. Two hours had passed with Derek's hypnotic antics, but the subjects, it seemed, had no recollection of the time elapsed.
Does hypnosis really work? One may have his personal doubts, but after seeing one of Derek Stone's incredible "Theatre of the Mind" performances, those doubts will certainly carry a little less weight.
Still later in the show, he convinced a young man and a young woman that they were exotic dancers, and they spun wildly together around a silver-polished pole. And if that was not enough, to add insult to injury he convinced the same young man that he had a fixation on a woman in the bar, and that he could not rest until he' kissed her full on the lips. After each display, Derek put his subject back into a deep sleep, and some lay right on the floor until they were again called on to perform his bidding.
Again and again, the subject got to their feet when called upon to perform one ludicrous act after another. At one point Derek had the whole lot crawling on the floor to pick up imaginary eggs
laid by a flock of Irish Knights chickens! In turn, each subject had his moment of humiliation, but in the end was instructed to remember nothing of what had transpired.
Subject riding over imaginary Hawaiian waves on a surf board
Derek Stone as Levis Parsely
Subjects pole dancing after an auto-suggestion that they are erotic dancers
After searching endlessly through the large crowd, the subject finally finds the object of his adoration and satifies himself, the hypnotist and the crowd by kissing her full on the lips.
Hypnotist Derek Stone performs regularly during summer on Corfu at Irish Knights in Gouvia and the Temple Bar in Ipsos.
