In hypnosis terms, fractionation refers to the practice of repeatedly taking someone into and out of hypnosis. The idea is that, usually, the more that someone goes in and out of trance, the deeper they descend as they go back in.
Fractionation demonstrates a useful principle employed by Dave Elman. Building on the work of Hippolyte Bernheim, Elman believed that when you take a person in and out of Hypnosis, they tend to go more deeply into trance each time they return.
Richard Nongard offers, as an everyday example, those times when your alarm clock goes off and you hit the snooze button. Just do that two or three times and when you eventually get up you are more tired than when the alarm initially went off. Imagine how deeply you would sleep if someone crept-in and turned the alarm off after you’d hit snooze for the third time!
It is possible that fractionation depends, at least in part, on what Stephen Brooks refers to as “frustrating the trance.” Or we might think of this as simply delayed gratification. The client is either just about to enter into hypnosis, or is presently enjoying it, when you pull them out of it. This means that when they next sense the opportunity to go back ‘in,’ they do so quickly, eagerly and usually to a greater depth.
This is a useful principle for the hypnotist, making our task so much easier.
