by Jacara » February 24th, 2006, 9:50 pm
I've been thinking about this lately. I would think that if you had time to keep reinforcing these new beliefs/behaviours, it'd certainly start to have an effect.
What I was considering is whether it's possible to "make" someone do something they subconsciously don't want to do. Since hypnosis gives you access to their subconscious, my theory is that you should be able to find the experiences that caused them to have their current view, and re-process those memories (as long as you're non-threatening and don't let on that you're out to change their beliefs) so that they lose a bit of the strong reaction from it.
Example: Someone has a deep-seated opposition to anal sex, so they won't even do it in trance. First you have to explore what caused them to form this belief (probably some childhood memory that gave them a mental note that "ass=evil") and talk them through it, telling them that there was really nothing evil about it... and after a number of these sessions, they may be open to the trances where they're willing to let you try new things. In time (with more sessions) you may be willing to bring out a new side in them.
So I think it's possible to change some deep personality traits, but you need to take a long time and be willing to do a little hypnotherapy with them, finding the source of their beliefs.
The question & answer stuff is best in-person, so I could only really see this working well on a significant-other.