The Racquette

Issue date: 9/12/08 Section: A&E

Hypnotized students relaxed so deeply that they collapsed into a heap on one another.

Joshua Seth convinces Tyler Kellog that he has eleven fingers during a segment of the comedy hypnotist show.

"I felt relaxed-super relaxed-but I was a bit worried when I woke up without my top shirt on," recalled sophomore Amanda Dickson after being hypnotized on stage with a group of her peers. It was a night of amusement for most and confusion for some in Dunn Theater on Friday, September 5 when comedy hypnotist Joshua Seth brought his interactive show to SUNY Potsdam courtesy of the Office of Student Involvement and Leadership.

The hall was packed with anxious students who cheered and clapped to encourage Seth to take the stage. It was so packed, in fact, that people without seats had to be turned away for safety reasons. The beginning of the act was lackluster, featuring a movie about the hypnotist's achievements in America and Japan. When the performer finally took the stage, he started in a most anticlimactic fashion by doing infantile "mind tricks," such as asking the audience to guess of what number he was thinking. The next segment consisted of a longwinded description that hypnosis is the same as being in one's unconscious mind. Just as some students were getting fed up with the opening drudgery, Joshua Seth asked for volunteers, and the audience came back to life.

Approximately 15 volunteers took the stage, and Joshua Seth proceeded to calm them into a state of deep relaxation through just his voice and words. After he was confident that the participants were all fully relaxed, he began to manipulate their perception of reality. In their minds, the subjects traveled from a tropical island to a Potsdam winter, adapting appropriately by stripping off layers and hats, and then promptly cuddling up together.

Each person was instructed to take up imaginary orchestra instruments and one particularly charismatic participant conducted the group through a recording of "The William Tell Overture." At one point, the men were all convinced that they were pregnant and had to give birth. When asked for his opinion about being pregnant, one man presented the sage advice, "don't let Brad Pitt knock you up." The grand finale of the show was a rap-off in which all of the participants took turns at the microphone strutting their rhymes-in Japanese.

After a rather annoying description of all of the hypnosis CDs and books Joshua Seth was trying to sell, the hypnotist closed up his act. He left the participants with two suggestions: one was humorous, telling the students to shout, "I love you!" every time they heard his name, until they left Dunn Theater, and the other was a little cheesy, the concept that they could do anything they put their minds to. Perhaps the funniest thing of all was that after those who were hypnotized woke up, they had hardly any recollection of what they had done on stage. Participant Max Howard, sophomore, said, "I don't recall so much. I remember having triplets." It was evident through the overwhelming laughter and cheers that, whether or not they believed in the actual hypnosis, the audience had a wonderful time.

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