Bambi Sleep in "The Face"
https://theface.com/life/erotic-hypnosis...gma-safety
Erotic hypnosis: âItâs just tying someone up without ropeâ
Using hypnosis to intensify sexual experiences is a fairly niche and satisfying practice â when done safely and, of course, consensually. So why is it banned on so many porn sites?
Every so often, a niche sexual practice becomes the online discourse
du jour. It explodes into the mainstream in such a way as to bewilder, humour, or even horrify those whoâve never come across it before.
In recent months, our collective timelines (well, mine, at least) have been introduced to the
latex vacuum cube, the concept of a praise kink, and, most divisively,
erotic hypnosis. For those whose only experience with hypnosis is from 2009 when Derren Brown went on national TV to convince the public heâd
stuck them into their chairs, it may be difficult to fathom how the practice can be eroticised. Maybe youâre picturing some balding guy swaying a pocket watch in a fedora and nothing else. Or you might even be imagining Brown on the telly, in some kind of sexy outfit (please donât).
Whatever erotic hypnosis looks like, the practice is at least exactly what it
sounds like: the use of hypnosis to intensify sexual experiences, usually in a BDSM context. Essentially, if you thought your brain was the least sexy part of your body, think again.
As per practitioner
Neil the Erotic Hypnotist, erotic hypnosis, also known as hypnokink, can be used to enhance sensations, like pain or pleasure, or create ones that arenât there, to make fantasy scenes feel real, or as part of consensual non-consent (CNC) play by controlling or immobilising the subject (within certain limits). He says the draws of the practice include increased sensitivity during sexual encounters, longer and more intense orgasms, a general interest in BDSM, or being turned on by the idea of being controlled or even âmanipulatedâ.
The latter is what drew 30-year-old Eden*, who enjoys being âgaslit, tricked, teased, and taken advantage ofâ, to hypno CNC. âItâs like flirting, arousal, and mental bondage mixed with intense sexual fantasies and psychological manipulation,â they explain. âYou can be pushed into a dream-like world where the hypnotist has full control over what you think and feel.â They admit that while this might sound like âa terrifying ideaâ, when itâs done well, itâs like âa heightened fantastical reality that you share with another personâ.
Eden compares it to bondage. âOnce someone has you genuinely tied up, youâre totally at their mercy. This is just tying someone up without rope.â
Edenâs been fascinated by the idea of being put to sleep ever since they can remember. They recall watching TV tropes such as being hit with tranquiliser darts, or kidnapped using a chloroform rag, and feeling a particular intensity as the character helplessly slips out of consciousness.
âIâd draw doodles of comics, imagine myself getting captured, struggling against some evil mastermind, and falling into some elaborate trap that put me to sleep, like a room filled with sleeping gas,â they tell me. âI felt weird and embarrassed about it, but as I grew up, I started recognising that same feeling in bondage, submission, and hypnosis.â
Now, they add, âit also helps me relax and trust people more; itâs sort of like therapyâ.
âHypnokink content is subject to restrictions on several porn sites (hence the existence of the term âmind fuckâ, which is used on porn sites to get around censorship)â
If your interest is piqued, there are several ways to conduct erotic hypnosis: in-person with a qualified hypnotist, at home with an IRL or virtual partner, or alone with audio or video recordings. A professional session will be safer and may help you enter a deeper trance, but each technique largely works in the same way.
First, thereâs guided meditation to induce a state of relaxation, followed by erotic hypnosis triggers to induce a trance. Then, once the subjectâs in a deeper state of hypnosis, they can be given suggestions or commands. These suggestions can either take effect during the trance, or be post-hypnotic, meaning theyâll be triggered in regular life by certain actions or phrases.
Example commands from Neilâs sessions include: every time he holds the subjectâs wrist, they feel an orgasm for as long as heâs holding it (vibe); when he touches their forehead and says âstatueâ, they become, you guessed it, a poseable statue; and when he says the word âhornyâ followed by a number between 0 and 10, the subject becomes aroused according to that number, with 10 being âthe most aroused theyâve ever beenâ.
However, according to erotic hypnotist
Miss Sara, this wonât work unless youâre open to it in the first place â for example, you wouldnât be able to hypnotise someone off guard, if you didnât know them first. âThe amount of influence IÂ have is related to how willing the subject is to accept the suggestions and how deeply they want to allow themselves to sink,â she explains. âA lot of that involves roleplay and participants who are very eager to go into trance. You canât hypnotise someone who doesnât want to be hypnotised.â
Although that may sound relatively harmless, or even just totally unbelievable, erotic hypnosis is actually highly stigmatised, even in the kink world. Hypnokink content is
subject to restrictions on several porn sites (hence the existence of the term âmind fuckâ, which is used on porn sites to get around hypnokink censorship), thus making life difficult for its creators. Thereâs also a widespread fear that the practice is inherently dangerous, as well as easy to abuse.
This is where the aforementioned discourse comes in. AÂ recent
BuzzFeed News exposĂ© alleged that a series of hypnokink recordings, known as Bambi Sleep, were used by a self-described erotic hypnotist, James*, to âbrainwashâ subjects in the US and force them to partake in sexual acts they didnât consent to. The article contains distressing testimonies from victims about being sexually assaulted while in a state of trance (theyâd consented to be hypnotised but not to sex or sexual touch), and being forced to listen to the Bambi Sleep tapes for hours at a time.
The recordings, which are available for free on YouTube, aim to âfeminiseâ or âsissifyâ the listener into becoming a â
sexy bimbo girlâ (also called bimbofication). Theyâre considered dangerous because theyâre allegedly designed to be forgotten, making the subject less able to resist triggers outside of a trance. They also contain sexually explicit, agency-eroding content, and are so contentious that discussion about them is banned from the 126k-strong
r/EroticHypnosis subreddit.
While this horrified
BuzzFeed readers, it also divided them. Many sex workers and erotic hypnosis practitioners described the piece
Source:
https://twitter.com/MistressSnowPhD/stat...9577441280
as âirresponsible and anti-kinkâ, criticising it for conflating kink and abuse,
Source:
https://twitter.com/jessicavanmeir/statu...2644318209
and claiming that while a tool like Bambi Sleep âmay make someone more vulnerable to an abuser, the [audio] files themselves canât change someone into something theyâre notâ.
Source:
https://twitter.com/DominaSnow/status/16...0976391169
There were also concerns that the headline (âAfter these people tried erotic hypnosis, they couldnât recognise themselvesâ) may heighten the taboo a

eady surrounding the practice, particularly among those outside of the kink community.
Source:
https://twitter.com/jessicavanmeir/statu...9913481216
âItâs important to make the distinction between nefarious actors â who arenât necessarily professional hypnotists â and a tool that can, and typically is, used for safe, consensual kink playâ
As someone whoâs
written about erotic hypnosis in the past, IÂ was similarly critical of the framing of the story, and particularly the sensationalist headline. The
BuzzFeed article is nuanced and harrowing, but what it describes is abuse using multiple tools: erotic hypnosis, yes, but also forced drug-taking and electrocution to enact emotional, physical, and sexual violence on unsuspecting, kink-curious people.
Source:
https://twitter.com/britdawson/status/16...6527060992
Thatâs not to say erotic hypnosis or even regular hypnosis canât be abused (in fact, it
famously has been, as have
BDSM dynamics in general), but itâs important to make the distinction between nefarious actors â who arenât necessarily professional hypnotists â and a tool that can, and typically is, used for safe, consensual kink play. Framing it otherwise just serves to stigmatise and villainise non-traditional sexual practices and those who engage in them.
âWith the use of hypnosis or without, James would still be an abuser; he abused all of us in and out of trance,â Ava*, one of the survivors from the
BuzzFeed piece, tells me. âI do, however, think people should be aware of the safety issues involving the Bambi Sleep files specifically.â Avaâs even created
a document detailing all their unsafe suggestions and triggers.
To get around this, 25-year-old Rebecca*, who listens to the Bambi Sleep tapes every night, has her boyfriend edit them to remove potentially harmful parts, including negative feeling suggestions. With the vetted recordings, Rebecca says she âgets to be a pure, sexual being without worldly cares and [her] usual anxietiesâ. âMy Bambi traits are now a part of Rebecca,â she continues. âI dress better at work, I exercise more and eat better, and my body positivity is as high as itâs ever been. I feel like a free spirit.â
Thereâs a whole other articleâs worth to unpack when it comes to Bambi Sleepâs theme, but if curated, used mindfully, and with someone you trust, like how Rebecca uses it, erotic hypnosis itself is safe. âItâs when you put something that involves the power of suggestion into the hands of someone who has the intent to harm and manipulate, and that person finds victims who are vulnerable and often masochistic, that hypnosis can be dangerous,â says Mistress Sara. âBut you could say that about anything.â
Even though any dom-sub relationships, or any relationships for that matter, could run the horrible risk of becoming abusive, Neil believes erotic hypnosis is particularly stigmatised because itâs so misunderstood. This, he says, is âmostly due to media portrayals, where itâs depicted as a form of mind control, with the subjects unable to resist the hypnotistâs commandsâ. So, he continues, âto many people, hypnosis is the antithesis of consent, hence itâs to be shunnedâ.
To combat stigma and make the erotic hypnosis community as safe as it can be, Neil encourages practitioners to share
best practices on hypnosis forums, as well as to recommend trustworthy hypnotists and warn others away from abusive ones, as Ava and the other survivors have worked to do. And, despite all they went through, Ava still practises erotic hypnosis â though not with the Bambi Sleep files â and doesnât want their experience to âdemoniseâ the practice, which they think is âsuper hot and makes every other kink more fun to exploreâ.
Ultimately, as Miss Sara concludes: âPeople think that hypnosis must be some form of magic or manipulation. They assume that, if hypnosis is real, anyone can be put into a trance with a snap of the fingers, and thatâs simply not true. Hypnosis isnât magic, and it isnât mind control. Anything can be harmful if itâs in the wrong hands.â
*Names have been changed