Book Review: Self-Hypnosis and Subliminal Technology: A How-to Guide for Personal-Empowerment Tools You Can Use Anywhere

 I’m always a little wary of books that propose to give you simple tools to make a person more empowered. In many cases, I’ve found the explanations unclear and the focus more on the author than on the reader. Thankfully, Eldon Taylor’s most recent offering, “Self-Hypnosis and Subliminal Technology”, is not one of these.

Mr. Taylor’s background is in lie detection; he was a practicing criminalist in the 80s, when he stumbled across some research on using subliminal audio during hostage situations. That led him to take a long, hard look at subliminal self-help programs, which seemed like the launch point for his career in writing books about harnessing the power of the human mind.

What I think I like most about this book is that it presents ideas and concepts simply in a way the reader can associate with. If you’ve done meditation in the past, you’ll find that many of the techniques for slowing down brain wave activity very familiar, including deep breathing exercises.

Many of us struggle as we learn to meditate. OK…let’s be honest: Many of us continue to struggle as we try to make entering a meditative state more automatic to relieve stress on the fly. Taylor breaks the process down for us, and gives us audio files to work with so we can try it on our own. If you “can’t meditate”, you really need to pick up this book.

Before you pick it up, though, I’d try to get rid of the “can’t meditate” message in your brain, because if it’s present, then this book or any other book isn’t going to help you. Just sayin’. And this is coming from the guy who thought that entering a calmer state was total crap ten years ago.  

I have many students who complain that they are distracted while they attempt to meditate. There’s an exercise in this book for dealing with distractions, which I found to be an excellent addition.

Pushing beyond the boundaries of “meditation”, Taylor teaches us to hypnotize ourselves for self-improvement and self-awareness. We all have areas in which we would like to improve, but our past—and the emotional ties to negative events—keep us from growing past a certain point. We can also include habits that we know are bad for us that are hard to kick in this category.

We’ve all seen or heard of hypnotists who do stage shows and make people do crazy things. Taylor mentions it in passing to make a point, but he’s not talking about something as frivolous as entertainment. If your mind can overcome a fear, allow a fantastic, positive idea to take hold, or need to do something in life that makes you truly uncomfortable, then you will be successful. Taylor summed up this idea perfectly in a recent interview: “Basically, if you do not believe you can succeed, then this belief will prevent you from becoming the best you can be.”

This book is real, and by saying that I mean that Taylor doesn’t promise “10 days to a happier you”, or some other outlandish claim. (I think “French in 10 Minutes a Day was the one that really galled me, after studying the language for more than 20 years!) If you’ve been heavy for years, you’re not going to lose the weight in 10 days. Americans all want the quick fix, and I’ll go on record as saying that this book is NOT a quick fix. But it provides a simple, powerful toolkit to assist you in making life changes. 

I wish I had had this book many years ago before performing a recital publicly for the first time. I probably would have approached the whole thing with a lot more confidence. And I will definitely look it over again before going in for my next tattoo. I managed my fear the first time, but some reinforcement never hurts.

I highly recommend this book, and hope you’ll take the opportunity to check it out.