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You are here: Home / Essays, articles, etc. / Book: Steve Hassan on “Unfreezing” (1988)

January 1, 1988 by Caroline Letkeman

Book: Steve Hassan on “Unfreezing” (1988)

  
Combating Cult Mind Control by Steve Hassan (1988)

Leah Remini promoted Steve Hassan’s book1 on Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath (Season 1, Episode 8).

THE THREE STEPS TO GAINING CONTROL OF THE MIND

[…] On the surface, the three-step process to gaining control of the mind seems quite simple. These three steps are unfreezing, changing, and refreezing.

Unfreezing

To ready a person for radical change, his reality must first be shaken up. His indoctrinators must disorient him. His frames of reference for understanding himself and his surroundings must be challenged and broken down. Upsetting his view of reality disarms his natural defenses against concepts that challenge his reality.

Unfreezing can be accomplished by using a variety of approaches. […]

Hypnotic processes constitute another powerful tool for unfreezing and side-stepping a person’s defense mechanisms. One particularly effective hypnotic technique involves the deliberate use of confusion to induce a trance state. Confusion usually results whenever contradictory information is communicated congruently. […]

Sensory overload, like sensory deprivation, also effectively disrupts a person’s balance and makes him more open to suggestion. A person can be bombarded by emotionally laden material at a rate faster than he can digest. The result is a feeling of being overwhelmed. The mind snaps into neutral and ceases to evaluate the material pouring in. The newcomer may think this is happening spontaneously within himself, but the group has intentionally structured it that way.2; 3

Notes

  1. Hassan, S. (1988) Combating Cult Mind Control. Park Street Press ↩
  2. Emphasis mine. Cf. Subliminal messaging in Leah Remini: Scientology & The Aftermath (all episodes). Examples: Season 1, Episode 0; Episode 2 ↩
  3. See also: Transcript: Cult expert Steven Hassan on his emotional reaction to the Aftermath series (S1 E8) (2017) ↩

Filed Under: Essays, articles, etc., Malignant Persuasion Tagged With: hypnosis, Steve Hassan, subliminal messaging, unfreezing

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