Sam Norton
Student Life Editor
Take a deep breath. Close your eyes. Relax. “The most important thing for you to do is for you to use your mind. Visualize everything I ask you to visualize,” Sailesh said as he uttered the words that would leave students in a hypnotic state of mind.
These words made the unexpected happen—students shared their friends’ dirty secrets, read audience members’ minds, pelvic thrusted on-stage, and experienced the best orgasm of their lives.
Sailesh, who was nominated by “Campus Activities Magazine” as America’s Best Male Entertainer of the Year and by MTV Europe as the Best Hypnotist Show, hypnotized a group of students into doing the unthinkable on Friday, March 23. Julie Lessard, president of the Social Activities Council, said, “He (Sailesh) has come here free of charge, he has given us a free show. We won him at our activities conference in November.”
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Sailesh, who has been hypnotizing people on-stage for 17 years, has performed shows that vary from a G-rating, to PG, PG-13, R, and to European uncensored, he said. The hypnotist show that took place in the Mabel Brown Room Friday night was R-rated. Joanna Oko, a Keene State College freshman, said she was looking forward to the show being funny, entertaining, and for those hypnotized to do the unexpected.
“This is a rated R show. No one gets naked on my stage. You don’t reveal anything personal, but the third rule is that everything else is free game,” Sailesh said.
“You’ll do everything I ask you to do and you’ll like it too,” he said. As Sailesh started the countdown—5, 4, 3, 2, and 1, —students’ eyes grew heavier and heavier, slowly relaxing into a hypnotic state. One snap was all it took for the volunteers to fall into a hypnotic induced sleep. Upon wakening, Sailesh said, “Winter is moving in.” Sailesh made those hypnotized believe that the temperatures began to drop—from 60 degrees, to 40 degrees, to 20 degrees. In a desperate attempt to stay warm, those hypnotized snuggled up to warm another to preserve the body heat.
“Focus on my voice and my voice alone. Focus on breathing. Let all the energy go. Close your eyes. See for yourself how quickly and easily you go into a hypnotic state,” Sailesh said. Those hypnotized would do anything at Sailesh’s command, including confessing what they’d like most in a partner if they were of the opposite sex. Mike Ketterman, a KSC freshman, said he’s looking for “A tall glass of water.” While Chris Kouroyen said he’d like a “Tim Tebow type of girl.”
“It’s all in good fun,” Sailesh said.
Sailesh also hypnotized the student volunteers into fearing a nonthreatening object. Kouroyen panicked at the thought that his black belt was a live menacing snake. Sailesh would dangle this ‘creature’ in front of Kouroyen, who would dodge in fear that his belt was about to sink his teeth into him. “They’re called ‘Buckleheads,’” Sailesh said.
During the hypnotist show, those hypnotized also had to make up dirt fetishes that the audience members were said to have. When asked by Sailesh what one of the audience members’ dirty secrets was, Ketterman pointed to an audience member and said, “he masturbates to images of Tim Tebow.” “I hear he’s coming closer to you, he’s a Jet now,” Sailesh responded. Sailesh also asked junior, Michelle Davy, to identify a weird fetish that one of the audience members had. In a hypnotic state, Davy pointed to an audience member and said they like to rub mustard on before giving oral sex. “It’s not a hot dog, lady,” Sailesh said. The hypnotist show ended with the act that gave Sailesh the title as the Best Hypnotist Show by MTV Europe—under hypnosis, Sailesh hypnotized the volunteers into believing they were experiencing the best orgasm.
“Even though I’ve done it for 17 years, almost 5,000 shows, when I laugh, you know it’s funny,” he said. Sailesh does a total of 220 shows per year, he said. But, his interest in hypnosis started when he first got hypnotized.
“I was going to college, got hypnotized, did some crazy things and started reading about it because I needed to know how it happened. As I started to read about it I spent three years reading and didn’t really get that much off of it. I started working with a hypnotist and learned more off of him in two months than I did in three years reading,” he said. “In the future I want to be able to do my show and amaze people at what is being done and be able to teach them how to hypnotize themselves so they can change their lives for the better,” Sailesh said.
But, his show would be nothing without volunteers, he said. “The people on-stage are the stars of the show.”
Sam Norton can be contacted at snorton@keene-equinox.com