Hypnotizing Maria

airplane-traps; remember it’s not the towers that’ll get you ...
    ... it’s the cables that brace the things. I know.
    Stop thinking about dying, please, and look out for the wires. You want to fly low, you pay attention to the landscape, you help me out a little, here.
    Jamie Forbes solved the problem with back-pressure on the control stick. In a minute the airplane cruised above the claws of most towers, slow-turning left to follow a river meandering southeast. The flying mind relaxed.
    We never flew this way in the Air Force. When we lifted off some runway, we knew where we’d be landing, no matter how far away it might have been. There’s no square on a military flight plan to check well decide along the way.
    Not any more. Civilian flying, you take off and go, when the weather’s nice. Think about landing, if you want, half an hour before you get there. Press on in the general direction; not many places in the country more than twenty minutes from a little airport.
    His new higher mind didn’t care for air-talk. Want to know how you can de-hypnotize yourself?
    No, he thought.



CHAPTER FIFTEEN
    J amie Forbes landed for fuel at Pine Bluff, Arkansas, its runway afloat on a vast emerald lawn, fresh-trimmed. Nice people there, friendly to strangers as they most often are at little airports.
    “Where you headed?”
    “Florida.”
    “Long flight.”
    “Yes. I’m out of Seattle.”
    A laugh. “ Long flight!”
    Some words about the weather, a quick history of Pine Bluff flying when he asked, fuel for the airplane, then start engine once more and away.
    Level at a thousand feet, instruments looking good.
    Want to know how you can de-hypnotize yourself?
    I never want to speak to you again, he thought. He didn’t mean that, decided to be careful of his suggestions from now on, even in fun. They’re powerful stuff.
    OK. After I’ve given my consent to truck along as a mortal for a few years, how can I de-hypnotize myself without un-mortalizing myself at the same time?
    You don't.
    I don’t understand.
    Of course you understand. You do just what you said, Jamie. You un-mortalize yourself.
    He laughed. This odd conversation was different from any he’d had with himself, and it was fun. Oil pressure’s good, oil temp’s normal.
    How do I un-mortalize without dying? What’s your plan?
    Pretend nothing that's happened on this flight has been coincidence. Pretend it was a lesson waiting for the right time in your life to come along and that time is now.
    According to what you've heard in the last twenty-four hours, how did you become a mortal in the first place?
    I was hypnotized, he thought, I accepted fifty billion trillion suggestions that I’m a mortal and not pure shining spirit.
    How did Sam Black bring you back from knowing you were in prison?
    He snapped his fingers.
    And with that reminded you who you are, that you had bought your ticket to an entertainment, that you had volunteered for the stage.
    So I de-hypnotize by reminding myself... ?
    ... of who you were before the show began. Affirmations. Counter-hypnosis. Constant, non-stop declarations. You de-hypnotize yourself by dropping negative suggestions and affirming positive counter-suggestions.
    That I’m not a mortal?
    Fact is, you're not. Want to know what that feels like? Deny suggestions you’re less than spirit, affirm that spirit is who you are, always have been always will be, no matter you’re spirit choosing games of mortalhood.
    Every player has a life beyond the game. Even you.
    Interesting. He drew a pencil from his sleeve pocket, wrote the idea on the map, not far from the town of Grove Hill, Louisiana: I’m spirit. Deny all else.
    Such as?
    I don’t do such-as’s.
    Such as . . . “I am not a limited mind, trapped in a limited body subject to disease and accident.”
    Nice denial. Now your affirmation, please.
    He considered that. I am already spirit, here and now. Perfect. Undying.
    Not bad. Shifting the definition of yourself from the trapped to the free. And you do it over and over and over ; you never quit , you put down suggestions that you're mortal as fast as they come in. Every time you're aware of a hint that puts you down.
    Why?
    You want to know why , watch what happens when you do it.
    How do I know it’s true?
    Hypnotized, you don't. You can't prove you're spirit. Not wanting to seem foolish, most folks accept the suggestion they re one more body killing time till time kills them.
    But they’re