By Craig Henderson
Student Life Editor

On Tuesday, Oct. 28, students from the Neurology Club, Biology Club, Cardio Vascular Club, and the Psychology club invited Hypnotist Tom DeLuca from Florida to demonstrate his skills.

DeLuca earned his Master’s Degree in Psychology with a minor in communications from the University of Illinois. He says he adopted the profession when one of his professors in college introduced and trained DeLuca to do hypnosis. The professor even had DeLuca hypnotize for him.

“I really got fascinated by it; I did a lot of 1-on-1 and then one of the people I hypnotized said I should do a show at a hotel,” DeLuca says.

The Florida hypnotist says that it takes both the participant and the performer in order to be hypnotized. “You have to neutralize their fear and get them over their anxiety. Some people are scared when they volunteer, and you have to make everything seem normal and okay.”

DeLuca started his performance with 20 volunteers, which each individual had imagined a certain dream while they were under hypnosis. Some of the actions were laughing, fishing, bodybuilding, heard music in their shoe, and two students were hypnotized into thinking they spoke the language of an extra-terrestrial.

President of DeLuca Enterprises also gave the volunteers trigger words. These words, such as ‘Dearborn,’ and ‘Chicago,” forced the participants to act out in a manner in which DeLuca told them to.

Brandon Kennedy was one of the volunteers who were under hypnosis. When DeLuca said the phrase ‘Blue,’ Kennedy would be confused with what the mascot was, and every time the phrase was said, Kennedy would come up with a different animal.

Kennedy says, “I am not sure what I really did, and people have shown me from their cameras, and I am not sure I would’ve done that.”

DeLuca also says that many people cannot be hypnotized. Some volunteers are too scared or nervous, try too hard or someone may have bumped into them, thus knocking them out of hypnotization, and it becomes hard to go back. Five volunteers lost focus during DeLuca’s performance.

The Florida hypnotist also has used his skills to cure people of their addictions such as smoking and also fears. “I would go back to the underlying cause of their fear, and walk them through it.”

For more information on Tom DeLuca, visit http://www.tomdeluca.com/.