Students enjoyed mentalism and hypnotism Friday night at the Rich Aimes Hypnotist Show.

The show featured a variety of mind games and hypnotism followed by a motivational workshop. Mr. Aimes called for 18 volunteers to be on stage and become hypnotized before a group of their friends and classmates. When a person is hypnotized, a person becomes very relaxed and open to suggestions, but they are still awake. He slowly counted from one to ten.

He then told the students to concentrate on his voice. Along with the help of sound effects, he convinced the students that it was getting very cold. They started rubbing their arms and some started to shiver. Then Aimes convinced them that it was starting to get hotter. Students started wiping the imaginary sweat off their arms and foreheads.

Next, Aimes convinced them that they were driving a Formula 1 racecar. The students grabbed the imaginary steering wheel and made left and right turns, all in unison at Aimes’ command. While he was doing this, Ms. Aimes approached a few students blowing on the back of their heads and moving their chairs. Some of the students smiled, but they all did what Aimes suggested.

After the race, it was time for the concert. Aimes chose a few students and put them back to “sleep.” Then he told them when they awoke, they would be a certain celebrity. They awoke thinking they were Beyonce, Jay-Z, Justin Timberlake, Christina Agullara, Dolly Parton, or Elvis. Aimes played the music and the students started lip synching the song of the celebrity they believed they were.

“I don’t know what happened, I was aware but nothing seemed weird and when it was over, my friends all told me I lip sang a song by Christina Agullara that I didn’t think I knew” said Natalee Staggs, a freshman marketing major from Collierville.

Aimes also preformed mind tricks with four other volunteers from the audience. He had five envelopes, one with a new 100 dollar bill, the others had nothing. He used his powers of suggestion to make the students guess the wrong envelope. When one student was left holding an envelope, Aimes gave her the choice to switch with him or keep hers, she kept it. At the end of the act, Aimes was left with the envelope holding the 100 dollar bill.

In another trick, he gave a student a book and told her to flip to any page and pick out a big word and concentrate on it. Aimes told her to “tell” the audience what letter it started with using only her mind. He said he was having trouble reading her mind because the path was blocked by a big mountainside, which was the word she had been concentrating on. “I was looking at apartment and mountainside and I concentrated on “mountainside.” I don’t know how in the world he knew,” said Dimphy Sasse, a sophomore from Albany, California.

Rich and Marielle Aimes are both board certified hypnotists. They have performed at colleges and universities, large and small, all throughout the United States. They have also wowed corporate clients, fairs, and theme parks.