'autohypnosis' originates from Greek combining forms: the prefix 'auto-' from Greek 'autos' and 'hypnosis' from Greek 'hypnos', where 'autos' meant 'self' and 'hypnos' meant 'sleep'.

'hypnosis' comes from Greek 'hypnos' via 19th-century medical coinage (coined into English by figures such as James Braid); 'auto-' has long been used as a combining form from Greek 'autos', and the compound 'autohypnosis' was formed in modern English by combining these elements to mean self-induced hypnosis.

Initially the components pointed to 'self' + 'sleep'; over time the compound came to mean not literal sleep but a self-induced hypnotic or suggestive state used for therapeutic or self-regulation purposes.