What makes hypnotherapy a powerful personal development tool?
By Bernard Chanliau, Tuesday 14 March, 2006
Mind over Matter to Create the Life you Want – the Benefits of Hypnotherapy
Mention hypnotherapy to someone in the street, and the chances are they will smile and conjure up an images of watch-swinging stage wizards and jokes about “gazing into the eyes of mystic therapists”! It is a shame that one of the most powerful methods to enhance your life is veiled with such suspicion, when in reality it is an everyday and comfortable experience …and a very powerful one that has the ability to enhance your life tremendously in just a few sessions.
Hypnosis is a life tool that can be used to cope successfully with a variety of personal challenges from presentations and exam nerves to stopping smoking and weight loss. Simply described, it involves ‘reprogramming’ behaviour patterns and automatic thinking of the subconscious mind to produce outcomes that are more desirable.
There is an ever-present dialogue in the minds of human beings. For ‘well-adjusted’ people that dialogue is filled with positive statements about themselves and their environment. For others, this internal conversation may be filled with negativity and they may not trust themselves, their feelings, other people, or life. Inner dialogue creates a self-fulfilling prophecy, for the brain cannot distinguish between thoughts imagined vividly and in detail and reality. So the more we believe something, the more likely it is to materialise in reality. Therefore, negative inner dialogue is limiting because it stifles the opportunity for a more positive experience.
It’s interesting that we here in Ireland have a tendency towards negative – ‘we are not worthy’ - inner dialogue, which often prevents us from reaching what we’re truly capable of… and in using that kind of dialogue on others, limiting their potential too. This is one reason why personal development is really taking off in Ireland as people realise that these shackles can be thrown off with a simple change in belief and help to focus on a more positive manner of thinking. Hypnosis and its sister technique, Neuro-Linguistic Programming, are at the base of many of today’s personal development workshops in improving confidence, communication, presentation and sales skills.
Hypnosis works by reprogramming inner dialogue and thinking patterns to align with and create a desired outcome. It allows us to experience thoughts, fantasies, and images as almost real and by experiencing a situation differently, we learn to act and feel differently.
Now let us kill a few more myths about hypnosis. Some people are worried that the hypnotherapist will get them to do embarrassing things like walking like a chicken. Well, there can be no hypnotic experience without the client’s agreement and participation, with the desire being true in the client’s mind, so unless the client actually wants to walk like a chicken it is impossible for the hypnotherapist to cause this!
Others worry about going into a deep sleep and never waking up. When the therapist leads you into a hypnotic ‘trance’, it’s rather like having a nice daydream. You are still conscious of everything around you and fully in control. The only difference is that your subconscious mind is at the fore and more open to suggestion than it would be in your normal waking alert state. This allows the therapist to work on introducing new, desirable suggestions to your mind. You can come out of trance at any time if you want to. It is true that some people go into trance more easily and deeper than others, but the worst that will happen is that you will have a bit of a nap from which you will awake beautifully refreshed!
And you probably didn’t know it, but you actually go into trance several times a day without realising – when driving, daydreaming, watching TV or doing anything habitual that you know how to do backwards! So watch out for all those hypnotic suggestions in the adverts!!
What are the applications of Hypnosis?
There are many applications; here are some of the main ones:
- to improve concentration, memory and learning for academic performance
- to reduce performance anxiety e.g. stage fright, exam nerves, presentations
- to increase confidence and positive attitude e.g. assertiveness,
- for habit control and some addictions e.g. smoking
- for career advancement e.g. achieving goals, making decisions, controlling emotions and anger, increasing motivation
- to control phobias and fears e.g. agrophobia
- to improve sports performance e.g. golf swing
- to improve health – e.g. stalling the spread of cancer cells, managing stress and panic attacks, promoting sleep, weight loss
- to improve relationships – by enhancing self-confidence and image in the relationship
What happens in a session?
The first session involves a lot of talking. Before hypnosis can begin, the therapist needs to get a good grasp of your problem, and check for any medical contra-indications (for example, hypnotherapy is not advised in the first four months of pregnancy, or for people who have chronic depression, pacemakers or who are having electro-convulsive therapy or taking hallucinogenic drugs). She will also demonstrate what it’s like to go into trance and check your mind’s acceptance of hypnotherapy. The goals and outcomes of the therapy will also be agreed in terms of the positive changes you wish to make.
Subsequent sessions will then continue to work specifically on the problem to be addressed with a cumulative effect in results. The number of sessions required depends on the size of the challenge and also different people just progress at different speeds. No problem is ever the same as another and no two people are alike! Therefore, the content of the treatment is very individual.
Lorna McDowell is based in Galway, and Gort. She is a member of the Irish Institute of Counselling & Hypnotherapy and a Lore Certified Executive Coach.
To book an appointment please call Lorna on 091 635 583/087 919 0622 or info@xenergie.com.
