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About Hypnotherapy
It’s important to understand what hypnosis is, and crucially, what it’s not.
There is no such thing as mind control! What you see on stage is not what it looks like, and certainly has very definite limits. Consider for a moment that people could take control of the minds of others, subjugating their will entirely. The world would be a very different and far worse place.
Now, let’s think about a good model of the mind. We operate day-to-day in our conscious minds. That’s where you’re processing reading this, right now. All the information we need to recall, but don’t have running through our minds all the time, can be said to be in our sub-conscious minds, and everything else – all our programming, maps of ourselves and the world, triggers for feelings and responses, can be said to be in our unconscious minds. We have no day-to-day access to our unconscious minds unless we are dreaming.
The primary role of your unconscious mind is to keep you safe. It makes conclusions about every event, situation and interaction. It references them to its view of you and, where necessary, will create defence mechanisms and prompt you to do those things it feels will help you. The problem is that sometimes the conclusions are no longer relevant, sometimes the things it considers will help you, actually harm you, and sometimes the conclusions are just plain wrong. However, your unconscious mind ALWAYS seeks to help you. So, anxiety helps to prepare you to face perceived threat, depression helps to withdraw from perceived threat, OCD helps you to feel some control, when perhaps chaos has impacted you. Some addictions have their origin in gaining mood control, some in approval and some in both of these things.
Hypnotherapy is so effective because it works to change negative feelings or compulsions we are experiencing precisely where they have their roots – the unconscious mind. We do this using suggestion, imagery and metaphor. Your unconscious mind is most receptive to suggestion when you are deeply relaxed or confused.
In hypnosis, you may be aware of what is being said all the time. Equally, you may drift in and out of awareness, and you may even fall asleep. It doesn’t really matter, because we are only ever interested in your unconscious processing, and your unconscious mind is always scanning – 24/7. Think about the mother who is in an exhausted deep sleep. If her child cries she is awakened straight away. The unconscious mind is always working for you!
If you want to come out of hypnosis, you will always be able to. Further, your unconscious mind will not accept any suggestion it perceives to be dangerous, threatening or contrary to your personal beliefs, morals and ethics. If that were to happen, it would bring you straight back to waking consciousness.
We will use a gentle physical relaxation technique, deepen that state of relaxation and then make the appropriate suggestions. All we are doing is altering your state of awareness, and you may be surprised to learn that you probably do it every day. So, if you’ve ever been driving and got to that point where it seems you’ve lost recollection of a part of the journey, you’ve been in a different state of awareness. You have clearly been able to drive and react, but there comes a point where you lose your memory of it. We can think of it as a bit like tuning in to different radio frequencies.
There is no need to be actively listening, or trying to analyse anything. In fact, it’s better if you don’t! Just let the words flow over you and let your powerful unconscious mind do all the work. What's more, because we will be asking your unconscious mind to do this work for you, there is never any need to disclose what you are working with.
To gain the most from hypnotherapy, recognise that everyone’s experiences are different, so there’s no need to come to it with any specific expectation of how it will feel. Just let go and treat it as no more needing your attention and focus than, say, a massage. Allow your experience to be unique.