Hypnosis For Anxiety
I imagine, if you have found this post off Google, you are looking for a new solution to your anxiety problems. You’ve probably spent years in talk or cognitive therapies. Doctors have prescribed you all different kinds of anti-anxiety medication. You’ve tried yoga and self-meditation. Nothing has worked and you are now here considering hypnotherapy for anxiety.
Maybe, you’ve heard about the large volume of research being gathered over the last 10-15 years. You’ve learned hypnotherapy can be a highly effective therapy for anxiety and stress. Maybe, one of your friends or family members tried and it and recommended it to you. Regardless of what has brought you to this post to explore hypnotherapy for anxiety, you undoubtedly have some questions. How does it work? Why is it so effective? Is it temporary or permanent?
We’ll get into all of that today and more.
Hypnotherapy For Anxiety That’s Not a Disease
People new to hypnotherapy for anxiety often bring some misconceptions about anxiety born from the field of psychology trying to mimic the medical profession. They received a “diagnosis” which carries an idea of something being wrong with them. Words like “disease”, “illness”, and “disorder” have been thrown around about their anxiety. Psychiatrists gave them a variety of pills to suppress this “disease” or “illness”.
It’s important to note that anxiety can come from medical conditions like diabetes. However, it’s not true for the majority of clients who come through my door. These people have ruled out this by seeing medical professionals and doctors. I highly recommend you do the same before coming to me.
But… let’s assume you have and you are sure your anxiety is none of these. You might have noticed a pattern to your anxiety; certain situations or triggers in which it occurs. If that’s the case, then what you view as a disease is just a nervous system trying to do what it’s been calibrated to do.
Hypnotherapy For Anxiety, Because Hypnosis Is a Natural Stress Reducer
Anxiety is the activation of the sympathetic nervous system. It activates when we are making sense of the world or perceiving a threat to our body. It’s the nervous system that generates stress. Blood sugar fluctuations activate it which is why diabetes and anxiety are strongly linked.
This is your “fight or flight” defensive system. However, running screaming out of a board room or beating your colleagues with a club is not beneficial to modern society. Thus, the theory is this nervous system has evolved to produce the suppressed form of fight or flight we call anxiety. It’s an uncomfortable experience, but one that doesn’t come with physical reactions, which makes managing stressful conflicts in constructive ways much easier.
The sympathetic nervous system has an opposing nervous system called the parasympathetic nervous system. This is the nervous system of relaxation. The sympathetic generates stress and the parasympathetic takes away stress. When people in the self-help or therapy world talk about having a balanced nervous system, they are talking about switching back and forth between these two systems to keep your stress level manageable.
One of the great things about hypnosis is just simply being induced into hypnosis shifts the mind and body into the parasympathetic. In other words, just by seeing a hypnotherapist and just allowing them to guide you into a hypnotic state, your body will immediately begin to destress. With no other therapy applied, this creates a temporary relief of anxiety similar to how seeing a massage therapist reduces stress.
Hypnotherapy For Cause
You can pay a novice hypnotist a small fee to take you into hypnosis to begin destressing and reducing your anxiety, but if you are here, you probably want a permanent solution. Hypnotherapy for anxiety can accomplish this by going for the “cause of your anxiety”.
To understand how this works, it’s best to think of your anxiety disorder as a collection of patterns. The mind begins by perceiving an object in the external world. It evaluates it against a set of rules that we call “subconscious beliefs”. These rules determine what neurochemicals the body produces in response to this object. The body’s chemical composition changes and it creates what we call an emotional experience. This emotional experience drives behavior.
Thus, every anxiety episode follows a pattern of “External Trigger -> Subconscious Thoughts -> Anxiety -> Behavior”. The more of these anxiety patterns a person has, the closer they are to be labeled as having a disorder by a psychotherapist.
The most important element in this sequence is the subconscious thoughts or beliefs which determine how the subconscious mind fires off anxiety. Childhood events largely create these rules. Hypnotherapists work with a client to reframe these beliefs at the causing event.
Dealing With the Cause of Anxiety
Perhaps, as a child, you grew up in an unstable environment. This resulted in the development of several subconscious beliefs about the general safety of the world. Maybe, you learned that social situations are not safe from negative social experiences as a child. You might have had an overbearing and abusive parent figure. This could lead to your anxiety firing off to a variety of vocal tones or gestures. Maybe, a dog bit you and just being around them causes a flood of anxiety.
All of these represent the moment in which a subconscious belief was created. This is an association between a certain object or symbol in the external world and a meaning. In this particular case, the meaning is “danger”. When the mind perceives these objects or symbols, it responds with anxiety to let you know “something bad is about to happen”.
A skilled and board-certified hypnotherapist can work with you to change this subconscious belief. The triggering object or symbol no longer creates the emotional state of anxiety once this process has been successful. My website contains testimonials of clients who have gone through this process with me to create life-transforming change in their struggle with anxiety.
Hypnotherapy For Anxiety Right Now
If you are struggling for money and can’t afford hypnotherapy for anxiety, hypnosis recordings can provide a cost-effective way to get relief. As we mentioned previously, just entering into the hypnosis begins to take away stress, leading to an immediate reduction in anxiety. Thus, if you get triggered, having a hypnosis recording on hand to bring yourself into balance can be very useful.
To help with this, I’ve had one of my professional hypnosis recordings made available for free. This track is a 10-20 minute process that rapidly begins to remove stress from the body. Put in some earbuds, find a recliner or couch and let yourself sink into the process as the voice guides you. When you come out of it, you will feel refreshed and renewed.
Free Hypnosis Recording For Anxiety
To get it, just use the form to the side of this blog to subscribe to my weekly newsletter. You’ll get it as a gift.
If you found this post on hypnotherapy for anxiety to be useful, check out these other posts on stomach anxiety, situational anxiety, and fear vs anxiety.
