Hypnotic Suggestions

I am deeply fascinated by people. Always have been.

I am forever intrigued by the resiliency of the human body, and spirit, and our innate ability to heal ourselves.

And, over the last few years, I have been even more interested in the mind and the latent powers that lie within it.

I guess that’s what ultimately lead me to study Clinical Hypnosis.

After working with people for over a decade through the practices of yoga, meditation and the therapeutic applications of both, I started to wonder about a few things:

-How can an athlete train his whole life to compete in his sport and then when he finally gets the chance to prove himself, he bonks??...Gets in a terrible accident and totally loses any chance he’ll ever have to race for the National Team.  All his hard work, the constant sacrifices, his confidence, his hopes and dreams – done.  Over.  In an instant.

-Whereas another athlete trains the same way for his sport of choice, follows much of the same protocol, and goes on to become employed by the national team, win nearly every match decade after decade – making him a virtual legend and keeping him playing professionally well into middle age...??

-Or how about the cancer patient who is told the prognosis “doesn’t look good” and she simply believes it...accepts that this is her fate and quickly passes away within a few short months.

-Or the other cancer patient who is told the same exact thing, for nearly the exact same type of cancer, and instead throws herself into research, implementing diet changes, taking supplements, undergoing surgery and chemo treatments, while also undertaking practices that help her to calm down, de-stress, alkalize her body and visualize herself healed and healthy. Then – within a few months is suddenly “cancer free”...?!

-Or how about that really great guy/girl who is super smart, really attractive, sooo nice, interesting, kind and really fun to be around and yet they consistently seem to be in relationships with total a**holes who treat them horribly?!  No one can figure out why someone so great would stand for such utter nonsense. Yet they do – over and over again.

-Or – how about why some people seem to have no problems with money; it seems to flow freely and easily into their lives. Whereas others seem to work and work and work and yet never seem to have any money and always seem to be struggling/saving/scrimping/tightening their purse strings??

-Or how about the guy with the really smokin’ hot girlfriend who can’t stop obsessing about the fact that she is, or will, cheat on him? He obsesses about this so much that finally he ends the relationship because of the stories he’s concocted in his head. The girl is left bewildered and Mr KnowItAll won’t speak to her even though she has sworn on her life nothing of the sort has ever happened...

(I could honestly go on forever I think but here’s just one more...)

-And, finally, how about the fat homely girl who wakes up one day and decides she’s tired of being fat and homely and starts dedicating herself to a healthy eating and exercise program to ultimately drop most of her weight and become an elite level athlete in less than 2 years!? Compared to the fat girl who wakes up filled with self loathing about her weight and appearance and tries and tries to lose the weight, stick to an exercise program, eat healthier – only to bounce around like a yo-yo and ultimately fail – trapping herself in a prison of negativity and disgust...?!

I think you’re starting to get the point.

You know what all these people have in common?

Their beliefs.

With the release of such popular books and movies like The Secret and What The Bleep Do We Know? Many people have started to examine themselves a bit more closely.  And this is a good thing. Really good! The teachings and ideas in some of these popular self-help books are things that Yogis have known and been practicing for centuries. But it’s people like Milton Erickson, Franz Anton Mesmer, and other famous hypnotists in history who have really brought to light the idea that it’s not just our beliefs that are possibly shaping our reality, but also what we may believe at the deepest unconscious levels of our minds. Things that we may not even be consciously aware of!

 I recently came across some work by Joe Vitale that suggests the very same thing. That we can convince ourselves through “positive thinking” and “visualization” and the creation of “vision boards” that we are worthy of love and wealth, but if the deeper recesses of our mind contain unconscious beliefs that suggest otherwise, we will ultimately fail. We will ultimately sabotage our efforts or attract into our lives the very thing(s) we are desperately wishing to avoid.

Every day, in so many ways, people are constantly being hypnotized. We do it to ourselves with the perpetual repetition of our recurring thoughts.  Plus – advertisers, commercials, and images that marketing executives inundate us with every day, continually shape the way we view ourselves and our world.  It’s all planting “suggestions” into our minds that will ultimately affect what we believe to be real and true. 

The human mind is very suggestive.  This is true for everyone.  Whether you believe it or not.

Hypnosis is designed to lull you into a relaxed and thus highly receptive and concentrated state. A state that makes it easier to suggest things that will ultimately have a lasting and permanent effect on the way we think and what we believe.  It helps to guide the mind into an objective and creative place whereby the client can observe and begin to change some of those core internal beliefs that may be sabotaging the intention(s) to change, heal and/or improve themself or their life.

When I first started studying Hypnosis it was for sheer fascination and personal curiosity. Now, as my practice develops and I get busier with more clients, I am starting to notice just what a total powerhouse this is! It’s the missing link. The body and the mind both need to be on the same track for things to really get better.  My ultimate dream is that Yoga Therapy and Hypnosis become a more integrated part of our health care system. There are times when our doctors are needed to help support, and heal our internal physiology and our body’s chemistry to help bring us back into balance. But there is also something to be said for our own untapped internal healing capabilities. Medicine is not always the only answer.

So with the recent changes in my life and some of the stresses and patterns that I have recognized in my own self as of late, I have decided to take myself on as a client.  While I’m always working on my own yoga practice and continue to exercise and meditate daily, I am actually going to schedule time for myself at my office and enter into a self hypnosis program to start delving into the recesses of my own inner beliefs.  As a highly kinaesthetic person, I learn best through experience.  So – here we go.  I’m off into the deep unknown to see just what is lurking there that keeps me on my own lil’ merry go round of weirdness. 

Wish me luck. ;)