by: Debbie Friedman
“Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe it can achieve.”
- Napolean Hill
Hypnosis is an enjoyable, easy and effective way to change our bad habits into good ones and our negative feelings into positive ones. All of our emotions, beliefs, and habits reside in the subconscious mind and hypnosis provides direct access to the subconscious mind to replace any negatives with powerful, positive beliefs.
While many people think of it as “deep sleep”, hypnosis is a comfortable and relaxed state that focuses attention and concentration, bypasses the conscious mind filter, and allows the subconscious mind to be open and receptive to positive suggestions, tapping into the power of the body-mind connection. Most people experience a heightened state of awareness when they are hypnotized, while only about 10% will enter into a state where their mind is so relaxed that they do not remember the session.
People experience this natural, normal state at least twice each day – before they go to sleep and when they wake up. If you have experienced arriving somewhere and can’t remember actually driving there, or if you have missed a freeway exit then you have been in a natural hypnotic state often referred to as “highway hypnosis”.
Natural hypnosis may also occur when you become so involved in an activity, reading a book, or watching a movie that everything else seems to be blocked out, even to the point of not hearing people who talk to you. Whenever concentration is intense, it’s easy to slip into a natural hypnotic state.
Hypnosis has been used for thousands of years as a powerful tool to help and heal. Early records mark the Egyptian sleep temples and the Temple of Aesculapius in Greece as sites where hypnosis was used as an important part of the healing treatment.
The ancient Hawaiian Kahuna’s, healing masters, routinely used hypnosis in their healing practices. A resurgence of the use of hypnosis began in the 1700’s with the work of an Austrian physician named Franz Anton Mesmer. In the 1800’s Dr. James Braid brought hypnosis to the medical arena with his work in hypnoanesthesia.
Hypnosis was used as an effective and rapid treatment for “shell shock”, now referred to as post-traumatic stress disorders, following World War I, World War II, and the Korean War.
The American Medical Association approved hypnosis as an effective treatment in 1958 and recommended that training in hypnosis be included in medical school curriculum. Hypnosis and guided imagery continue to be integrated into modern medical and health care systems.
The National Institute of Health recognizes hypnosis as a Complimentary and Alternative Medicine treatment modality and continues to fund research to validate the importance of hypnosis.
Research results have shown dramatic results in a variety of areas, particularly as an adjunct to conventional cancer treatments and for pain management. Moving even more into the traditional arenas of medical care, hypnosis remains as one of the most powerful healing modalities by utilizing the power of the subconscious mind in motivating the mind-body connection for balance and health.
Hypnosis is probably best known for breaking habits with stop smoking and weight loss success and yet it has been found to be effective in reducing and managing stress, achieving deep relaxation, increasing energy, overcoming fears, overcoming insomnia, and reducing the experience of pain.
Hypnosis has also been shown to be effective in overcoming test anxiety, improving test performance, improving sports performance, improving motivation, setting and achieving goals, improving memory and concentration, increasing self confidence, and building self-esteem.
Most of us have habits or feelings that we’ve tried to change and yet nothing we do seems to make a difference. We know how we want to act and feel, but our decision-making and will power doesn’t seem to be enough to have any lasting effect. Although our conscious mind has made a decision to change, the beliefs and ideas held in our subconscious mind won’t allow the change to take place. Hypnosis allows the subconscious mind to move into agreement with conscious desires and goals so you can live a life of freedom and success!