Hypnotherapy

Hypnotherapy is healing by trance state – an altered state of awareness.  The term hypnosis is derived from the Greek “hypnos” meaning sleep and is a state of mind enhanced by mental and physical relaxation in which the subconscious is able to communicate with the conscious mind.

Contrary to popular belief, hypnotherapy does not result in a deep state of sleep.  If you are being hypnotised you stay in complete control of your senses, you are aware of everything going on around you and you are not expected to do anything you don’t want to do.  You are able to speak and answer questions at any point, and could even stand up and leave the room if you so desired.

The point of hypnotherapy is to access your own inner potential and is an alternative treatment for healing emotional and psychological disorders, inspiring personal development and overcoming unwanted habits.  It is intended to help you to become more accepting of yourself and others, and to unlock feelings that you may – or may not – be aware of so that you can release them.

It aims to change your response to problems, and the therapist will be trying to change a negative reaction to a problem to a positive one.

A hypnotherapist will encourage you to use your own imagination to ‘float away’ using a whole range of techniques which may include story-telling, visualisation or analytical techniques to reach the root of the problem.  In order to succeed, you have to be personally motivated to change, as it’s a joint effort between you and the therapist.

Hypnotherapy is generally a short-term approach to making changes and very few sessions should be required to make a difference (usually between 3 and 6 sessions, although you should notice positive changes after the first session).  You can also learn techniques to be able to hypnotise yourself and practise at home, as an alternative form of meditation.

It’s not just inner potential that hypnotherapy looks towards releasing, but also helping the body to initiate its own healing processes and stimulating you to change.  It’s a way of reprogramming your patterns of behaviour, and for planting ideas in your mind or – for example – ways to initiate lifestyle changes. 

There are a whole list of problems which can react positively to hypnotherapy including stress, anxiety, anger, panic attacks, aches and pains, unwanted habits or addictions (e.g. binge eating, smoking, alcohol addiction), IBS, migraine headaches, low self-esteem and insomnia or erratic sleep patterns.