Hypnosis
Hypnosis can be found throughout history and can be traced back to ancient times. Despite the myths, you have complete control during hypnosis. The best way to think of hypnosis is a deep state of relaxation (clients often tell me it is so relaxing that is hard to put words to the experience) while having heightened attention and suggestibility.
In this state of deep transformation you can go deep into your subconscious mind. During this trace state, your mind becomes deeply relaxed and open to thoughts and suggestions. This paves the way for positive changes, healing, and personal growth.
The Power of the Subconscious
Our conscious mind is aware of our immediate surroundings, thoughts, and actions. It allows us to think, rationalize, make decisions, and solve problems as we go through the daily activities of life.
The unconscious mind is our thoughts, feelings, desires, deep seated beliefs, emotions, automatic behaviors, and memories that are hidden from conscious awareness. Research suggests that unconscious processes influence various aspects of our lives, from decision-making to relationships, often guiding our actions without our explicit knowledge.
In a hypnotic state, your conscious mind goes into a deeply relaxed state, allowing the subconscious mind to come to the forefront. Once the subscious part of the mind is in the driver’s seat, all of the hidden parts of the mind can be explored, getting to the root of your issues much faster than dealing with the conscious mind alone.
The hypnotic state allows for deep work on the subsconscious mind.
Click To Schedule a Hypnosis Session With Dr. Cynthia
Common misconception about hypnosis.
-
These are all false! All hypnosis is really self-hypnosis. The client is always in control. The hypnotist is there to help guide and structure the experience. It is a relationship of mutual responsiveness.
Hypnosis can make it easier to experience suggestions but it does not force you to have that experience. The client can refuse a suggestion, do the opposite of what is suggested and can break the hypnotic trance all together. The client cannot be made to do anything they do not want to do.
-
Hypnosis is not sleeping, however, some people do fall asleep. The state of brain waves that the hypnotist is trying to reach is a state of focused concentration (Theta). Although there is decreased physical activity, the client is aware, responsive, and can remember everything that went on during hypnosis. The ECG’s (brain waves) of people in sleep are different than a person who is under hypnosis. Brain activity during hypnosis is at the Alpha-Theta border, where the optimal range for visualization and hypnosis or reprogramming of your mind begins. It's the mental state which you consciously create your reality. At this frequency, you are conscious of your surroundings, however, your body is in deep relaxation. If a person goes into a deep trance, it can be similar to the Delta Waves found during sleep.
-
Since hypnosis is a state of focused concentration, you can be anxious and still be focused. Relaxation is not a prerequisite for hypnosis to occur but it is much more likely that hypnosis will work on someone who is in a relaxed state. This is why time is spent doing an induction that consists of helping a client get into a very relaxed state.
-
People range on a continuum of hypnotizability. About 20% of people can be hypnotized quite easily and deeply. About 65% can be hypnotized to lighter states and with practice and experience can go on to a deeper trance state. Of the remaining 15%, some can achieve a light trance state and others are not able to reach any trance state at all.
Factors such as fear, inability to give up control, motivation, lack of rapport, and distracting physical surroundings can all detract from one’s ability to become hypnotized.
-
The client can terminate the trance state at any time. If the hypnotherapist left the room or if hypnosis were interrupted before instructions to emerge were given, the client would either open their eyes or could choose to go into sleep and would wake after a brief nap.
Occasionally a client will not want to emerge from hypnosis because the state is so pleasant, but even in that case, further instructions will help the client emerge. After doing hypnosis for 25 years, I have never had a client not emerge from a hypnotic state.
-
Although hypnosis allows the client to access memories, with great attention to detail, the client can censor what is divulged to the hypnotherapist. The client can withhold information or even lie if they wish to. It is important to remember that memories themselves are stored on the basis of perception and emotion and can be subject to distortion.
-
Hypnosis is not therapy in and of itself. Rather it is a therapeutic tool that should be used in conjunction with other modalities to promote self-awareness.
Although the results of hypnosis are often astounding, cures are by no means guaranteed, nor are they generally instantaneous. It is not uncommon for people to need more than one session of hypnosis, however, I have had clients change remarkedly after just one session of hypnosis.
-
Anything that has the ability to help can have the ability to hurt, if the wrong person uses it. This is why it is important to seek out a skilled hypnotherapist that has to follow an ethics code (for psychologists that is the APA code of ethics) that you trust to complete hypnosis.
Anyone can learn to do hypnosis but always check their training and credentials to avoid harm. Hypnosis is usually described as a pleasant and refreshing experience.
In hypnosis your mind is always aware and observing. You can talk during hypnosis. This is why people who may be deeply hypnotized and actively involved in a childhood memory are able to answer the therapist’s questions. It is like being an observer of a movie or being the main character of the movie, the choice is yours. You can be the star in the movie and the observer all at the same time. And all the while you can remain in the relaxed hypnotized state.
Hypnosis can heal because you are given access to your subconscious mind. Sigmund Freud discussed the concept of repetition compulsion. Now psychology has transformed a lot since the time of Freud, but his teaching on hypnosis is still relevant. This is the irresistible urge to redramatize or reenact emotional, typically painful, experiences that occurred in our pasts. Repetition Compulsion is the blind impulse to repeat experiences, behaviors, or situations, regardless of the harm it may cause to us. No matter how harmful and destructive the behavior, a person seems compelled to repeat it. Willpower alone is often ineffective in controlling the compulsion. Once this is brought to the forefront, you are able to realize what the destructive behavior is, and often a new healthy suggestion can be offered by the hypnotist in order to replace the former negative behavior.
For example, smokers often have a deep fondness and love for their cigarettes despite having the knowledge of how bad they are for your health. Through hypnosis you can return to the time where you first developed these loving connections to your cigarettes and get to the root of why they are so important in your life. The psychologist can then offer negative associations to the cigarettes, gaining access to your subconscious mind, and the craving and love for cigarettes can go away. I often tell clients that we were not born a smoker. Somewhere you learned to love cigarettes and now we have to unlearn this. The same premise holds true with a number of addictions.
One of the main goals of hypnosis is to access the subconscious mind. Again, this is the part of our mind that lies beneath ordinary consciousness, beneath the constant bombardment of thoughts, feelings, outside stimuli, and other assaults on our awareness. The subconscious mind functions at a level deeper than our normal awareness and occur without conscious perception. In hypnosis we experience our intuition, wisdom, and creativity. We are able to access parts of our mind that our not available to us in our everyday conscious state. You are in control, you are able to remember anything that you truly want to, and you can always stop at any time.
PAST LIFE REGRESSION
PAST LIFE REGRESSION
Dr. Cynthia Edwards-Hawver is certified in Past Life Regression and was trained by Dr. Brian Weis, MD. If you are interested in booking a past life regression session, click the link below.