Get 20 people in a room to write out their five goals in life, and you can be guaranteed somewhere on each and every list would be health, wealth and happiness. A few might add a slim figure, a date with Jennifer Lopez and a lifetime’s supply of money most of us crave personal success and security. All it takes is the right mindset and these goals are achievable.
Let’s think about what we mean by the term ‘right mindset’ for a moment. By this I suppose we mean the right way of thinking, i.e. positive thinking. But don’t you just hate it when people blab on about positive thinking this, positive thinking that, like all you have to do is whistle a happy tune, imagine you’re 10kgs lighter and…..think positively !
If it was that easy we’d all walk around with perpetual smiles on our face, wondering how we’re going to spend that two million dollars in our Swiss bank account (and that’s US dollar by the way, not Malaysian ringgit) now that we’ve just been promoted to managing director of Apple.
Positive thinking ain’t easy! Especially when the husband wants a divorce, you just bought shares in Swissair and your nice little house has just been repossessed. And even if you aren’t that misfortunate it’s still a tall order to think positively.
There are too many barriers, distractions, woes and worries. So how do we get thinking positively?
The trick is to manipulate the mind. The mind must be conquered because it is the mind that dominates all aspects of your life. It is the mind that convinces you of what you can and can’t do.
Change begins in the mind – not through advertising, not through nagging, not through peer pressure, not through physical exercise but in the mind.
To understand how change can come about we need to understand how the mind works – both consciously and subconsciously. The conscious mind is your communication centre. It thinks, calculates, plans and directs all the actions of your body and everything you do that you are consciously aware of - what you say, what you choose to eat, whether you support Manchester United or Classic Wanderers (who?) and yes, the decision to read this article is controlled by your conscious mind. These are actions that you are consciously controlling.
The subconscious mind on the other hand doesn’t think, plan or calculate. It just takes in everything we learn and experience in our lifetime. It soaks up information and experiences like a wet sponge.
It stores and recalls every piece of information put into it. It doesn’t make choices; it accepts everything – it doesn’t sift through what’s good and what’s bad. It doesn’t make judgments or decisions. It doesn’t work in a rational or logical way. It does, however, begins forming beliefs based on what we have learnt and experienced – and these beliefs determine how we react to everything in our life.
Responsiveness to ideasThe conscious mind takes up approximately 10% of your total mind, while the subconscious mind makes up the other 90%. What this means is that when you make a decision (a task that is done by the conscious mind) to make changes in your life, that decision is being made by only 10% of the total mind.
The subconscious mind is unaware that a new behaviour is being introduced and lacks the capacity to support it. In some cases, the subconscious mind may not have access to the information that would support the new behaviour. For instance, all smokers were once non-smokers. However, just like a computer may retrieve only certain files or may find some files outdated, the subconscious mind may have access to the information that promotes smoking behaviours and may find the non-smoking behaviors “out-of-date.” Our mindset is formed.
The bottom line is that if we are unhappy with something in our lives, we must do something that will change the beliefs in our subconscious mind. Hypnosis is probably the most effective way of reprogramming your subconscious mind.
I’m simply talking about an increased responsiveness to ideas and suggestions. In fact hypnosis is a natural state for all humans. You’ve been in a trance state many times. You have entered hypnosis whilst day-dreaming, whilst driving (especially true of some Malaysian drivers!) or when watching TV. We’ve all said ‘sorry, I was not focusing on what you said’ – and indeed you were. Your conscious mind was temporarily shut down.
There are many misconceptions about hypnosis, all of them wrong. Contrary to what you may have heard it is absolutely safe, you do remain in complete control, you will never be persuaded to do anything against your will, you can still hear and feel the world around you – and you can come out of it at any time you want to.
You’re not in a coma, you don’t become paralyzed – you are simply in a state of hyper-relaxation and suggestibility.
So how can it help and who does it? Hypnosis has the power to speak directly to your subconscious mind. Through suggestions new and positive data and information can be planted into your subconscious mind.
With time hypnosis overrides negative beliefs stored up over the years. It can change the way you feel about yourself, transform your habits and behaviour, reduce stress, control pain, eliminate fear and convince you of the need to lose weight. This way, as your conscious mind chooses to make the change, your subconscious mind will now be supporting it and so the change becomes more achievable.
A form of therapyAnd just who is going to make these suggestions? The answer is you, either with a little help from a hypnotherapist or on your own through self – hypnosis.
Every day, without realizing it, you give yourself suggestions. Some may be negative ones. “Oh, what’s the point I’ll never pass the test“ As easily as our mind believes the negative suggestions, it will also fall for the positive ones. “I just love going to the gym“
Induce a relaxed enough state and you can convince yourself of almost anything. The hypnotherapist can help induce this relaxed state either in therapy or by teaching you self-hypnosis.
He or she can also help you get to the root cause of the problem. Once under hypnosis the root cause can be eliminated and behaviour changed through guided imagery, positive mental images and direct suggestions.
Here’s one – picture a slim, healthy, non-smoking, confidence oozing, spider loving you. Now I suggest you hunt out Julian Leicester the hypnotherapist.
Hypnosis is an effective form of therapy. It does not use drugs or pills and is direct and swift and therefore cost effective.
It has been widely practiced in the US and Europe for many years and today is a highly sought after therapy by many Malaysians.
Julian is a London trained subconscious specialist with Hypno-Station. He is Malaysia’s most renowned clinical hypnotherapist, media personality, columnist, event host and book author.
