Millions of people suffer from anxiety in one form or another. For some people, anxiety becomes a normal part of everyday life, but chronic anxiety should not be seen as normal. Hypnotherapy is one way of treating anxiety. Hypnotherapy helps people reach parts of the brain that are outside their conscious control, where the anxiety is generated.
Anxiety
Whatever form the anxiety takes, it is generated from a primitive part of the brain. That part of the brain is outside our conscious control, so we cannot simply decide not to be anxious. It is a reaction that is learned over time, and is much more likely to happen when we are under stress.
Anxiety can be debilitating. It can have a massive negative impact on our lives. Some people live with chronic anxiety, assuming it to be normal, but it is not. Anxiety is treatable. It is quite possible to live our lives with little or no anxiety at all.
Treatment for Anxiety
There are three broad areas of treatment for anxiety:
- Life style changes – Exercise, eating properly, sleeping well, meditation, mindfulness and so on.
- Medication – Antidepressants, beta blockers, and anti-anxiety medication for example.
- Therapy – Hypnotherapy, CBT, Counselling and other therapeutic practices.
People find some of these practices to be more effective than others – but there is no general rule. We have to find what suits us best.
Hypnotherapy and Anxiety
Hypnotherapy works well with anxiety because the anxiety is generated outside our conscious control. Hypnotherapy works on the unconscious parts of the brain – the parts we don’t have any conscious control over. It allows those parts of the brain to rewire themselves into patterns that are more useful.
You may have heard about the plasticity of the brain – the ability of the brain to constantly change as we learn new skills, think of new ideas, and change our thinking patterns. Sometimes it learns the wrong thing – it may learn to be anxious when it is inappropriate to be so. Hypnotherapy can help it re-learn that reaction, so that we can deal with stressful situations more appropriately.
Hypnotherapy is not magic. A hypnotherapist does not simply click their fingers and make everything better. It may take time and a bit of effort, but after a few weeks, changes start to emerge.
If you suffer from anxiety, in any one of its many forms; if you would like to get it under control; if you think that hypnotherapy might be an option for you – then contact me to talk it through, and see what hypnotherapy can do for you.
Photo by Gift Habeshaw on Unsplash
