What is Clinical Hypnotherapy? It is a deep form of guided meditation to assist clients in healing, creativity, and spiritual growth. I've been involved in Clinical Hypnotherapy for nearly three decades and because of the words hypnotized and hypnosis, Clinical Hypnotherapy is shrouded in a fog of misconception. But it's really quite simple.
Clinical Hypnotherapy and Healing
Clinical Hypnotherapy works almost excessively in the subconscious mind. To get an understanding on how hypnotherapy operates, it's important to understand the subconscious mind.
The subconscious mind
Underlying our awake-state and the rational conscious mind is the subconscious mind. By definition, we are not normally aware of this aspect of our being (sub means under). While we're busy going about our day, deeply engrossed in the conscious mind, the subconscious mind lies quietly beneath the surface.
It’s the home of the non-physical realms of the human experience. Some aspects include our dreams, intuition, creative ideas, imagination, and most importantly in the world of healing, our emotions.
In addition to what’s listed above, the subconscious mind also holds our perceptions. These perceptions are subconscious beliefs of who we think we are as people and how we think the world operates. In other words, whoever we think we are as people and however we think the world operates, quietly lives under the conscious mind in the subconscious. And many of those perceptions are formed when we're quite young.
Suppressed emotions
Human beings are designed for growth and experiencing life to the fullest. That includes all of our emotions. Pain, jealousy, anger, enthusiasm, joy, contentment, etc., are all part of the human experience.
When emotions are experienced fully, they dissipate. The problem arises when we avoid experiencing unpleasant emotions. We essentially put them in the closet to re-emerge at a later date…and they do, sometimes with vigor.
Unexperienced and unpleasant emotions can get suppressed into the subconscious mind without conscious knowledge or intention on our part. When that happens, they get stuck there. The subconscious mind will then continue to re-create uncomfortable circumstances in our lives, so the suppressed emotions can be experienced and live out their life cycles.
Repeating patterns
How do you know if you have suppressed emotions? (By the way, we all do.) The answer is simple...repeating patterns of pain. If you have difficult emotions repeating themselves in similar circumstances, regardless of the people you are dealing with, then it’s a suppressed emotion. There’s a suppressed emotion for almost every difficult life situation. It takes a certain amount of honest self-reflection to discover your repeating patterns, and then recognize them as inventions of your own subconscious mind.
Can clinical hypnotherapy heal suppressed emotion?
Yes. Suppressed emotion (and the patterns they create) can be released in hypnotherapy sessions when a client enters a deep state of relaxation. When the mind is deeply relaxed, the invisible protective barrier between the conscious and subconscious minds (called the Critical Faculty of the Mind) will let down. When the Critical Faculty is down, the subconscious mind is open. When the subconscious mind is open, numerous Clinical Hypnotherapy techniques can be implemented to produce desired results in healing.
What use is Clinical Hypnotherapy in healing?
Clinical Hypnotherapy can be used effectively wherever there is suppressed emotion and/or repeating patterns of suffering. In the three decades I have worked as a Clinical Hypnotherapist, I have helped clients with Abandonment, Unworthiness, Addictions, Asthma, Athletics, Cancer, Fibromyalgia, Physical Pain, Weight Loss, Depression, Eating and Sleep Disorders, Forgiveness, PTSD, Stress, Death and Dying, Emotional Pain, Grief and Loss, Panic Attacks and Fear, Relationships and Family, Sexual and Physical Abuse, Career and Finances, Divorce, Major Life Changes, and Past Life Interference.
How do I know if Clinical Hypnotherapy works?
What does healing look and feel like? That’s a good question. After all, we’re not just doing this for entertainment. First and foremost is suffering stops. Your intended areas of healing improve. Anxiety attacks go away, relationships mend, problems with money vanish, health recovers, awareness increases. In short, you feel better. Life improves.
More specifically, the following is a list of things likely to occur the following week after a Clinical Hypnotherapy session.
- Your condition improves
- Coincidences / Synchronicity / “Magic”
- Unresolved situations present themselves
- Improved outlook on life
- Increase in confidence
- Feelings of being on your life path
- Improved focus in life direction
- You know what to do
- Increased relaxation /well-being /less stress
- Heightened awareness of senses
- Increased creativity
- Amplified feelings (love, anger, happiness, sadness, etc.)
- Physical ailments relieved
- Emotional symptoms disappear (depression, anxiety, phobias, etc.)
- Vivid dreams
- Increased energy, enthusiasm
On rare occasions, after an initial session, things may seem to get worse. This is usually a temporary experience. The subconscious mind is attempting to purge suppressed emotion. It's best for the client to stay as detached as possible, and just let it happen.
- Your condition intensifies
- Emotional symptoms increase (depression, anxiety, phobias, etc.)
- Physical ailments get worse
- You get sick
Does Clinical Hypnotherapy work for everyone?
No. In my observations of doing hypnotherapy for nearly three decades, it's obvious Clinical Hypnotherapy isn't for everyone. In my estimations, about 20% of the population naturally gravitate to hypnotherapy. It's not uncommon for these clients to experience miraculous breakthroughs, healings, and awakenings. One the other hand, about 20% have no inclination toward hypnotherapy whatsoever and will probably never use it throughout the course of their lives. The remaining 60% fall somewhere in between.
There are many contributing factors to why someone will or won't benefit from Clinical Hypnotherapy. Some of those factors may include personality type, past experiences, and all forms of conditioning (i.e. family, peer groups, education, religion, culture, society, and the media).
What is a Clinical Hypnotherapy session like?
Clinical Hypnotherapy sessions last about an hour and can be done in-person, over the phone, or on the internet. I start by talking to the client, to identify suppressed emotion and where they feel them in their body. The client then lies or sits in a comfortable position and I read a story to guide them into a deeply relaxed state.
The client remains awake and aware the entire time. It’s a little like dreaming while being awake. When the client is deeply relaxed, I use a variety of techniques to release subconsciously repressed pain. The sessions conclude by creating a positive emotion in the subconscious, to be lived out by the client in the future. Sessions tend to be deeply relaxing and profoundly insightful.
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Clinical Hypnotherapy and Creativity
To be human means to be creative. It’s our birthright. Everyone creates the life they live each day, even if it seems like a dull and lifeless routine. That’s because we are all a product of the choices we make or don’t make.
Clinical Hypnotherapy and creativity
Enhanced creativity is a natural by-product of hypnotherapy. Why? Because when we go into a deeply relaxed state and release suppressed emotion from the past, obstacles to the source of creativity are effectively removed. Those channels will then be permanently opened, allowing creativity to pour through. At that point, it’s up to you to determine how you will utilize the gift.
Traditional creativity
When most of us think of creativity, we think of the arts (dance, music, writing, movies, theater, etc). However, creativity can extend far beyond the arts into any aspect of life, such as building a house or designing a garden. However, the internal mechanics remain the same.
You can ask any artist where their creativity comes from. Many won’t know and may say something like, “It comes from somewhere else.” Furthermore, many creators tend to enter a naturally relaxed state while creating. It’s a timeless and awake meditative state, often referred to as “The Zone”. Clinical Hypnotherapy can help create and maintain that creative state. Creators who use hypnotherapy techniques on a regular basis can enhance their creativity and find it easier to go into The Zone. The result is a constant stimulation of their creative vision and intuitive insights.
Manifesting - creating your personal reality
Manifesting is a Clinical Hypnotherapy technique based on the concept of, 'what lives inside you will be reflected back to you in your day-to-day life'. In fact, everyone manifests daily. The only problem is, many of us project our fear and negativity out into the world, which can often shape our reality.
Manifesting techniques put a positive spin onto the creative potential of the subconscious mind. It’s done by creating a positive vision on the inside and waiting for it to appear in the 3D world. It can be applied to any area of life (health, relationship, finances, buying a home or car, performance results, etc). However, if suppressed emotion comes up during the manifestation process, you may need to release it first.
Clinical Hypnotherapy and Spiritual Awakening
This is where Clinical Hypnotherapy can go to an entirely new level by creating experiences that are incredible, wild, unpredictable, surreal, outlandish, magical, miraculous, and flat-out fun! This is where hypnotherapy comes alive, and for me, that’s what it’s all about.
What is a Spiritual Awakening?
Historically, a spiritual awakening refers to a shift in consciousness, or an awakening to an awareness of reality, which has been previously unrealized. Often, the results lead to the experience of Oneness with All That Is.
The essence of that Oneness, which binds us all together, is a form of universal energy. Hypnotherapy can help open you up and integrate those energetic experiences into your being. What does that actually mean? It means your life has just changed…big time.
Spiritual Awakening is an event
What you’ve experienced will allow you to see the world as you’ve never seen it before. Your perception of what life is and how the world functions will expand into vast new realms and possibilities, that stretch far beyond the physical world. Life can get very dynamic and exciting.
You may have visions or exceptional sensory experiences. A spiritual awakening may also go on for a period of time. But whatever the circumstance, you are getting re-wired to connect with a highly intelligent energy presence that is much larger than you are. You will not be the same person afterward.
Spiritual Awakening is personal
There are as many different ways to experience a spiritual awakening as there are people experiencing them. Each one is tailored by a higher intelligence to optimize whatever experience is needed. Plus, it can happen more than once in a lifetime. One thing is for sure, it won’t be boring and hypnotherapy can be an incredibly helpful tool.
Disclaimer - neither of us can make a spiritual awakening happen
Spiritual awakenings are born of a higher intelligence. Call it God, the Divine, the Universe, Collective Consciousness, or whatever you want. It's this presence that makes it all happen. All we can do is set the vibrational stage. However, here are a few tricks that have withstood the test of time.
Desire
If you want a spiritual awakening to happen and take some action, it will. The energy in charge will answer your prayers, in its own time and in its own way. Remember, it’ all about personal growth, so be willing to make some effort. You may have some healing or maturing to do. Also, keep in the back of your mind, it won’t happen the way you think it will.
Hypnotherapy and Meditation
Hypnotherapy is a form of meditation that creates a positive biochemical change in the brain. It also paves the way for a spiritual awakening, by aligning your personal energy with the energy that makes it happen. Working as a divine invitation to that source, hypnotherapy can set the tone by dissolving your inner resistance.
The Living of Virtues
Virtues are human behavior qualities that boost the experience of life. They are portals that raise personal vibration and can be accessed with hypnotherapy.
When hypnotherapy helps put these virtues into action, they set the energetic stage for a spiritual awakening. Some of those virtues include compassion, self-acceptance / self-forgiveness, forgiveness, and gratitude.
What are some results from a spiritual awakening?
As I mentioned before, a spiritual awakening will be an event you will not likely forget. Below are a few things that may happen during a spiritual awakening.
- You feel like something has happened inside of you
- Your life goes through a significant change
- Synchronicities and coincidences happen regularly
- You long for connection and meaning
- You want to know who you are
- You start to experience more subtle energies
- Your sensitivity increases
- Creativity increases
- New people with similar interests start to show up
- Frequent experiences of deep peace and calm
- Unexpected feelings of happiness, joy, and bliss
- Feeling connected to nature and all of life
- Relationships improve
- You lose interest in fear, judgment, and conflict
- Inhibitions are released
- Intuition and psychic abilities sharpen
- Awareness increases, sensing of energy is activated
- Life has more meaning and purpose
- A desire to contribute emerges, you want to give
- Well-being increases (physical, financial, emotional, and spiritual)
- Healing can intensely accelerate
- Life gets more interesting, exciting, and fun
- Prayers get answered
- Problems start to improve by themselves
- Living is more effortless, things flow
- Abundance radiates, your needs are taken care
- Miracles happen
Conclusion
Clinical Hypnotherapy is for anyone longing for personal healing and spiritual awakening. If you have a passionate interest in meditation and/or spirituality, this method is something to look into deeper. It is interesting for healthcare professionals, think of Yoga Instructors, Psychologists, Counselors, Energy Healers, Naturopaths, Hospice Care Providers, Hypnotherapists, Reiki Practitioners, or any professional working in holistic and wellness related careers, who want to supplement their practice by incorporating techniques of this magical, life-changing modality.
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