Hypnosis and the Placebo Effect

THE PLACEBO EFFECT




So, what is it about the Placebo Effect?


Some people say: "Hypnosis is only a placebo...it's not real". I say "Of course!" It's all about belief.


Placebo is the gold standard that medications are tested against. Isn't that interesting? The experimental criterion about "if a chemical is useful or beneficial" is: "does it beat out a sugar pill"? Well, I think that that gives a lot of power to a sugar pill. Or, a lot of power to the belief that the sugar pill has some power to be helpful. And it does!! Sugar pills are incredibly healing....if you believe they are. Pharmacological Medications are incredibly healing...if you believe they are. What is the common denominator? Belief. 


It is truly amazing...A sugar pill that is colored red is more effective. If the red (sugar) pill is more expensive, it works even better. If the sugar pill is in the bottle of a popular, highly advertised medication, it works best!! It's all about expectation and belief.


How many times have you had a headache, taken a pain reliever, and felt better within a few minutes? The power of belief in action! It actually takes a minimum of 20 minutes for an over-the-counter pain reliever to have any effect. Yet we pop an aspirin, Tylenol, Ibuprofen, or whatever, and we feel better right away. Belief is amazing. In a lot of studies, a sugar pill works as well or better.


The mind is so powerful. What we accept and believe as real...becomes our reality. The old New Age idea that "we create our own reality" is true (although there is nothing "new" about that concept...we have known it for thousands of years). The Secret is simple and basic: "We Become What We Think About".


My job is to help people take control of how they think, feel and behave. Hypnosis is truly the "Royal Road" to the Unconscious Mind, which drives so much of what we think, feel, and how we behave.


Give me a call. I'm always happy to have a conversation with you.


303-250-5138

axtellhypnosiscenter.com

Anxiety Part 2

 

Part 2 Generalized Anxiety, Other Anxiety, and What to Do

Generalized Anxiety is quite common, affecting an estimated 3 to 4% of the population. This type of anxiety fills a person’s life with worry, anxiety, and fear. People who have generalized anxiety are always thinking and dwelling on the “what ifs” of every situation. It feels like there is no way out of the vicious cycle of anxiety and worry. The person often becomes depressed about life and their inability to stop worrying.

People who have generalized anxiety usually do not avoid situations, and they don’t generally have panic attacks. They can become incapacitated by an inability to shut the mind off, and are overcome with feelings of worry, dread, fatigue, and a loss of interest in life. The person usually realizes these feelings are irrational, but the feelings are also very real. The person’s mood can change from day to day, or even hour to hour. Feelings of anxiety and mood swings become a pattern that severely disrupts the quality of life.

People with generalized anxiety disorder often have physical symptoms including headaches, irritability, frustration, trembling, inability to concentrate, and sleep disturbances. They may also have symptoms of social phobia and panic disorder.

Other types of anxiety include:


Phobia, fearing a specific object or situation. Humans can develop a phobia about almost anything! A phobia is an overwhelming fear that makes it impossible to go near the feared situation. For example, someone who has a phobia of flying will not just be afraid to fly, they will absolutely be unable to get on an airplane.

Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), a system of ritualized behaviors or obsessions that are driven by anxious thoughts.

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), severe anxiety that is triggered by memories of a past traumatic experience.

Agoraphobia, disabling fear that prevents one from leaving home or another safe place.




My approach to helping clients with anxiety:

Hypnosis and Neuro-Linguistic-Programming

It is my experience that a combination of hypnotherapy and neuro-linguistic-programming techniques can be the most rapid and effective approach to overcome anxiety issues. As a client experiences hypnosis, they learn to relax deeply, perhaps more deeply than ever before. With repeated experience, that relaxation starts to spill over into day-to-day life, and the client becomes more generally relaxed. Worry, tension, stress, fear, anxiety, anger, frustration, etc. become less and less.

As clients learn and apply skills from neuro-linguistic-programming, they become empowered to take control of the (unconscious) thoughts that underlie the anxiety issues, so that deep and lasting relief is experienced.

When hypnosis and NLP are combined with other skills that I teach, deep and lasting relief can be enjoyed in a fairly short time frame.

I am always happy to answer any questions you might have, and I always offer a free consultation to prospective clients.

I work with English speaking people anywhere in the world, using Skype.




 

Hypnosis and Test Anxiety

OVERCOME TEST ANXIETY

So frustrating! You’ve studied, and you know the material. You’ve done the work, and you should ace the test.
But you’re nervous. Anxious. Your brain locks up and you can’t think. You can’t remember. You know that you know the answers. But you just can’t seem to pull them up.

MENTAL MELTDOWN

Otherwise known as cortical inhibition, this mental meltdown is the result of ANXIETY.  Anxiety causes an imbalance in the autonomic nervous system which throws the brain out of sync. The brain simply stops functioning effectively, and this results in confusion and difficulty in remembering.


Like most phobias, test anxiety can begin with just one bad experience. Being punished or ridiculed for poor performance can start a spiral of anxiety and failure that only grows worse. Every time you take a test, the anxiety comes up, your thinking clouds, you can’t remember, and you do poorly on the test, and the next test is worse. The digestive system shuts down and you feel queasy and nauseous. It’s hard to breathe. Your hearing and vision become hypersensitive, and you become distractible. You have a hard time concentrating, and may even get a headache. Your self-confidence drops even lower. It doesn’t matter how well you know the material, you just can’t access what you have learned.

Learn to Relax

Hypnosis operates at the level of the unconscious mind. It is the unconscious mind that controls the autonomic nervous system. Hypnosis can affect mental and physical factors that cannot normally be controlled consciously. With hypnosis, anxiety can be turned into relaxation. The fear can be replaced by confidence, clarity, and focus.


When you are relaxed, you do your best. I can teach you how to be calm, cool and collected when taking tests. You can feel confident of your ability, and you can perform well.


I can teach you how to get past the anxiety that’s been holding you back. 


It’s YOUR  brain!
You CAN learn how to use it. I can show you how.


I am always happy to answer any questions you might have, and I always offer a free consultation to prospective clients.

I work with English speaking people anywhere in the world, using Skype.

 303-250-5138