If you are struggling with anxiety or a debilitating phobia, you are not alone. Anxiety disorders are the most common mental illnesses in the U.S. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, about 40 million adults age 18 or older suffer from a form of anxiety—that’s 18% of the population. If you’ve tried to treat your anxiety with meditation, exercise, and even talk therapy to no avail, it might be time to give an alternative treatment a try: hypnosis for anxiety, fears, phobias.
Many people suffer from irrational fears in the form of anxiety and phobias, and according to the National Institute of Mental Health, the percentage of people with anxiety disorders in on the rise. Phobias usually develop during childhood and are harbored in adulthood. Feelings of fears and anxiety often cause individuals to build their lives around their phobias. Although they are aware that their feelings are irrational, people with phobias experience exaggerated fears.
Phobias are categorized into these four types:
1. Natural environment phobias (fear of heights, water, darkness, etc.)
2. Animal phobias (fear of snakes, spiders, dogs, etc.)
3. Blood-injection-injury phobias (fear of blood, injections, injury, etc.)
4. Situational phobias (fear of heights, flying, dentists, etc.)
Though phobias can be categorized differently, they are formed in the same way and can be treated by a trained hypnotherapist.
By now you are probably aware that hypnosis is less of a stage performance and more of a therapeutic method. While using trance to relieve anxiety and fears seems unorthodox, there is a great deal of published research about the use of hypnotherapy for stress and fears. Direct suggestions haves sometimes proven to treat anxiety and phobias effectively. More often than not, however, direct suggestions are ineffective. But before you cast doubt on the relieving properties of hypnotherapy, consider that the process of induction and deepening alone is enough to calm stress. Moreover, there are numerous methods hypnotherapists employ to treat people with anxiety and phobias.
Systemic desensitization is where hypnosis and Neurolinguistics meet. The procedure enables an individual to gain an impression of inherent authority over fearful or panic-inducing triggers. The advantages of hypnotic desensitization over traditional desensitization are enhanced visualization as well as the ability to have post-hypnotic suggestions encourage healthy behavioral responses.
Low self-esteem is a trait that is commonly associated with anxiety. If that is the case, hypnotherapists often employ ego-strengthening methods. The intimate connection between mind and body is an aspect of hypnosis that is often overlooked. But when treating a fragile ego, hypnotherapists will use the mind-body connection to provide relief through repaired self-regulation.
Hypnotherapists might also choose to age regress patients to experiences immediately before they began to feel fearful or anxious. This approach offers the sequence of reactions to unfolding, enabling the hypnotherapist and the individual to pinpoint situations that evoke anxiety or fear. Additionally, age regression can provide a resource state that can be brought to the consciousness when the individual experiences times of high stress. Not only does age regression identify the conflicts that cause a person’s anxiety and phobias, but enables the individual to bring coping mechanisms to conscious awareness.
Talk to your physician or psychiatrist to provide a referral to see a hypnotherapist. Regain control of your life and stop living in fear with hypnosis for anxiety, fears, phobias.
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