The Bite

Photo by Rick Hustead

I eventually learned how to drive an automatic transmission vehicle. That was the kind of cars my parents had (my subconscious known) and I didn’t have a pressing need to learn stick shift. In fact, I was one of the few if only sixteen-year-olds who didn’t really want to drive the second I got my driver’s license. If I had a horse when I was a teenager I might have been more motivated, but that’s another story.

However, in 1997 I decided I wanted (needed) to learn how to drive stick shift. I was living and working in Hull, England, at the time. My work contract and work visa would expire at the beginning of December, and several jobs I considered applying for required the new hire to have a car and be able to drive to various venues. At that time, virtually every vehicle on the road was “manual transmission,” so I didn’t really have any option but to drive what was available. As I recall, as it seemed to be more expensive to have an automatic car in England at that time; driving lessons in an automatic would also cost more. So not only would I have to learn how to drive on the opposite side of the road to what I was used to in the United States, but also to use a clutch pedal and the gear stick.

To my surprise, though, I liked it.

The instructor was very patient with me, despite the number of times I stalled the vehicle. At the very beginning of the lesson, he told me about “the bite,” that moment when the clutch is engaged just so and the driver shifts the car into the correct gear while depressing the accelerator (or something like that). He said that when this is done correctly, with perfect timing, you should feel and hear the car easily slide into the gear and smoothly move forward. No stuttering or sputtering of the engine, no jerking movement of the car as the engine gasps for air before stalling out. Smooooooth. I grinned from ear to ear the first time I felt that bite, and promptly stalled the engine. But, I did it; and the metaphoric significance of the term “bite” continues to resonate with me.

I returned to the United States a few months later. I eventually got a job working as a proofreader and then managing editor at Black Belt® magazine. In 2005, I completed my hypnotherapy training at the Hypnosis Motivation Institute and opened hypnotherapy practice, Calminsense Hypnotherapy®.  I no longer drive stick-shift—it is actually more expensive to buy a manual transmission vehicle here—but the concept of feeling or listening for “the bite” plays a big part in my day. It is the metaphoric exhale of a relaxed breath that my clients take as they drift into hypnosis. It is the optimism I feel about the success of my hypnotherapy practice when I pick up the phone to answer someone’s questions about hypnosis and whether hypnotherapy really works. (It does.) It is the excitement and pride I feel for a client when the person achieves his or her self-improvement goal, glowing with pride and renewed self-confidence at this accomplishment. It is the sense of calm and joy I experience when I first climb onto my horse’s back, as we transition smoothly between his gaits or amble down the street on an impromptu hack.

For me, ultimately, “the bite” represents achievement, success, accomplishment. I know that if I ever absolutely needed to, I could probably still drive stick-shift without stalling the engine too many times. To this day, I still always listen and feel for that moment when my car automatically shifts gears. It makes me happy that I can tell when that happens and even feel bad for the car when the engine seems to be straining too hard going up a hill. Most of all, I enjoy hearing and feeling the bite when, if only for a moment, most things in my and my clients’ lives are comfortable and smooth.

Have you felt your “bite” today?

Sara R. Fogan, C.Ht. is a certified hypnotherapist based in Southern California. She graduated with honors from the Hypnosis Motivation Institute in 2005. For more information about Calminsense Hypnotherapy® and to set up an appointment, please visit http://www.calminsensehypnotherapy.com/.

© 2016

Dressing the Part

 

                Whenever I have to get something done, I dress the part. When I was working as a magazine editor, I wore a suit to work just about every day. I don’t know why I started doing that. Perhaps it was because, having just returned from England after living abroad for seven years, I was used to seeing professional people looking like they had somewhere important to go. Monday through Friday, on the London Underground, at bus stations and walking around the city, everyone looked so chic. (Of course, people dressed the part in Los Angeles, too; but since most people drove cars out here it was hard to know how they really looked from outside the vehicle.) But I also discovered that it was easier for me to get and maintain that mind-set for my work throughout the day.

My days as a magazine editor are long over, but I continue to dress for whatever part or role I am playing on a given day. If am going to give a presentation about hypnotherapy or work with my hypnotherapy clients, I wear business attire. If I am going out to the barn to ride my horse or just hang out with him and do chores around the barn, I put on my “horse clothes”: i.e., britches, shirt or sweater, half-chaps, Mountain Horse Jod boots. Right before I get on Galahad, I am also wearing gloves and my Troxel riding helmet. If I am competing in a horse show, I wear specific riding gear for that: white britches, white blouse and stock tie, black dressage coat and my tall dressage boots—plus white leather gloves, hair-net and stock pin. If I am going out for the evening, I wear appropriate attire for whatever the activity or event I am attending.

Finally, dressing the part helps to increase my self-confidence in my ability to do whatever task is at hand. When I was dressed like an editor—or what I thought an editor should wear—I also looked and acted like an editor. As a hypnotherapist, it is important to me that I can convey a sense of confidence, experience, calm and support to my clients. Sometimes, I also wear a name badge to reinforce this image when I work with someone for the first time. When I’m at the barn, I feel more confident and secure about my activities knowing that I am wearing protective gear that is specifically designed to prevent serious injury if I fall off a horse or get kicked or stepped on.

Guess what? I even put on something that tells me (and my subconscious mind) it’s time to relax and unwind from the stresses of the day when I am just planning to hang out at home reading or watching television. I know that my SCM should “know” how to relax as instinctively as it knows how to do most of the activities I mentioned above. However, sometimes I even have to remind myself that it’s okay to just do one thing (or nothing) at a time. In a way, the clothing functions like the critical area of my subconscious mind, as Hypnosis Motivation Institute founder John Kappas, Ph.D. described in his Theory of Mind. This is the area of the mind that rejects any unknown or unfamiliar (painful) information for the SCM. So, to put this model into effect, when I am at work seeing a client, my official attire reminds my mind rejects distracting message units about the time I will spend with Galahad later in the day. And when I am with my horse, my riding garments remind me to focus on him.

 

Especially the boots: they have a reinforced steel toe to protect my feet in case I start thinking about something other than my boy, who likes to remind me where my attention should be focused  if it drifts away from him.

                                                                            

Sara R. Fogan, C.Ht. is a certified hypnotherapist based in Southern California. She graduated with honors from the Hypnosis Motivation Institute in 2005. For more information about Calminsense Hypnotherapy® and to set up an appointment, please visit http://www.calminsensehypnotherapy.com/.

© 2014