Thoughts of the Day

Photo by Sara Fogan

Every now and then I like (and need) to take a few moments and remind myself about what is really important to me, in my life. If you follow me on my Calminsense Hypnotherapy Facebook page you may have seen some of these quotes before on this page, or will in the future. Many of these Quotes of the Day are beautiful examples and illustrations of the work I do as a hypnotherapist, so I will probably draw on them in future essays.

• “A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking.” – GSW Syndicate

• “Those who think that the world is a dark place are blind to the light that might illuminate their lives.” – Wayne Dyer

• “Be there for others but never leave yourself behind.” – Dodinsky

• “Forgiving is not forgetting; it’s actually remembering ‘remembering’ and not using your right to hit back. It’s a second chance for a new beginning.” – Mrs. Anahata

• “Don’t be afraid to fail, be afraid not to try.” – Lolly Daskal

• “The beautiful thing about education is that no one can take it away from you.” – B.B. King

• “I learned that courage is not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it.” – Nelson Mandela

• “I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear.” – Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

• “Imperfection is beauty, madness is genius and it's better to be absolutely ridiculous than absolutely boring.” ― Marilyn Monroe

• “The trouble is, you think you have time.” – Buddha

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/.

© 2018

Hypnotized Sharks

(This blog was originally posted on August 14, 2014)

Image courtesy of Microsoft

 

According to Hypnosis Motivation Institute founder John Kappas, Ph.D., people escape or flee into hypnosis when they perceive a threat or danger.  As I learned during my hypnotherapy training at HMI: “Hypnosis is created by an overload of message units, disorganizing our inhibitory process (Critical Mind), triggering our fight-flight mechanism and ultimately resulting in a hyper-suggestible state, providing access to the subconscious mind.”

Apparently, sharks do a similar thing.

Last year, I watched a fascinating documentary about shark behavior in a Shark Week episode titled Zombie Sharks on the Discovery Channel®. In it, Eli Martinez, a shark expert, explained a neuro-physiological phenomenon called “tonic immobility.” According to Martinez, sharks can be rendered immobile whenever they are turned over onto their backs or, in some cases, by touching an area of a shark’s face. For all intents and purposes, tonic immobility temporarily paralyzes the shark until the contact is removed and/or it may rotate its body to a normal position.

Apparently, this area of the face and down the back is loaded with sensors which can quickly become overloaded by sensory stimuli. For example, an overload of sensory stimuli would occur when a researcher places his or her hands on the animal’s face or flips the fish onto its back to subdue it when inserting a tracking device, or if a larger predator, such as an orca, catches it and turns the animal onto its back as a predatory behavior. To complete this picture, imagine the psychological stress that a shark experiences when another animal—whether it is a human or another predator(s)—is swimming and lunging with hands or an opened toothy mouth, to catch it. There would be even more stress and anxiety for its survival when the fish is cornered and caught. In some instances, as in the case of the researchers and videographers for Shark Week, there would be additional sensory stimuli from the cameras and extra lighting in the ocean. By the time the shark is subdued on its back, it has endured an incredible overload of sensory stimulation. It is no wonder that the fish zones out.

 

This phenomenon sounds a lot like hypnosis to me.

For more information about tonic immobility, check out the articles at the following links: 

• “Tonic Immobility on Sharks”: http://www.sharkaidinternational.org/report_tonic_immobility_on_sharks.html

• “Discovery Channel’s ‘Zombie Sharks’ Explores Tonic Immobility”, Woodlands Online at  http://www.woodlandsonline.com/npps/story.cfm?nppage=53506

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/.

© 2018

Micro-Aggressions

(This blog was originally posted on May 3, 2016)

Photo by Rick Hustead

Someone is finally doing it. Someone is finally suing Starbucks® because the company “shorts” advertised quantity of coffee in iced beverages compared to the ratio of ice. O-kay, then.

The company argues that ice is supposed to be in an iced beverage. Isn’t that implied—even explicitly stated—in the names of the beverages like iced coffee, iced tea, iced-green-tea latte, etc.? Even the Frappuccino beverages made with a lot of ice. Considering how many units of iced beverages Starbucks® sells each day, I doubt that the plaintiff in this case is the first person who noticed the imbalanced of the coffee-to-ice ratio. Most people who order an iced beverage simply pay and happily walk out of the store or take a seat along the coffee bar and enjoy their drink, end of story. I wonder what inspired this person to actually sue the company over this imbalance instead of simply ask the barista to prepare the beverage with less or even no ice, or simply stop buying coffee there in the first place?

Last year, one of my nephews introduced me to the word “micro-aggression.” I remember laughing at the concept of micro-aggressions. I didn’t laugh because I believe some complaints and perceived injustices are truly funny or deserve to be dismissed out of hand, but because the word itself is demeaning and yet so accurate. In the context of the many injustices (real or perceived) that are occurring in the world, not receiving the advertised amount of coffee in your iced beverage doesn’t seem like a big deal, or even that it should be. Taking the company to court for a $5 million payday over this imbalance is a bit extreme. And yet, it’s happening. My question is: how did this and similar situations get so far?

A couple years ago I posted a blog titled Passive-Aggressive Behavior in which I explained the origins of this behavior, which typically begins during early-childhood. A youngster naturally starts to become more independent from his caregivers between the ages of two and five. However, if the adult does not provide options and opportunities for the child to demonstrate the desired behavior, the youngster may adopt passive-aggressive responses to these requests in order to display some kind of autonomy. Rather than ask directly for something, the individual hints and insinuates that something is wrong/must change until other people in the environment change behavior to accommodate him. Over time, this strategy becomes a subconscious known—a go-to behavior to get what the person wants. I can’t help but wonder if passive-aggression is at the root of so many examples of micro-aggression we are seeing lately.

There is a huge difference between assertiveness and aggressiveness/passive-aggressiveness. In the first case, an assertive Starbucks® customer would immediately, politely, tell the barista that there is too much ice in the beverage and ask for it to be remade. (There is a sign on the counter of every Starbucks® that states the store’s policy about re-making a drink to a customer’s satisfaction.) If the new drink still wasn’t made to the person’s satisfaction, the person could ask for a refund and stop going there for coffee. Maybe even a letter to the CEO would be in order. Conversely, an aggressive customer might rudely complain about the drink, demand the refund/reject apologies from the company, etc., and even stomp loudly off the premises and tell everyone about the lousy experience. The passive-aggressive customer may take the beverage as it was originally prepared and then complain (loudly or discretely) about everything that is wrong with the drink. The final step on this path would be to take the complaint to court.

I do not know all of the details about this customer’s lawsuit. Perhaps the individual has made many attempts to change how the company prepares its iced beverages and even had a one-on-one meeting with the CEO to vent frustration about this perceived rip-off. But is this issue so important to press legal charges, knowing that the cost of hiring a legal team to defend/prosecute this injustice may become financially prohibitive? Sure, the ultimate pay-day could be worth this effort—if and when it eventually comes. The question I have about this issue is whether having a disproportionate ratio of ice-to-coffee symbolic of another more personally meaningful perceived imbalance in this person’s life.

Maybe it isn’t about the coffee, at all.

 

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/.

© 2018