Getting to the Cause through Corrective Therapy

(This blog was originally posted on September 14, 2016)

Photo by Rick Hustead

Earlier this year, I posted an essay about one of my favorite cognitive, non-hypnosis techniques, the Paris Window, which helps get to the cause or foundation of a client’s therapeutic issue. Here, the individual is asked to describe his or her feelings about this goal or issue in the context of personal feelings and beliefs about how other people feel about it. Corrective Therapy is a second cognitive technique that helps to identify the subconscious cause or root of the therapeutic goal by having the client write five or six sentences about what he or she wants to accomplish through hypnotherapy and replace each word (or group of words) with a relevant synonym (subconscious symbolism).

The intention of this technique is to get to and identify the true goal of the therapy as it exists in the client’s subconscious mind. The process or format of each of these sentences will depend on his or her suggestibility (Emotional versus Physical). To start, the person writes the sentence with each word the head of its own “column.” As the client writes each new sentence, the Physical Suggestible client will provide synonyms to replace each word in the original sentence; the Emotional Suggestible client will provide a synonym or metaphor/association for the each word in the previous sentence.

Consider the following example for a client who comes in for hypnotherapy with the following stated goal: I want to lose weight. A Physical Suggestible client might choose the following synonyms to replace the original word or phrase for this goal in follow-up sentences:

I	Want	to lose	weight
Me (I) ↑	desire (want)	to drop (to lose)	pounds (weight)
(client’s) name (I)	need (want)	to take off (to lose)	inches (weight)
Man/Woman (I)	have to (want)	release (to lose)	body mass (weight)
Person (I)	must  (want)	let go of (to lose)	size (weight)

When an Emotional Suggestible client chooses replacement words to express the goal, this individual will be replacing the word from the previous sentence with a new synonym/association. The word or phrase in parentheses indicates the term that has been replaced.

I	Want	to lose	weight
Woman/man (I)	need (want)	relinquish (to lose)	pounds (weight)
Sister/Brother (woman/man)	want (need)	missing (to lose)	obesity (pounds)
Daughter/son (sister/brother)	rejection (want)	lacking  (missing)	ugly (obesity)
Husband/Wife (daughter/son)	isolation (rejection)	deficit (lacking)	lonely (ugly)

                                               

                                                                                       

I employ Corrective Therapy during the cognitive (alert) portion of the hypnotherapy to discover any underlying, subconscious motivation(s) behind the person’s unwanted behaviors that may be preventing the desired behavior change. One benefit of this technique is that it is very visceral: the person can literally read the story about how the origins or basis of this subconscious resistance evolve while writing the responses to each question (ideomotor response). Once the issue is revealed, I will discuss it with the client in terms of his or her beliefs and feelings about the problem/conflict and create strategies to change unwanted behaviors and accomplish this goal. When the person is in hypnosis, I incorporate specific suggestions in his or her hypnotic script to help the person implement these new beliefs or behaviors to help actualize this self-improvement goal.

Trauma Relief Hypnotherapy

I am currently offering a 25% discount off the first hypnotherapy session for active/retired military personnel and first-responders (including fire-fighters, police officers, ambulance/EMT personnel, and EMS dispatch operators) through November 30, 2018.

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

Today’s Yoga Lesson: Physical vs. Mental Homeostasis

 (This blog was originally posted on September 20, 2016)

Photo by Rick Hustead

I noticed something very interesting during yoga this morning. As I stood tall and still in the “mountain” position with my feet flat on the floor, I could just detect the tiniest of swaying motion of my body as my muscles and tendons worked to maintain my balance. These movements were so miniscule as to almost go unnoticed. But they were there: constant adjustments of the various muscles, tendons and internal organs to keep the body completely balanced and ready for anything. I could imagine the lightning-fast neural (subconscious) communication between my brain, inner ears and the muscles in my legs and abdomen as I consciously worked to hold this position. 

This experience was just one example of how my body strived to maintain physiological homeostasis (balance) during the class. Other examples were increased breathing and pulse/heart-rates or adjust my stance when transitioning between poses or when I had to work harder to maintain more intense positions. And then something really interesting happened. About halfway through the class, even with the more intense positions and exercise, my breathing and heart-rate seemed to return to a more normal rate for me.  Even though I was still working hard, but it was like my body had become used to this work and was compensating for/working more efficiently to achieve those positions. 

Achieving mental/emotional homeostasis during the class was more challenging for me. Once I made the initial observation about how my body was working to stay in balance, my mind started racing. Wow! This is so interesting! I know what I will write my blog about tonight! It took a few breaths to get focused on what I was doing, and supposed to be doing: practicing yoga, not writing about it! Unlike my physical body, which automatically made adjustments to achieve homeostasis, my conscious mind had to intervene and bring my thoughts, emotions and focus back to what I was supposed to be doing in class. 

Ultimately I did learn a very important lesson today: Even when my body (and mind) is completely still, it is always moving. 

Special Offer: Trauma Relief Hypnotherapy

I am currently offering a 25% discount off the first hypnotherapy session for active/retired military personnel and first-responders (including fire-fighters, police officers, ambulance/EMT personnel, and EMS dispatch operators) through November 30, 2018.

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

Inner Resources

(This blog was originally posted on June 15, 2016)

Photo by Rick Hustead

“In the midst of change we often discover wings we never

knew we had.” – Ekaterina Walter

On Saturday, October 27, 2018, a lone gunman armed with an AR-15 rifle and two handguns burst into the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and opened fire on the congregants during their worship services. Eleven adults died in the attack; the victims’ ages ranged from 54 to a 97-year-old woman who had survived the Holocaust. The shooter reportedly wanted to kill all the Jews. The physician on-call that day (and a member of the Tree of Life Synagogue) later told interviewers that the shooter even disclosed this goal to him and the rest of his medical/surgical staff (also Jewish) when they were preparing to treat his gunshot wound. The Anti-Defamation League has declared this incident as the deadliest anti-Semitic hate crime in United States’ history.

Saturday’s shooting is just one in a string of mass shootings over the past year or so. Last week, social media was filled with tributes to the victims of the shooting at the Route 91 Harvest Festival at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, Nevada, on Sunday, October 1, 2017. On that night, a lone gunman allegedly adapted an automatic rifle to open fire on thousands of attendees at event. At the time this blog was originally posted, more than 500 people were injured and 59 people died of injuries they sustained. This event has been called the worst single-shooting in modern American history, surpassing the carnage at Pulse Night Club in Orlando, Florida on June 12, 2016. Even before Sunday's shooting, however, various attacks ranging from a terrorist bombing during pop star Ariana Grande’s concert in Manchester, England, in May 2017 to vehicle and knife attacks on European streets have claimed countless lives. In the past year, scores of people have died and many more sustained serious injury in various incidents in which terrorists drove vehicles into crowds gathered at popular tourist sites in England, France, Spain, Canada and the United States. 

These tragedies have required us to change not only an attitude or belief system, but our very way of life. If we can't be, let alone feel, safe at place of worship, a concert or meandering down the street in a populated location, where can we go? It’s not an impossible thing to do, but at the moment tragedy strikes, it certainly seems that way. How do we go on after something like that? 

Grief comes in many different forms, and each one of us grieves and mourns in different ways for the loss we have experienced. There is no time limit or restriction when it comes to feeling sadness, anger/rage or even in disbelief about the specific tragedy we have experienced. These emotions can feel overwhelming and often come in waves (versus “stages”). In one moment we laugh while we think about the special, loving, fun times with the person who has died; in the next, we can’t stop sobbing, inconsolable.

But it also at times like this that we usually discover, eventually, inner resources to keep on going, keep on living and keep on loving. With the love and support of other friends, relatives and social resources, we re-discover that source of inner strength we forgot we always had, the one that helped us get through a previous challenge or loss. Sometimes, it feels like learning how to walk for the first time: step by step, one foot in front of the other. Baby steps. And then, one day, we wake up and experience maybe one moment, an hour, or just a few seconds of optimism about something in our lives. It may not be complete happiness or joy, but just a flash of brightness—a sensation of lightness or collateral beauty—that reminds us that those other, positive, long-forgotten emotions are still possible.

Maybe not today or even tomorrow, but someday. And on days like these, that possibility is cause for hope and even motivation to take those steps. 

I would like to offer my deepest condolences to all of the victims, survivors and family members and friends of these shootings. These senseless and tragic losses of life will always be remembered and mourned.

Special Offer: Trauma Relief Hypnotherapy

I am currently offering a 25% discount off the first hypnotherapy session for active/retired military personnel and first-responders (including fire-fighters, police officers, ambulance/EMT personnel, and EMS dispatch operators) through November 30, 2018.

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