Wednesday, January 11, 2017

Hypnotherapy for Health and Well-Being



(This blog was originally posted on January 5, 2014)


Photo courtesy of Fotolia

Hypnotherapy incorporates the client's words to increase
motivation to follow healthy behavior and improve well-being.





One of the most common requests I receive is to help someone, through hypnotherapy, to live a healthy lifestyle. Each person will have a specific issue or area that he or she would like to address and/or focus on or improve or change. Hypnotherapy is such an effective tool to facilitate these health-related behavior changes because the hypnosis scripts incorporate the client’s own words and motivations to achieve those goals. I reinforce these suggestions by creating suggestibility-specific scripts (e.g., physical or emotional suggestibility) with which my client's subconscious mind will identify, accept and understand so that he or she can easily and comfortably accomplish these objectives.



  • Lose weight or maintain weight lost
  • Stop smoking
  • Improve quality/quantity of sleep
  • Exercise/increase physical activity
  • Reduce/manage stress
  • Make healthy food choices
  • Drink more water/increase hydration
  • Improve/increase motivation to follow the new lifestyle regimen.



SPECIAL OFFER!
I am currently offering a 10 percent discount on all hypnotherapy for smoking-cessation sessions. This offer is good through January 31, 2017 and is not exchangeable for cash. For more information and to set up an appointment, please contact me at (661) 433-9430 or send an e-mail to calminsensehypnosis@yahoo.com. I look forward to hearing from—and working with—you soon!


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/. 
© 2017

Tuesday, January 10, 2017

What You Can (and Cannot) Expect From Hypnotherapy

Photo by Rick Hustead



      I would like to clarify a couple of things about hypnosis and my role as a certified hypnotherapist. First, as I explain on my website, hypnosis is a natural, drug-free and highly effective therapeutic modality that has been used for centuries to help people change mental scripts for unwanted beliefs or behaviors that no longer work for them. Whether you want to lose weight, quit smoking, increase your self-confidence, overcome a fear or phobia, or achieve just about any vocational and avocational self-improvement goals, hypnosis can help you get it done.

     My goal is to help each and every one of my hypnotherapy clients to achieve his or her vocational and avocational self-improvement goals. I participate in continuing-education courses throughout the year to fine-tune my therapeutic skills and learn new techniques that I can apply in my practice. Between sessions with my clients, I make myself available to answer any questions or discuss an issue that may have come up during the week via a follow-up phone call, e-mail correspondence or both. I provide a recording of the hypnosis component of their therapy for them to listen to during the week and even give them “homework” assignments to help reinforce the new behavior until their next hypnotherapy session. These assignments may include breathing/relaxation exercises to practice, maintaining their Mental Bank program by writing in their Mental Bank ledger each night before bed, reading specific articles or watching online videos about related hypnotherapeutic techniques that are available via the Hypnosis Motivation Institute online video library.

     I work with my clients to achieve their stated goals; when they have accomplished what they set out to do, we typically part ways until they want to work on something new. I generally do not need to explore unrelated issues or discuss experiences that occurred long ago in my clients’ lives unless they state or believe that event pertains to their presenting issue or affects how they currently lead their lives. Having said that, hypnotherapy is not an overnight miracle “cure” for anything and everything that ails or distresses you. By the time most people come in for hypnotherapy, many months or even years have passed since the unwanted belief or behavior was created. Meanwhile, their subconscious mental script has had plenty of time to nurture and reinforce that unwanted habit. Although hypnotherapy is also generally a shorter-term therapy than many traditional psychotherapeutic modalities, it will likely take more than one hypnosis session to change and/or permanently remove that behavior.

    Finally, California law allows me to provide hypnotherapy as a complementary or alternative treatment to help my clients to achieve vocational and avocational self-improvement goals (Business and Professions Code 2908). For example, I am certified to help people manage pain and individuals who suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder to deal with a myriad of physical and emotional symptoms. However, I may only do so with a referral from a licensed medical doctor or mental-health professional; I must receive a referral from both of these health-care providers to work with a client who has PTSD. I ethically and legally cannot and will not address some issues (e.g., age regression therapy to identify possible past abuse) or diagnose medical or mental-health symptoms. If I feel that your issues are or become beyond my scope of expertise as a hypnotherapist, I will refer you to a licensed medical doctor or psychologist for further evaluation and/or treatment.


SPECIAL OFFER!
I am currently offering a 10 percent discount on all hypnotherapy for smoking-cessation sessions. This offer is good through January 31, 2017 and is not exchangeable for cash. For more information and to set up an appointment, please contact me at (661) 433-9430 or send an e-mail to calminsensehypnosis@yahoo.com. I look forward to hearing from—and working with—you soon!




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/.
© 2017




Monday, January 9, 2017

Hypnosis to Quit Smoking: January 2017 Special Offer!



Photo by Rick Hustead





People have various motivations to give up smoking cigarettes. Increasing restrictions on the areas people can smoke in public makes it more difficult and uncomfortable to light up when they are out of the house. Some people hate the smell of smoke in their hair and on their skin and clothes. Others decide that the financial burden of purchasing cigarettes is no longer worth the enjoyment of smoking them. For example: A pack of cigarettes costs more than a gallon of gasoline in most locations in the United States; and health and life-insurance policies can be more expensive for people who smoke. But the primary motivation people quit smoking is to improve their health. Here is a list of the specific physiological/health benefits of quitting smoking and an estimated time frame in which these benefits are realized since smoking your last cigarette.
  • 20 minutes: Blood pressure, pulse rate and body temperature return to normal/natural level.
  • 8 hours: Carbon monoxide level drops to normal level; oxygen level in the blood increases to normal.

  • 24 hours: Chance of heart attack decreases.

  • 48 hours: Nerve endings start to re-grow, and ability to taste and smell improves.

  • 72 hours: Lung capacity increases and bronchial tubes relax.

  • 2 weeks-3 months: Improved circulation and increased lung function (up to 30%); it becomes easier to walk.

  • 1 month-9 months: Decrease in coughing, sinus congestion, fatigue and shortness of breath. Also, cilia begin to grow back in the lungs, which increases their ability to clean, handle mucous and reduce infection in the lungs.

  • 5 years: Decrease in lung-cancer death rate for the average smoker (one pack per day): from 137 per 100,000 people, to 72 per 100,000 people.

  • 10 years: Decrease in lung-cancer death rate for the average smoker (one pack per day) to 12 per 100,000 people. This rate is almost the same as that for someone who has never smoked. Other benefits include replacement of pre-cancerous cilia and decrease risk of other cancers associated with smoking: bladder, esophagus, kidney, mouth and pancreas.

Hypnotherapy is an effective tool to help you achieve your goal of becoming a permanent non-smoker. This is because hypnosis enables you to communicate with your subconscious mind to reprogram your previous subconscious mental scripts about wanting and needing to smoke with ones that reinforce your decision, motivations and ability to stop smoking. I offer a 6-week, smoking-cessation hypnotherapy program that is good for people who smoke one or more pack of cigarettes a day. A two-hour intensive session is also available for people who smoke fewer than five cigarettes per day. During this time, you will learn how to resist the triggers of your psychological and physiological addiction to nicotine while you gradually stop smoking altogether. I also record and provide a customized stop-smoking track to listen to and reinforce this new behavior (lifestyle of a permanent non-smoker). If you are ready to quit smoking, I am here and ready to help you.


SPECIAL OFFER!

I am currently offering a 10 percent discount on all hypnotherapy for smoking-cessation sessions. This offer is good through January 31, 2017 and is not exchangeable for cash. For more information and to set up an appointment, please contact me at (661) 433-9430 or send an e-mail to calminsensehypnosis@yahoo.com. I look forward to hearing from—and working with—you soon!



                 


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/.

© 2017


Friday, December 23, 2016

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.



  • “Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.” – Mother Teresa

  • “Allow today to be your chance to prove that you are better and stronger than you were yesterday.” – Troy Amdahl

  • “Every adversity carries with it the seed of an equivalent or greater benefit.” – Napoleon Hill

  • “Optimism is the one quality more associated with success and happiness than any other.” – Brian Tracy

  • “Faith gives you an inner strength and a sense of balance and perspective in life.” – Gregory Peck

  • “Don't get fooled into thinking just because something worked last time it will work next time.” – Bruce Van Horn

  • “You alone are enough. You have nothing to prove to anybody.” Maya Angelou

  • “Dreams are illustrations... from the book your soul is writing about you.” Marsha Norman

  • “Distance not only gives nostalgia, but perspective, and maybe objectivity.” – Robert Morgan

  • “It’s better to walk alone with dignity, rather than beside people who constantly require you to sacrifice self-respect.” Lolly Daskal





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