Water as Metaphor

(This blog was originally posted on January 24, 2017)

Photo by Rick Hustead

I use a lot of different metaphors when I work with my hypnotherapy clients, but water imagery is probably my favorite. Let me tell you why.

As one of the four elements (earth, air and fire being the other three), water has great transformative power. Water gives and supports life as embryonic fluid and also comprises the fluid all life requires to survive. Of course, there is also a destructive aspect of this substance: Just three inches of fast-moving water can displace heavy objects such as boulders, cars, even slabs of earth. It can smooth pebbles or destroy crops/landscape/property. The devastating tsunamis in 2004 (Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami) and 2011 (Great Sendal Earthquake, Japan) took lives.

But water can also heal. It washes away dirt and detritus from a wound. It provides refreshment, it cleans and cleanses. The sound of raindrops tapping on tree leaves or a roof during a summer rainstorm, or that of a babbling brook or ocean waves moving in and out on a tide, can bring great relaxation and comfort. A body of still water can provide an opportunity for reflection (metaphoric and literal) or exercise, for swimming.

My favorite metaphors of water feature its restorative/transformative powers. When it is heated, the water droplets become vapor (air). When it is frozen, it becomes solid as the ground even though the slippery characteristic of ice makes its surface much more difficult (but not impossible) to stand on. And when water is in its original liquid form, it can take the shape of any container or environment in which it is held. That is what I love most about water as a metaphor: it speaks to the part of and in us all that is capable of adaptation, change and transformation depending on the situation in which we find ourselves.

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®, please visit http://www.calminsensehypnotherapy.com/.

© 2018

Recipe for Success, Part 2

(This blog was originally posted on January 19, 2017)

Photo by Rick Hustead

People often come in for hypnotherapy to change or adopt a behavior that will help them achieve a specific goal or succeed at a particular endeavor. Contrary to popular belief (and the stories we tell ourselves), Hypnosis Motivation Institute founder John Kappas, Ph.D. asserted that such success had nothing to do with intelligence, working hard, being nice or deserving, etc. Rather, success (or lack thereof) boiled down to the mental “programming” a person received and how that program was reinforced in daily life (behaviors).

In Part 1 of this blog, I explained why subconscious resistance to changing those familiar—albeit unwanted—behaviors can keep us stuck there. In today’s blog I describe the Recipe for Success to help you stop the self-limiting script and help you achieve your self-improvement goals.

1.       Believe that you are 100% successful at what you want to achieve. Everything that happens to you is an expression of the subconscious signal you send to the universe. As you change the previous programming of this script by changing those old beliefs, the Universe will send you new opportunities.

2.       Daily Reinforcement. According to Dr. Kappas’s Theory of Mind, every one of your current beliefs and action reinforces what you learned from the time you were born until you were about eight years old. If you are battling homeostasis, you must battle it daily by practicing the new beliefs and behaviors you want to replace the old, obsolete ones.

3.       Ideomotor Response. Handwriting daily affirmations and goals/achievements in the Mental Bank Ledger is a great way to reinforce those new behaviors. (I teach my clients how the Mental Bank Concept helps to replace their obsolete subconscious mental script with one that will help them achieve new goals and provide their first ledger to get them started!)

4.       Symbolic Language. Dr. Kappas chose monetary and numeric symbols (e.g., the $) to represent success and growth because numbers are an important part of how the subconscious mind works.

5.       Hypnosis. The hypnotherapist facilitates a natural process that occurs at least twice each day during the “Magic 30 minutes” after waking up in the morning and just prior to drifting off to sleep at night. These periods of natural hypnosis are when a person is most suggestible to changing or adopting a new behavior/belief. (This is why you are encouraged to do the Mental Bank right before going to sleep at night.) Similarly, the hypnotic suggestions given during hypnotherapy also “ride the wave” into the subconscious mind to effect the desired change.

6.       Precognitive and Venting Dreams. The majority of change does not happen in the office during the hypnotherapy session. Rather, the hypnotherapist plants the seed for this change that grows over time, starting in sleep. For example, during hypnosis I drop in a hypnotic suggestion that my client will have a venting dream to release any attachment to the unwanted behaviors. Meanwhile, the person can gain insight and benefit from dreams that occurred during the precognitive stage of sleep about how to resolve any conflicts that have prevented achieving the desired goal.

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

Recipe for Success, Part 1

(This blog was originally posted on January 18, 2017)

Photo by Rick Hustead

People often come in for hypnotherapy to change or adopt a behavior that will help them achieve a specific goal or succeed at a particular endeavor. Contrary to popular belief (and the stories we tell ourselves), Hypnosis Motivation Institute founder John Kappas, Ph.D. asserted that such success had nothing to do with intelligence, working hard, being nice or deserving, etc. Rather, success (or lack thereof) boiled down to the mental “programming” a person received and how that program was reinforced in daily life (behaviors). 

Dr. Kappas attributed the difficulty to change or re-program these behaviors to homeostasis, whereby a person tends to only go so high before hitting a metaphoric “ceiling” to this success. Silently, suddenly self-sabotaging behaviors start to happen to keep the individual stuck in the same (comfortable and familiar) life patterns he or she is trying to change or improve. It is easier and oftentimes more socially rewarding) to stay the same or resist change (see Systems Approach in Hypnotherapy). Fortunately, there is also a metaphoric “floor” to this resistance, at which time the person goes so low that he or she is motivated to make a positive change and break out of this negative or limited cycle.

In Part 2 of this blog I will describe the Recipe for Success to help you stop the self-limiting script and help you achieve your self-improvement goals.

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