Hypnosis, psychology and social networking continued…

Hypnosis, psychology and social networking continued…

If you read my previous post on this subject I said the hypnotherapist needed to be honest. That isn’t quite true. He or she needs to be benevolent rather than malevolent. Lies are usually malevolent but not always. The child who tells his parent about his invisible friend isn’t being honest but isn’t lying either and so when he says he has been playing with his secret friend Charlie; he is being imaginative. Children believe what they say when they are playing and so can sound very honest. The same is true of adults but honesty is still the best policy unless honesty would be malevolent. If someone is over-weight for example it is impolite and malevolent to point it out.

When you are communicating you need to relax and if you are being nasty and malevolent this will be harder to achieve and probably impossible. I have said in previous posts that we can say to ourselves a 1,000 times, “I am more confident,” or “I look good,” and not believe it; but if someone else says “You look good today,” it immediately enhances our self esteem and we feel better and more confident. The hypnotherapist does the same thing but much more effectively when he is trying to rebuild someone’s self esteem. If you don’t believe you can lose weight, the hypnotherapist can help you believe in yourself and it will be easier to stick to a diet and exercise program. The same applies to conquering addictions like drugs and smoking. The hypnotherapist does need knowledge of addiction though; especially with drugs when he will advise clients to reduce the drug slowly. The typical reduction accepted, is a 10% cut in the dosage every two weeks. This reduction works for most drugs but can be difficult when you get down to the last pill in the case of benzodiazepines like Valium, for example. Many people take 30 mg of Valium a day and a 3mg cut is easy but when you get down to below 10 mg a day cutting less than 1 mg isn’t easy and clients often cut more than 10% and this will result in withdrawal symptoms. The hypnotherapist can help negate the withdrawal by giving the client something else to think about other than the withdrawal symptoms which may seem overwhelming. Even on the last 2 mg of Valium a day clients can have problems cutting down and then many file 10% off a pill, take that and keep cutting slowly even though cutting the last 2 mg to nothing may take as long as 6 months.

Hypnotherapists can use the power of suggestion to help with many other problems and need to understand the way the mind works and also the other systems in the body. Suggestion can have a direct affect on the nervous system and reduce pain; it can have an indirect affect on the endocrine system and change the hormone levels. When we are relaxed we produce more oxytocin which is often called the ‘love hormone.’ We produce this when we are relaxed and when we are touched or cuddled. The opposite is the hormone cortisol and high levels of this are implicated in many problems. High cortisol levels also make us feel unwell and anxious and of course anxiety produces high cortisol levels and so it’s a vicious circle. In many people who suffer from anxiety this results in the system going out of control and they experience ‘anxiety attacks’ or ‘panic attacks’ this is a serious and distressing problem that can be helped by hypnotherapy.

You can help stop people becoming anxious using both traditional face to face networking skills and online social networking skills. The main skill to remember is to be nice, be diplomatic and be honest although not malevolently honest as in ‘that’s a fat butt, you must have eaten a few fries to get that.’

Everything we say is suggestion, particularly in person; but also we suggest things with what we write. Just being repetitive makes the suggestion more effective; repetition is both a rhetorical device and a psychological device and used by preachers on a Sunday to instil beliefs and advertisers every day of the week to convince you that their bread is tastier and softer than the other guys. Remember that and be careful of what you say and write and put more thought in to it. Thinking can be a great exercise to improve yourself! Try it while eating your next meal and imagine your next conservation; practice being honest but diplomatic. Consider how to address people, what is proper but friendly. At one time in England nearly everyone was addressed formally as mister, miss or missus but that has made way for more informal communication and first names are used far more often. When you end a letter, end it with your first and possibly you last name too and sign it with your first and last name. It is more informal and informal is seen as friendly. It can be a little confusing if you only use your first name. I have two entries in the guest book of my website and they both have a first name only; I have no idea who they are. I have a lot of friends online and offline and connections on Facebook, LinkedIn and other social networks; so just a first name doesn’t identify who left the message. I must admit I am guilty of leaving messages on answer phones that start with ‘it’s me.’  Just the way you address someone is important to establishing contact and the appropriate form of address is needed. My doctor addresses me informally and if I address him as ‘doctor’ it is more formal but informal would be inappropriate.  Informal isn’t always a two way street. There is etiquette offline and there is also etiquette online, never SHOUT! Use a relaxed style of writing and even if you only write one line try to stay in touch with people who are important to you. I send virals out, jokes, pictures or videos to inform, entertain and amuse. I forwarded videos on a couple of days ago and many people enjoyed them; it gave me a reason to contact people and they were reminded I am still here if they need me.

You should remember that everyone needs everyone else and so don’t ask what they can do for you; ask what you can do for them. In this blog, I am trying to inform based on my experience in psychology and to a certain extent hypnosis. Thinking changes a lot about psychology and hypnosis in particular. In recent years CBT (cognitive behaviour therapy) has become popular and some hypnotherapists have used that in conjunction with hypnotherapy or used it to alter the suggestions they give. I haven’t discussed hypnotherapy for a long time and so missed most of these suggestions. I am familiar with CBT generally and not a fan, I have my own thoughts about hypnotherapy and haven’t been affected by collective and trendy thinking. Always beware of trends. I remember a movie that was about a girl with multiple personalities and psychiatrists who watched it were influenced by the collective suggestions in the movie. They started seeing the symptoms of multiple personas in all their patients and the diagnosis of the problem in the USA soared in the months after the movie was released. You can be the subject of suggestion and although we don’t like to think we are easily led; we often are.

Check back for more interesting blogs. I intend to do a few every week and more comedy. 🙂

28, November 2010 | Categories: social networking, Uncategorized | Tags: addiction, beliefs, benzodiazapines, hypnosis, hypnotherapy, psychology | Leave a comment