How to Kick the Habit with Hypnotherapy
Modern neuroscience gives us a real insight to how our brains work and how we form habits. The word “habit” usually has negative connotations, this is because we allow many of our habits to form by accident. We don’t intentionally set out to create a habit of eating a bar of chocolate after work every day – it just seems to happen.
This is because most of us don’t understand how, or why, these habits form in our brains. Once we understand what is going on in our brains we can take charge of setting the habits we want, rather than feeling at the mercy of habits we don’t want.
And this is where hypnotherapy can be really helpful. Here at Inspired to Change we share that knowledge of what is happening in our brains and help you to reshape those existing bad habits turning them into positive ones.
Here, two of our clients share their stories of how hypnotherapy helped them to take back that control.
Nadine had been struggling with food choices, in particular sweet foods.
“I knew I wanted to quit sugar for the long term but I felt I had little control over my cravings”
Our Devon Hypnotherapist Emma explained to Nadine how her brain worked and why it was keeping her stuck in her old behaviour patterns that she so desperately wanted to shift. This helped Nadine realise that she needed to change her mindset and she knew that Emma was the right person to help her do that.
“I now have a better understanding of how my mind works, and especially that willpower is not the answer.
I know what I must do, how I must think, to succeed now. I have various tools which will help me and I feel able to achieve my desired result. My thinking is much more positive and I feel that I express this in my interactions with others.”
Nadine’s biggest achievement was when she found herself able to say no to someone offering her a treat. She realised that she could be in control of her choices without any feelings of guilt or of feeling deprived.
After just 6 sessions Nadine felt completely in control of what she ate and when, “I know that if I keep on using the tools, and if I focus on my objective, then I can and will become the person I ultimately want to be.”
But bad habits are always about food and drink. Julie was a petite, energetic woman who was the lynchpin in her family. She helped run the family business with her husband and grown up children and ran the household. She had a large, close extended family and it was her family that recommended she see Ali at our Maidstone clinic to deal with her bad habit.
When Ali asked her how she was going to help, Julie just held up her hands and Ali could immediately see the problem. Although Julie’s nails were fine, around each of them was red, raw, angry looking skin. There were little blood spots where the skin had been nibbled away and scabs were beginning to form. It looked incredibly painful and Julie said it was.
Julie admitted she wasn’t at all confident Ali could even help, but because of the positive results other family members achieved from working with Ali she said she was willing to ‘give it a try’ and in fact her daughter’s nagging and ‘telling her off’ was the final piece in making the decision to come, if nothing else to shut her up!
During the consultation Ali explained how the brain works and how it is designed to free up thinking space by referring back to established patterns of behaviour and habits and running them automatically for us, which is why Julie would ‘find herself’ chewing the skin around her nails without being aware of it.
Julie was surprised Ali wanted to address her stress and anxiety levels, not just ‘put her under and make the changes’, but Ali went on to explain that the reason we sometimes find it hard to change established habits is that, when we are stressed or anxious, both of which Julie experienced, our mind will override any conscious desire for change, insisting that the habit is what is keeping us safe, so we must carry on doing it regardless. Julie left her first consultation with a clear understanding of why she was finding it so hard and how the changes could be made.
Over the course of the few sessions Julie had with Ali they addressed the sources of her stress and anxiety as well as working directly on the habit. Julie was visibly relaxing, taking charge of situations at home and at work. She was delighted that the more relaxed she became the easier she found it to consciously address the habit and choose to do something else with her hands, which was sometimes simply admiring them and the recovering skin!
On their last session Julie held up her hands and smiled; she had had her nails painted and the skin looked perfect – she had the most beautiful, shapely hands. Since then, due to seeing further family members, Ali still gets reports of Julie’s beautiful hands.
If you are stuck with habits you just can’t kick maybe it’s time to book your FREE initial consultation with your local Inspired to Change hypnotherapist. Inspired to Change Hypnotherapists are based across the UK in Peterborough, Northamptonshire, Cambridgeshire, Leicestershire, Devon and Kent.
Inspired to Change Hypnotherapists are all recognised by the National Council for Hypnotherapy, the UK’s leading not-for-profit hypnotherapy professional association.
To find out how you can train as a solution focused hypnotherapist click here for our hypnotherapy school information