By Susanna Sweeney, MSC, MBACP, CHT
In this article, meet Jeffrey who attended me for hypnotherapy for stress and find out what brought him to attend a hypnotherapy relaxation clinic and how it helped him.
Jeffrey is a middle manager at a large multinational. He manages customer services which involves great responsibilities such as leading a large team, some of whom are based abroad with a substantial time difference that requires Jeffrey making himself available some early mornings for video calls.
What is supposed to be a forty hour work week, for Jeffrey ends up being fifty, sometimes sixty hours. In the evenings, Jeffrey is supposed to keep in touch with urgent emails.
Jeffrey was not happy. Right now, his life was dominated by feelings of stress. He came for hypnotherapy for stress to find a way to cope with the immense pressure he was under.
My first concern was to help Jeffrey to get to a place of relaxation. At the first meeting, he was jumpy and couldn't sit still. It was clear that his body was on constant alert. This is typical of a chronic stress state.
I used a number of powerful relaxation hypnosis routines. It took Jeffrey a long time to let go of the tension he was holding and to reach a place of physical relaxation.
It wasn't until the end of the first session that he reported his heart beat and breathing slowing down. Once he got there, he found the experience very pleasant though.
I gave Jeffrey a hypnosis relaxation audio for home use and asked him to use this daily before going to sleep. I wanted his physiology to get used to winding down at least once a day. If you are exposed to chronic stress daily as Jeffrey was, you actually have to re train your mind and body to be able to relax.
The following month, Jeffrey came back a changed man. Where he was tense all through the first meeting, his face looked much more relaxed now. Even his skin tone looked healthier, much less flushed than before. I could tell he was more present.
Jeffrey reported having relaxed at home most nights, just before going to sleep. The nights he did, he slept better.
The next piece of work using hypnotherapy for stress was going to be to change lifestyle habits that promoted a chronic stress state. We had a long talk about this. While he wanted to change his life, there was also a reluctance there to let go of some habits that he perceived as a clutch.
Jeffrey's life style had suffered under the pressures of work, and this in turn was making his experience of stress worse.
Jeffrey found it hard to say no at work, going along with requests as they came in even though this would put more pressure on his own already packed schedule.
We discussed what stopped him from saying no to colleagues. Jeffrey responded that he wanted to come across as likable and helpful. When we explored what that meant to him, it emerged that deep down he was judging himself. He never felt quite good enough at work and that was, to a large part, the reason why he pushed himself so hard. I suggested hypnosis for self esteem to help him overcome this obstacle.
Hypnosis for self esteem was done using regression hypnosis. Here, Jeffrey contacted a couple of experiences he had had as a young child which resulted in him feeling that he was not lovable and not worthy.
When experiencing these painful memories in a trance state, Jeffrey was able to feel some of the emotions associated, to make sense of them and to rebuild the connection with his innermost self, committing to self love and self care. This work was done over three sessions spread over three months.
Towards the end of our time together, Jeffrey started to look for another job and had already attended an interview. He finally decided to find a job that was more suited to family life.
Finding a new job was not going to be an easy task. It was not what Jeffrey had imagined he would do four month down the line when he first attended me for hypnosis for stress reduction. His expectation had been that hypnotherapy would somehow, magically take the stress away.
In reality, hypnotherapy for stress helped Jeffrey build resilience by changing habits that promoted chronic stress into healthful habits that supported better sleep, improved mood, sharper focus and improved concentration. But naturally, hypnotherapy cannot change real life circumstances that promote stress, such as a stressful work environment.
However, unexpectedly for Jeffrey, hypnotherapy helped him improve his self esteem. As a result he developed the confidence to view his job in a different light. He now recognized that there was a lack of fulfilment and no real work life balance in the current set up, and this insight led him to look for something more family friendly and rewarding.
I hope this brief article on hypnotherapy for stress has helped you to understand what you can expect from the treatment. I do hope you will give hypnotherapy a go!
In the comments underneath, let our community know what insights you have gained about hypnotherapy and stress relief.
Here is to your health and well being.
Regards,
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