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Hypnotherapy For Insomnia

Date: December 31, 2009
Author: Penny Pettman
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Having trouble sleeping can be really distressing and frustrating. You go to bed, wishing for a good nights sleep and then lay awake for hours, tossing and turning, becoming more and more anxious about getting to sleep. Or perhaps you drop off to sleep quite easily, and then awake at some unsociable hour and can’t get back to sleep. Either way, the result is that you may feel tired, emotional, irrational and not able to function in a way that you would like to in daily life.
Most people have had problems getting to sleep at some time or another and often this is due to specific worries or concerns, such as having a speech to give, an interview to face or being in new or unfamiliar surroundings. If you suffer from a sleep problem that affects your everyday life, it is advisable to first seek advice from your G.P to rule out any underlying physical cause.
As a Hypnotherapist, in Hertfordshire, I am constantly developing the tools and knowledge that I have to help people manage and overcome insomnia. On a more personal level, I myself have experienced sleep problems in the past, so this is an area, which is close to my heart. In this article I share ways in which hypnotherapy, Herts, can help people that cant sleep due to overthinking.
What I often notice about client’s, who present with sleep problems, is that they are thinkers. If I could identify, one cause in their inability to sleep well, it would be over-thinking. This may be thinking about problems from daily life that need solving or even thinking about sleeping!
Hypnotherapy, Herts can be useful in overcoming sleep problems in several ways. One way, it that hypnotherapy, can be used is to break the pattern of over-thinking at bed-time. This is important because falling off to sleep naturally and easily, is not a conscious act. Our unconscious mind is responsible for knowing how to sleep. In fact, it will have stored memories for how to sleep well and also how to sleep badly. We can’t think ourselves to sleep, in the same way that we can think our way through other problems. During hypnosis, Hypnotherapists, Herts, can help you recall times of good quality, restful sleep and make suggestions for you to experience high quality sleep again. Strategies are also taught which can help you to reduce over-thinking.
In addition, hypnotherapy can also help you to relax and let go off distracting thoughts. Learning how to let go in this way, can enable most people having sleep troubles, to sleep well again. Through hypnosis, clients are supported in planning for a good nights sleep, and cues for sleep are given and associated with activities that you usually do in order to prepare for bed. Suggestions are given in an open and permissive manner, in a way that avoids any resistance from the unconscious mind. For some people, being given suggestions to try to stay awake is the key to overcoming resistance and can break the pattern of consciously trying to sleep.
If you are having sleep problems, hypnotherapy can help you sleep naturally again. Until you have booked your session, why not try the technique below. I have personally found this technique very useful for getting off to sleep when I am kept awake by a busy mind.
Try the following: anytime a sentence begins to form in your mind, stop it in its tracks and separate and deal with each word individually. I like to imagine an invisible conveyor belt, delivering my thoughts that I can stop when I want. Take each word, and examine them one by one. You may want to ask yourself whether the word is anxiety provoking, if you are feeling anxious (once you break down the sentence into words, you can usually find that any emotional associations go) and then let the word float away, or be filed away, whatever works for you. You can then move onto the next word. This technique works by slowing down racing and repetitive thoughts and reducing the emotions they can cause. This help to induce a relaxed state, allowing sleep to happen. You may want to couple this technique with a relaxed breathing process. I find it useful to concentrate on the sound made from breathing in through your nose and out through your mouth. By focusing on the sounds only, it is possible to quiet your mind.

Hypnotherapy for Confidence:-

Date: December 31, 2009
Author: Penny Pettman
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Confidence is a commodity that not many of us possess but all of us require. You need confidence to approach the other kids in the play ground and you need confidence to appear for your first job interview. At every step of the way confidence helps you to achieve what you want provided of course that you are motivated enough to do it.

Confidence in one’s own abilities is something that is in very short supply. You will never find a confident person who does not have a basis to stand on. But there are innumerable people out there who have all the degrees and the necessary attributes to be successful people but the only thing that stands between them and success is a lack of confidence.

Being confident does not mean that you have to over bearing or that you need to be highly extroverted. Being extroverted or gregarious does not necessarily mean that you are confident. It simply means that you have certain abilities of being friendly or that you like getting attention but it certainly does not mean that you have a lot of confidence.

Confidence comes from a belief in ones self and ones own abilities. Confidence is a byproduct of the ability to see ones own true self as others see you and to see your own true self a shaving a certain amount of worth and standing in the overall scheme of things.

Being a person who has often been called confident I can safely tell you that confidence does not come from outside it comes from within. You have to believe in your self to feel confident and then and only the will you radiate true self confidence.

Hypnosis is a technique of unleashing the potential of positive thinking. Often for various reasons our own estimation of our selves as human beings is peppered with self doubt and question marks. Hypnosis helps to remove all those doubts and question marks from your mind and gives you the self confidence to reach a level of success that you always thought impossible.

A hypnotherapist helps you t o relax your mind so that you are able to reach a state of subconscious alertness. Once you are in this state of subconscious alertness you will be more receptive to suggestions that your conscious mind has been making and which your hypnotherapist will attempt to explain to you. No hypnotherapist can make you do anything that you as an individual do not want to do. No one can make you rob a bank or hold up a grocery store against your will.

Hypnosis helps you by implanting the positive seeds in your mind and by giving you the necessary impetus to achieve the most out of life. If you find that you are able to generate you r own confidence then there’s nothing like it. But for those of you who are unable to do so you need to make things absolutely clear to your self and you need to use hypnotherapy for that. So go ahead and try it. It will change you r life.

Will Everyone Have A Life Coach In The Future?

Date: December 31, 2009
Author: Penny Pettman
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Personal development has become so popular. It was only a decade ago, that people never heard of personal development. And life coaches? The only coach most people knew was the one for the favorite sport team. In this article, we will look at life coaching, and the trends towards to future.
When we look at personal development, self improvement, and life coaching, we find they fit together. A life coach generally deals with a system of improving the individual, so they can change the results.
You see, most people don’t think with that expanded view. Instead we are taught that we need to work harder to make better results. However, that is old thinking, and it looks like the world is waking up.
If we look at the personal development films around today, we see The Secret and many other films which would have been unheard of a decade or two ago. This has made a major shift in how people go through life.
More and more people are learning the benefits of personal development. The internet has supported this also. A few years ago, getting access to this great free information would have been unheard of. You may have had a magazine or two, and books, but those weren’t as accessible as going to Google and finding that information.
This has made more high achievers to look for life coaches online. And the life coaches have had a hard time finding unique individuals like you who wants to get more out of life – both professionally and personally.
This fusion has all come together to create a new industry of life coaches. And the trends speak for themselves. As more people want to get ahead in a competitive world, they need a life coach.
As the internet allows a life coach to easily gain access to those high achievers, they don’t have to charge expensive fees to cover traveling costs, and also they don’t have to have as big a marketing budget to get a client. This works best for you, and the life coach, creating a win-win situation.
Some of those in personal development are looking at a route to become a life coach. You perhaps may be in such a position yourself. And the life coaching industry now has more and more life coach certification and life coaching training that is making it easy to get into life coaching, and start your own practice.
The end result of life coaching is its impact. And the impact that life coaching can do is immense. It allows people to learn at a much faster rate. You don’t have to be stuck in a formal learning method, but can simply get help in the areas you need, and find the solutions you need now.

Depression Hypnotherapy

Date: December 30, 2009
Author: Penny Pettman
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Depression, as understood within depression hypnotherapy, is not a passing low mood, nor is it a sign of personal weakness or a condition that sufferers can spontaneously “snap out of”. It can destroy lives – not only the life of the sufferer themselves, but also the lives of those close to them.

Depression comes in many different forms, and from a wide range of causes. Some types of depression run in families, indicating genetic pre-disposition or psychosocial conditioning. Other forms can be triggered by organic causes, as a reaction to medication, a chemical imbalance, or result from interpretations of past experiences.

The cost of depression in human suffering cannot be over stated. People with depression typically demonstrate persistant sad or anxious moods, experience low self-confidence, negative thoughts, feelings of hopelessness, helplessness, emptiness, guilt and worthlessness. They often display a loss of interest in activities that were once enjoyed, demonstrate increased fatigue, have difficulty concentrating, remembering and making decisions. In extreme cases, depression can result in thoughts of death or suicide.

At a physical level, depression can affect sleep, either difficulty in getting to sleep, early-morning awakening, or a desire to oversleep. It can also affect the appetite leading to weight loss or weight gain. Long term depression tends to lower the immune system and typically results in persistent symptoms such as headaches, digestive disorders and even chronic pain.

But much of this suffering is unnecessary. Appropriate treatment can help most people who suffer from depression. In Western societies, 7 to 12 per cent of men experience diagnosable depression, and 20 to 25 per cent of women. But, many people with depression do not recognise that it is a treatable illness, and so endure life without receiving help. The first step to getting appropriate treatment is to seek medical advice. Treatment choice will then depend on the outcome of that medical evaluation.

Depression hypnotherapy, a very specific and enduringly effective form of ‘talking therapy’, has been shown to be a highly effective treatment for overcoming depression and helping people find lasting emotional well-being.

Christine Woolfenden, clinical hypnotherapist of Echelon Associates Hypnotherapy Practice (www.echelonassociates.co.uk) employs depression hypnotherapy to help individuals understand the source of their own unique emotional difficulties. Hypnosis is used to encourage relaxation, to focus the attention and then to identify and explore the causes, de-sensitise memories of the past, address the symptoms, and control the physical, emotional and cognitive responses to the triggers as they present themselves in the individual’s life.

Depression hypnotherapy offers people the opportunity to identify and develop their own inner resources to lead a more positive, emotionally fulfilling life, counteracting the negative physical side effects of depression, rationalising self-defeating thoughts and beliefs, re-programming the mind and body to respond positively to situations, people and events, turning problems into goals, building self-confidence and feelings of self-worth along the way.

Chris responds to her clients with integrity and respect, taking a compassionate yet goal directed approach to applying depression hypnotherapy to facilitate lasting emotional health.

Stress Hypnotherapy

Date: December 30, 2009
Author: Penny Pettman
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Stress, in the form of pressure, can be useful. It can focus the mind, improve motivation and, ultimately, lead to goal attainment. In this positive light it tends to be referred to as ‘ustress’. But, excessive pressure over prolonged periods of time can lead to feelings of distress.

Stress can be result from any number and combination of sources such as work demands, insecurities, change and uncertainties, long-term pain or ill-health, family expectations and financial concerns.

No one person’s cause is quite the same as the next. People interpret and react to things differently; what one person might consider an exciting challenge, another might find altogether overwhelming. Whether a person will react negatively or not to specific situations, people or events, depends largely upon their life experiences; what has happened to them in the past, how they have interpreted those events, and, most importantly of all, the nature of the emotions around the stored memories of those events.

Too much stress experienced over prolonged periods of time can be damaging both physiologically and psychologically. Individual’s body responses to stress (the fight and flight response) tend to vary, but typically people are left feeling physically tense, unable to sleep, out of control, feeling helpless, unable to cope and vulnerable to ill-health. Often emotions, perceptions of self-confidence and feelings of self-worth are also negatively affected, ultimately influencing choices and behaviour.

Christine Woolfenden DCH DHP reg. GHR, clinical hypnotherapist of Echelon Associates Hypnotherapy Practice (Charlbury, Oxfordshire) offers a holistic approach to helping individuals manage stress more effectively; the Stress Hypnotherapy Treatment Programme.

At the outset, the individual’s unique situation is assessed to identify and explore the causes, symptoms and triggers of stress as they are experienced. The physical, emotional, cognitive and behavioural ramifications of that stress are investigated in depth.

The Stress Hypnotherapy Treatment Programme employs deep relaxation hypnosis to lower the physical stress response and counteract the damaging side effects of stress, easing away tension to allow the body the opportunity to rest and repair and so operate optimally. By anchoring the physical and psychological sensations of deep relaxation, people are taught how to re-create those feelings whenever desirable or necessary. Direct positive suggestion and post hypnotic suggestion are used to re-educate the cognitive response to stress, and to instil alternative, more effective ways of dealing with specific stressors as they arise, so extending the ustress comfort zone.

Memories from the past that are interfering with the present are re-visited and re-framed so that the emotional and cognitive influence on the present and future are de-sensitised.

The Stress Hypnotherapy Treatment Programme also applies techniques such as mental rehearsal, creative imagery, future pacing and pseudo-orientation in time to reduce stress, build confidence and boost self-esteem.

At Echelon Associates, Christine Woolfenden www.echelonassociates.co.uk offers a Stress Hypnotherapy treatment programme to promote positive physical and psychological change in response to perceived stress in an individual’s life.

Getting More Out Of Life With Life Coaching

Date: December 29, 2009
Author: Penny Pettman
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Are you a goal setter? Are you a self starter? Do you feel geared for success? In life we find that coaches are present wherever there is high performance. From business men and woman to actors and actresses, and even athletes, they all rely on coaching. As you read this article, you will discover how life coaching can transform your life for the better.
The question is why do performance people keep performing ever better? We see Olympic athletes have coaches, and we see business people in the world’s largest corporations have life coaches.
Could continued success be down to having a life coach? It seems obvious, and it could be making an imprint that a life coach really could make a difference. But, how exactly could a life coach help you?
If you are like me, you are a goal setter. You set goals, and work about achieving them. You succeed, and now it is time for new goals. It seems like a basic process, and I guess it is. However, in practice it can seem a little more difficult.
We can say a day happens in 24 hours. But, life is not so simple. When you are stuck in the middle of achieving a goal, and problems present themselves, it can be hard to find direction, and achieve the success you seek.
Sometimes the goal takes longer than we anticipated. Luckily a life coach can really be our greatest asset at these times. These people not only have a strong personal experience of situations, they also have the added advantage of having a broader knowledge of situations, through coaching other people.
This third point view can be invaluable in practice, and can result in bigger breakthroughs. The time to achievement can be reduced also, and success can be felt sooner. As the life coach offers there advice, it offers a different point of view.
As you progress you will find that you can achieve so much more. And as life coaching deals with not only a certain area, but as a coach in life, they can generally help you with several areas of your life.
This is a big bonus; though many life coaches will specialize in a certain field. And here is where you will need to look at your needs before looking to find a life coach. There are many life coaches, and you want to get the best life coach for your needs.
Researching several life coaches is the best option, and considering that many will offer some free information or a free consultation, you can easily find the best life coach that will help you not only achieve more of that latent potential, but also achieve your best.

Hypnotherapy For Changing Habits

Date: December 27, 2009
Author: Penny Pettman
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Hypnotherapists utilise hypnosis to help people solve personal problems. Hypnosis is a state of mind, typified by deep relaxation, a narrowed focus and heightened sensory awareness. This state of mind occurs naturally and people slide in and out of this state, known as ‘trance’, all the time, in everyday life.
Examples of trance states include fantasising about someone you are attracted to, becoming deeply absorbed in reading a book, being anxious about an event causing you to re-live what could go wrong over and over in your head and daydreaming. As you may see from the examples given, trance states can be positive or negative, depending on what is being focused on.
Hypnotherapy is based on the philosophy, that trance states can be helpful and utilised to bring about positive change. This is because, when a person is deeply relaxed, as they are during trance, access to the unconscious mind is enabled. Hypnotherapists believe that learning, behaviour and change, occur at an unconscious level.
Categorising the mind into unconscious and conscious is just a conceptual model, a way of describing different aspects of the mind. The concept of unconscious and conscious mind is generally accepted in the western world. These different aspects of the mind are believed to have different functions. For example, the conscious mind is logical, rational, and sequential in thinking. It is also analytical, it uses words and numbers and stores short-term memories. The unconscious mind is intuitive, non-sequential in thinking, more creative, uses symbols and feelings and stores long-term memories.
If you imagine your mind as operating on a sliding scale, at one end, you have highly alert states, towards the other end, you have more relaxed states such as daydreaming and further towards the this end still, deep trance and finally sleep.
Often when people present with problems at Hypnotherapy Herts, they have attempted to solve their problem through conscious effort and have struggled with this. For example, the insomniac, who finds that trying to consciously fall off to sleep, just seems to make things worse. At hypnotherapy Herts, the hypnotherapist will use hypnotherapy to gain access to the unconscious mind. This type of therapy can be very useful for treating habits. For example, there are often unconscious issues associated with smoking that are best dealt with through hypnotherapy. Most people do not consciously decide to continue poisoning and damaging themselves through smoking on a day to day basis.
The conscious mind, although strong at logical thinking and the other functions mentioned, tends to be much more rigid in thinking. The unconscious mind is much more flexible and as it stores all your life’s learnings, it is in the unconscious mind where habits are created and maintained. Through hypnotherapy Herts, the hypnotherapist is able to make habit changes much easier and more naturally, by working with the unconscious mind.

Hypnosis and Hypnotherapy Training – Learn the Arts of Hypnosis at Home

Date: December 27, 2009
Author: Penny Pettman
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There are many applications for hypnosis and hypnotherapy training. Among the uses are helping an individual to deal with breaking a bad habit, such as smoking or biting the nails. While hypnosis training in a formal setting may be desirable when major issues are at stake, there is the ability to learn basic in the home. Here are some examples of way to get training to aid in simple projects.

Self-study is always a great way to gain an understanding and appreciation of just about any subject. This is certainly true with hypnosis and hypnotherapy training. To this end, there a number of books and study guides that can be purchased and used to learn about the basics of these disciplines. The advantage is that the study takes place in the home and within the schedule of the student. There are no classes to attend, and no degrees to obtain. The end result is a broad understanding of hypnosis and hypnotherapy methods and applications that may be employed for anything from easing a troubled mind to helping to break an undesirable habit.

There are online courses that provide hypnotherapy training as well. Most of these are unaccredited, and have the luxury of being available when and as the individual has time to study. Informative and helpful, these courses are designed for persons who want to learn more about hypnotherapy and its applications.

Some professional hypnotherapists also offer introductory home courses that are helpful in hypnosis and hypnotherapy training. The advantage to this approach is that there is interaction with a mentor, who is there to answer questions and help steer the student away from any conclusions that may not be appropriate for the subject matter. While these courses do not generally involve any type of certification, they are helpful in getting a solid understanding of hypnotherapy and what it can and cannot do.

Hypnotherapy For Confidence Building

Date: December 27, 2009
Author: Penny Pettman
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Confidence can be hard to pin down at times! Most people have had the experience of observing someone they know at a party or in a work situation, communicating with ease and naturally, without a hint of self-consciousness and have thought, “Why cant that be me?”
People look to hypnotherapy, Herts for all types of confidence problems. It may be that you lack confidence within specific relationships or situations, you may want to be more assertive or to become a better public speaker. Perhaps you want to be able to share some of the knowledge and ideas that you hold back because of lack of confidence, or you find it difficult to speak up in front of groups of people. Some people feel they lack confidence in all areas of their lives. All these experiences are common and can be helped by hypnotherapy, Herts.
Of course, in life there will always be natural differences among people. Some people just seem to be more introverted, whilst others seem to enjoy the limelight and draw others towards them with ease. Whether confidence is a problem is self-defined by the individual. If it impacts on your life in subtle or more obvious ways and you feel frustrated or held back by lack of confidence, then hypnotherapy may benefit you.
Hypnotherapists use hypnosis to bring about positive therapeutic changes in order to help people solve problems, such as lack of confidence. Hypnosis is an experience characterised by deep relaxation, a concentrated focus and increased sensory alertness. This state of mind occurs spontaneously and people slip in and out of this state, known as ‘trance’, all the time, in everyday life. Examples of trance states include fantasising about someone you are attracted to, becoming deeply immersed in a book, being anxious about an event causing you to re-live what could go wrong over and over in your head and daydreaming. As you may see from the examples given, trance states can be positive or negative, depending on what is being focused on.
Hypnotherapists induce deeply relaxing trance states because when a person is deeply relaxed, access to the unconscious mind is enabled. The hypnotic process is wonderfully pleasant and relaxing, which in itself is beneficial for people who lack confidence and experience stress and worry on a regular basis. Being free of stress and worry, during the hypnotic process, allows the therapists to pack your unconscious mind with positive suggestions of confidence. Whilst in this state you also get to practice situations in which you will act with confidence and conviction, through a process known as visualisation.
Hypnotherapy can also be effective in removing negative associations that you have developed between situations and feeling unconfident and it can also be used to remove and free you from negative emotions from the past. Sometimes self-esteem can be related to childhood experiences and these can be dealt with through at Hypnotherapy, Herts.
During your hypnotherapy treatment, the hypnotherapist will also work with you to achieve confidence through a technique called anchoring, which involves learning to develop an association between an external trigger, and a emotional response. Anchors develop all the time in everyday life as the human mind attempts to understand your environment by looking for patterns between things. Not all anchors are positive. People learn to make negative associations between things, such as feeling anxious or worried when they are required to give a presentation to colleagues. Your hypnotherapist can work with you to remove negative anchors.
If you are fed up with being held back or not being able to do what you dream of doing because of lack of confidence, book your appointment with a hypnotherapist now!

Life Coaching – a Coaching for a Better Life

Date: December 27, 2009
Author: Penny Pettman
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To start with, let us first do away with a few doubts that people usually have about life coaching. Let us see, why life coaching is generally so sought after and why in the first place does it work? Firstly a life coach is someone who lets you be yourself and tries to connect with you in a way that you desperately need at some critical moment in your life. He/she makes you realize your own worth and at the same time you feel a certain responsibility to carry out what the coach has asked of you. The coach helps you to analyze the situation by following a certain detached approach so that you see it in a way that you have never done before. They do no tell you how to live but tell you how you should capitalize on all that you have at the present, and how you can multiply the same in the future.

People confuse life coaching with counseling. It should be noted that counseling deals with a certain calamity in your life like accidents, breakups, divorces, etc. Hence counselors try to find answers from your past but life coaches focus on your current and future situations. Coaches make one aware of their situation but counselors try to dig out answers to your problems from your past. Also counseling is needed when the person is almost unaware of what is exactly wrong with him/her or is not even in a position to fathom the gravity of the situation and the need to set it right. On the other hand people who come for coaching are fairly happy in their lives and want to seek a betterment of it or realize that the barrier they have is actually not too big to be unmanageable. Another thing confused with life coaching is therapy. Therapy in reality is some sort of treatment that one needs to overcome some kind of trauma. But people seeking life coaching are in perfect health and just have to realize, that there are certain things in their life that need some attention on their part. Therapy sets the problems correct but life coaching aims at finding new ways to move ahead and be successful.

Life coaches help you to find for you where exactly your heart lies, what you are really good at, what motivates you, what angers you and how you can deal efficiently with it, what holds you back and how you can work on it, what is it that is not letting you progress in your business, what new strategies, planning, time-management, people management skills you need to employ to achieve greater heights, what you can do to maintain healthy relationships, what your secret desires are and how you can tap your potential to the fullest and aim for better and newer avenues. These and many more things are what the coaches help you in. Coaching is very common in the IT sector where the pressures are sky high with deadlines, work-pressure, bad eating and sitting habits, irregular timings taking a toll on performance in work and everyday lives. The life coaches help young people to find a reason and purpose in their lives. They help people to overcome stage fear and social anxiety, leave smoking, drinking, and so on, do away with their hidden fears and guilt, depression, etc. Life coaching makes one come to terms with the fact that it is we, who are refusing to move ahead in life. It gives a new outlook about yourself and instills confidence in you, that you can achieve anything that you set your sight upon. Life coaches help to get some discipline in our lives to extract better from every opportunity. And also to find opportunities that lie hidden in front of you –be it in personal or in professional life.

So it is never too late to go in for life coaching. If you think you want the maximum out of life-go find a life coach and fill your life with a sweet fragrance of success, bliss and contentment.