Yet another report this week demonstrates the effectiveness of hypnotherapy on the symptoms of IBS.
The Swedish study showed that 40% of people found some alleviation of their symptoms and in another study 85% of people still felt the benefits after several years.
There was a fascinating programme on the BBC this week about the Power of The Unconscious Mind. It was in the ever-brilliant Horizon strand and called Out of Control. It was looking at research into the idea that the unconscious mind controls so much of what we do. Not just the stuff we always kinda knew … but other things. It talked about learning and the way in which we begin to learn a new task consciously and then transfer that knowledge and understanding to the unconscious.
They looked at various brain patterns from unconscious knitting (yes, knitting) to golf. The most fascinating part for me was an experiment in which a researcher was able to look at images at a rate of between 5 & 10 a second and even in that short period of time he was able to take in certain patterns and information.
The researcher was looking for potential enemy sites in Afghanistan and using computers to analyse such an image would take a long, long time … using the vast power of the unconscious, he was able to notice interesting patterns in the photographs in .. literally … a split second.
Research continues but the underlying thinking is that the unconscious mind takes control of many functions and when we harness that power like we do in hypnotherapy the results can be phenomenal.
Watch the programme on the iplayer.
My initial reaction to reading this report was “No Sh*t Sherlock”. It seems the obvious that stress increases … wage freezes and relentless inflation etc … but by as much as 40%. I can’t claim to have crunched any numbers but I do have personal empirical evidence that suggests their research is broadly right. More and more people are lining up to see hypnotherapists because they are suffering from stress. And much of the stress is created by work. As more and more organisations cut back … the people left are expected to take on additional responsibility and extra work. And all under the silent threat of them potentially being next.
Often this leads to long term sickness with the label of stress or anxiety. I’ve noticed an increase in public sector workers finding it harder and harder to cope. Fortunately there are some simple techniques in hypnosis and NLP to help.
It’s an old sales adage; Usually trotted out by some over-polished, double cuffed sales manager or trainer. I once went on a sales training course and it was kindergarten … As I remember it we were expected to learn off rote some stock “killer phrases”. Imagine a class of cynical & reluctant trainees who thought they knew it all reciting, after teacher: “If I could show you a way of making this affordable, you’d be interested wouldn’t you?” And maybe someone got their knuckles wrapped for NOT nodding along to gain compliance.
And I always used to associate the “assume makes an ass of U & me” phrase with that slick superficial way. But of course the thing is that (notice my hesitation…) the bumming thing is that the phrase is true.
Assumptions are just little short cut programs that allow us to quickly categorise and make sense of stuff. and I ASSUME a lot … and I’m learning to accept that sometimes I’m wrong. Like when I had a lady in her 70s book in to see me … started formulating my intervention and kept doubting her ability to play along and let go … I was just being ageist. Turns out she really knew how to get into a good state and effortlessly accessed a trance state and easily made the adjustments. Little learn for little me.
Because these little programmes. These assumptions that can make asses of us are pretty much the basis of most presenting problems. And I think my job is to challenge clients’ assumptions and I know I begin by challenging my own.
If I had a pound for everytime I hear myself say “If I had a pound …” when I’m with a client I’d have quite a few quid. There are recurring themes. First is that one where the client says “Well the Doctor, who’s normally very good, said that he couldn’t help.” Or “Well my GP prescribed anti-depressants and they didn’t work for me” Or “He offered me some tablets to help me be calmer … but I didn’t like the idea” To those and other such client statements I hear myself saying “If I had a pound ….”.
There are some clients who present with very obvious non-medical problems that are caused by stress and I notice a pattern that this stress often creates certain symptoms and the doctors go to treat the symptom rather than thinking about going for the cause.
Hypnosis ain’t no magic bullet but I revel in the joy that a little bit of cause-related treatment brings to so many people who have suffered (Yes suffered) with something that can be binned in one or two sessions.
I don’t blame the GPs – they are expected to do their magic in a 7 or 8 minute slot and sometimes it takes a little longer to get inside the client’s world and begin to loosen their current belief. Once in there I know that I and other good practitioners can assist in making the changes and I’ll never see the client again … just their friends when they pass on my little business card.
Every so often this story comes up: Should the NHS refuse to treat obese people, smokers and other “undeserving” patients. It was in the Daily Mail this week so is most definitely true. An investigation has revealed that one in four health trusts in England bars certain operations or procedures for smokers or those deemed too fat.
It’s complex and it becomes political particularly with the current debate about the health bill going through parliament. I know I see a lot of people with weight issues and the thing is they know they are overweight, they know what they should be doing, they can usually tell me the calorific value of any named foodstuff. They also know that their overall health is at risk … And all they want is help. And they feel the NHS ain’t giving them that help.
At the end of a session with a new client I like to ask them if they got what they expected. One client last week said an emphatic ‘no’. Seeing the look of abject horror on my face he quickly qualified his remark adding that he kind of expected that stuff you see in the movies. ”You mean this sort of thing?” I said, pulling my fobwatch out from the drawer, he laughed. “Yes, I really thought it would be like that … but I’m not disappointed.”
Everyone has some kind of expectation of hypnosis. I like to think that my clients are always surprised in some way because the unexpected will stay with them. Just this morning a client answered my ‘expectation question’ with “Err Surreal, but GOOD surreal”.
Good. Surreal.
“You’re my last resort” a client said to me last week. I suddenly felt more pressure than usual. My stated aim, and the agreement I have with clients is that I will do anything and everything to help them make their changes, but that phrase “Last resort” made me worry a lot. What does it say about his faith in the hypnotic solution? Maybe he is unhelpable? Could he be just proving to himself that he is going to hang on to his problem?
This all happened in a fraction of a second and I realised that my thinking pattern was similar to many clients’. And if I continued with that mindset I might indeed be unable to help. So I asked myself a simple coaching question … and the mindset changed.
“What else could that mean?” I said internally. And a flood or more useful thoughts came to me. ”This is the answer he has searched for and his motivation is high” was the most useful … so, I figured, working with him would be easy. And it was.
Very often asking that simple question opens up a whole world of possibilities.
I saw another disturbing piece in my local paper this week. The first line says it all: “MORE people were taken to hospital with obesity-related illnesses in the North East last year than anywhere else in the country.”
It’s a cost to us all but many people feel helpless and resort to drastic measures in the form of bariatric surgery, more commonly known as “gastric band” surgery. This procedure involves cutting into the body and stapling, or banding or even removing a portion of the stomach so that patients feel full on less intake of food.
The report says over 500 people underwent this surgery last year.
I am often asked if a hypnotic version of this procedure would be effective. Like all hypnosis it depends on the individual. In many cases hypnosis can help discover and fix the underlying cause and take a client through a process which re-programmes the mind and can make them believe that their stomach is smaller.
And it’s probably better to go the hypnosis route rather than the elective surgery route with all its inherent dangers.
How did I get interested in hypnosis & cognition & the brain. I blame (thank) my old college tutor Peter Maguire. It was he who first introduced me to the work of Tony Buzan … I’ve still got the battered paperback copy of Use Your Head.
This was back in the late 70s and looking back I assume Peter was following the work of Bandler & Grinder. He was eccentric and once lectured the group about the importance of “Thinking about thinking; Learning about Learning; Thinking about learning and learning about thinking. And Think About thinking about learning …” Although it was a long time ago I still quote that, and many other of his pearls of wisdom. And thank him for starting me thinking about thinking.