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proprioception exercise

Proprioception exercise the forgotten sense

    If you want to expand your sensitivity try this Proprioception exercise. We are accustomed to think that we have only five senses, but we actually have many more. For example, you have a sense of balance, a sense of heat and sense of proximity. One of the pervasive senses that we use all the time but people sometimes overlook is the sense of proprioception. This is the sense of knowing the spatial relationship between parts of your own body.

    Proprioception exercise increases sensitivity

    To test your own sense of proprioception try the following exercise. Close your eyes. Then extend one arm and then wave your hand around at random in circles and jab it out all over the place, move your hand above your head and behind your back. Keep moving your hand around and at the same time move your head, shake and nod and turn it in circles. Then move your hand to your face and place your index finger right on the tip of your nose. Most people can do that with absolute accuracy, even though it does not involve any of the other senses. With practice you can improve the sensitivity of this sense. For example, become aware of the position of inside of your left knee. Then focus your attention on that area and imagine that it is become hot, or that you can feel a tingle in that area.

    Proprioception exercise feedback from body muscles

    This ability can improve with practice. You can then try to become aware of your own abdominal muscles, or your back muscles. Getting in touch with your own body can help with sports performance and with easing muscle pains. Once you can identify will all the major parts of your body, relaxation become much easier. And relaxation of the body leads to relaxation of anxieties so it is worth exploring this ability we all have.

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    stop stuttering script

    Stop stuttering script

      A client emailed me to ask: can you sell me a good script to stop somebody stuttering? I do not have a stop stuttering script. I have dealt with stuttering before and improved the guy's speech tremendously, but in my opinion using a script is not the way to deal with stuttering.  

      Origin of stuttering

      Stuttering is the result of childhood trauma. A some point,  the child was made to feel nervous in some situation.  The child then got into the habit of being overwhelmed with nervousness in more and more situations. I once knew a man with a stutter who was brought up in France. He moved to the USA as an adult. He stuttered all his life in French, but had no stutter when he spoke English.
      The correct way to treat stuttering is removing the cause of the chronic nervousness. This can be done by several hypnotherapy methods. Maybe most often by regression to cause, and you don't need a script for that.

      That got me thinking about what other things scripts are not good for. The main class I suppose are substance abuses. They can all be helped, even stopped by hypnosis. But in most cases a script is not the right way to go. In my view all addictions are due to underlying unhappiness. People take drugs to escape from the way they feel now.

      No Stop Stuttering Script

      The correct approach is to find out why they are unhappy, why think they are not good enough, not wanted, whatever... and treat that. It will take several sessions. Once you have cleared whatever their particular unhappiness is that is driving them to take the drugs, they will stop by themselves. They won't need what the drugs are giving them any more. But every case is different and has to be understood differently. You can't use a standard script.

      What other common conditions are not treatable with a standard script?

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      Needle phobia removal

      Needle Phobia removal

        Blood/needles/injury phobia

        I had an interesting client today. He came to see me about social anxiety. He is about to start a new job and he is terrified that he will get so anxious that he will faint and then lose the job.

        I asked him if he had ever fainted and he told me that he had fainted about every two years since he was four years old. Now, the only thing with a psychological cause that makes you faint is blood/needles/injury phobia, so I was intrigued.

        I asked him about the fainting and sure enough, every instance was related to something medical. His last one was a year ago when he fainted in his doctor's office. The trigger was being shown an x-ray of his own chest. He also said that there were hundreds of other situations where he felt faint. He felt more and more anxious if he thought that he could not get away easily.

        After more discussion I established that he in fact had two issues. He had the medical phobia, and he had a more generalized anxiety of looking silly in public by panicking.

        I think that what has happened is that he has been suffering from a genuine physical problem, the blood phobia, that is making him faint. All the rest of his problems stem from a very understandable fear that he might faint in public.

        Needle Phobia removal

        The solution was simple. I taught him how to squat down and pull in his stomach to increase his blood pressure a little. I then tested him by talking about broken bones sticking out of someone's leg until he showed distress. Then I got him to do the squat. He reported that the feeling of faintness really did go away.

        So he had learned to control it in one way. I then got him sit down again and taught him how to tense his abdominal muscles and increase his blood pressure. Once again this banished the fainting feeling. He then began to realize that he did have control of this thing, for the first time in his life.

        All I had to do then was to teach him a bit of NLP visualization. That way he could change how he saw future events, instead of letting his anxiety run away with him. And that was all it took to change his outlook on life.

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        what they don't want

        It’s what they don’t want that is important

          I had a question from a hypnotherapist:

          What do you recommend would be the best script to use for Career Goal Attraction and also, the same client opening themselves to Attracting a new boyfriend, or girlfriend.

          Whenever a client comes with a problem, the therapist really needs to think about what the client is asking for, and why? What they ask for is not always what they need. The therapist always should consider the other side of the coin. It is often a case not of what they want, but what they don't want. 

          People want to lose weight, but never stop to ask why they have to eat. People smoke, but don't ask themselves what they get from it. Every behavior has a reason. No behavior in a normal person is random. And very often, the behavior is a reaction to that reason, without ever having the courage to tackle the reason head-on.

          You have to get the client to ask themselves 'what is it that is stopping you having what you want?', and work on that.

          In this case, the client wants to be open to attracting a romantic partner. The right question is therefore: "what do you think is stopping you?" You cannot influence the actions of others, you can only change your own actions. And what your actions will be depend on how you feel about yourself. How you feel about yourself depends on your own beliefs about who you are. 

          Therefore the therapist should focus on investigating what the client is afraid of, what they think is wrong with them. In almost every case it will be quite clear: lack of self esteem, lack of confidence, or long term anxiety.

          The correct approach would therefore be based on the script that most closely matches their particular circumstances.

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          experts never fail

          Seems experts never fail?

            It seems that experts never fail. Over the summer holidays I have had the time to look at some hypnosis videos, mostly on Youtube. (I fear I am getting addicted to Youtube. Is there a name for that?) I didn't have any particular plan, just following links from one site to another and watching whatever was recommended as the next video.

            More fame less evidence

            What struck me after several hours of video watching was that the more famous the hypnotist the less likely they were to actually test their client for hypnosis. It seemed to me that the one thing they all had in common was total self admiration. Every one of them was so ready to believe in their own techniques that it never occurred to them that it might not actually have worked.

            There was pushing and swaying and fast talking and slow talking, but every one of them told the client to close their eyes. And as long as the client's eyes were closed they kept on at whatever they wanted to do. It seemed that having your eyes closed is taken as positive proof that trance has been induced and that the client is taking it all in.

            So where's the proof?

            It was made even more obvious to me to see that many of the subjects were clearly not in trance, but neither the subject nor the audience felt brave enough to challenge the instructor. These instructors charge a lot of money for these training sessions, yet if it wasn't for the credulous participants who don't know any better, most of them would be out of a job.

            Next time you have a travelling showman come round your way, challenge him to demonstrate the signs of hypnotic response to prove the client is in trance. Would make for a much more interesting demo than most of the ones I have been watching.

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            hypnosis videos

            How true are hypnosis videos?

              How true are hypnosis videos?

              During this break I have had time to explore some of the hypnosis videos that I would not normally get round to viewing. You always learn more that just the surface story, don't you? Most of the videos were of teaching seminars located in various hotel rooms, but some were introduced as being in the hypnotist's home, often with family members and pets in the frame.

              What I thought was really interesting was the contrast between what was being said, and the results, as evidenced by the quality of the homes on show. In every case the 'world famous' hypnotist was telling the viewer how to become a top hypnotist. In many cases how to become successful in life. But the background showed clearly that the hypnotist in the video was not successful. He was in fact living in a rather ordinary home with none of the symbols of success expected of a 'world famous' seminar leader.

              Show me the money

              You have to wonder exactly how effective the product they are selling is. As usual, there was no proof of any kind offered, other than unsubstantiated stories about someone somewhere who made miraculous recoveries or became global business leaders. And thinking about it, if these trainers and gurus were actually any good, why would they not have made all the money they possibly need and retired? Why do they have to keep pumping out videos?

              I remember speaking to Andrew Newton, a UK stage hypnotist who travels the world about whether you can make a living in hypnosis. He said, and he has been in the business for thirty years, that the only people who made any money out of hypnosis in the UK was himself and Paul McKenna. I think the same sort of truth applies in other countries. Ninety eight percent of stage hypnotists spend their time night after night doing a two hour show at a school hall or the back room of some bar in a minor town to an audience of between twenty and a hundred before spending the day travelling on to the next town and doing it all again. I don't envy them their lifestyle.

              Maybe we should ask every hypno guru to show us the money before giving them any of ours?

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              smoking after pregnancy

              Starting smoking after pregnancy

                I have spent a lot of time talking to people who want to stop smoking. Nothing unusual about that, but I have a deep curiosity about why people keep doing things that they know are bad for them. I really got into psychology because I could not understand my own behaviour. I then widened my interest into examining why other people behave the way they do.

                I have read all about addiction, compulsion, attention deficit, and all the other explanations for why people persist in self-destructive behaviour when they clearly do not have to.

                Excuses for starting smoking 

                So when I meet a smoker, I am always interested in their view of why they smoke. I'm even more interested when I find someone who has succeeded in stopping smoking, and then starts again. I have never come up with a satisfactory answer as to why someone who has stop smoking for a year or two years would then decide to take it up again. They know they don't like it, it was usually really unpleasant to stop, and the reasons they give for starting again are way too trivial to be any kind of rational explanation. I have had people tell me that they started smoking again because "I just wanted to see if I had really stopped". Another person told me, "I just wanted to see what they tasted like", despite having smoked for 20 years and being in absolutely no doubt as to what they tasted like.

                Starting smoking after pregnancy

                Today I spoke with a young woman who said that she is unable to stop smoking. I asked her if she had ever stop smoking. She replied "yes, when I was pregnant. I stopped smoking for nine months." I said to her "and then you just started smoking again?" "Yes. I wanted to."

                I said to her "so why did you start smoking again?". She said, "Because the baby made me stop smoking. I didn't want to stop. I was forced to stop smoking because of the baby. So when I had the baby I went back to smoking again."

                I have heard this several times from women who successfully stopped smoking during their pregnancy, but started smoking fairly soon after their baby was born. This behaviour totally disproves theories that smoking is an addiction. These women had given up for eight and nine months so there was nothing there to be addicted to. All the nicotine had left the body long ago. The key to smoking in these cases seems to be all about the individual's view of who they are. It seems that there was a residual resentment towards the baby, that they had been forced to do something they didn't want to do, and were exercising their rights not to have other people tell them what to do.

                Identifying the causes of starting smoking after pregnancy

                It seems to me that in these cases smoking is tied up with their identity, with ideas of personal choice, refusing to do what other people tell them to do. They are quite happy to give up smoking while they are pregnant. They find it fairly easy to do. It is just something that they have to do at that stage in their life. But as soon as they exit that stage they want to reassert their own personality.

                I am guessing that smoking is tied up with their own self-image of independence, possibly rebellion.

                The challenge for stop smoking hypnosis is how to change that feeling into something positive.

                Improve your induction success by personalizing

                  Get the client to design their own induction.

                  There is a simple way to improve your induction success when doing hypnotic trance. Before the hypnosis session starts, ask your client to describe some outdoor place where they might relax while watching some clouds. It can be a real place they remember, or some imaginary place where they could really relax totally. They might be lying, or sitting, or even steering a boat. Leave it open to them, as long as it is a place where they can imagine relaxing easily and deeply. You can ask them for it during the interview, or you can give them some notice and get them to write it out and bring it with them to your session. The idea is to get something that is unique to each client, and to match the induction to exactly how they would like it to be.

                  Use that special location to personalize the experience

                  You can then use that as the core of your induction. Get the client to close their eyes and talk them through relaxing their arms and legs. As they relax their body, do a count down and take them down stairs, suggesting that with each step they are relaxing more and more. Finally, suggest that at the bottom of the steps there is a way out and they are in their favourite relaxing place. They are watching the clouds go by and letting go of all tensions and worries.

                  Then tell them to focus on one particular cloud. That cloud will slowly descend and surround them. They will begin to feel themselves becoming absorbed into the cloud, becoming weightless, and losing all connection with the earth around them. Embellish and expand on the idea depending on what their chosen relaxing place offers.

                  Then you can suggest that they are transported in the cloud to wherever you want to start the therapy. Or simply state that now they can see a screen showing them doing something, or some other visualization.

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                  Gambling addiction

                  Hypnosis for gambling addiction

                    I had a client today for gambling addiction. She told me that she binges on the slot machines, and has done for years.
                    She described a pattern of behaviour in which about once a week she just could not resist going to the slot machines (called pokey machines in this country) and spending hours on it. Once she has started she feels unable to stop. When she runs out of money she would just go and get some more. She has spent up to $2000 in one night.
                    She has no interest in horseracing or any other kind of gambling. At other times she has actually no interest in it, and feels no pull towards it. It's just that something happens and she has to go and use the pokey machines.

                    Is gambling addiction the wrong diagnosis?

                    This sounded exactly to me like a black and white thinking. I got her to look at the symptoms of dysthymia, laid out in a grid that I use. She looked at it and said "I am all over this. Just about everything listed here applies to me. "
                    I explained that she was self-medicating by going to the pokies. Every time she felt overwhelmed by all the other things in her life she went to the pokies. The noise, the lights, the music, the focus attention – all of this took her away from her problems. It made her forget all about her issues. She agreed that that was exactly what she was doing.

                    We spent the rest of the session talking about dysthymia. She seemed very open to it, and very relieved to finally find an answer. She said that she had been to another hypnotherapist. After a few sessions she sensed that that other therapist was getting annoyed with her because she could not find anything in childhood which explained her gambling addiction.

                    After she had gone, I thought about the foolishness of that other therapist continuing to press for a reason when there is no reason. There is the famous quote that "to the man who has only a hammer, everything looks like a nail."  I think that it is a problem for hypnotherapists who think that everything must be dealt with by hypnosis. There are many things that we are presented with, that do not come from childhood and cannot be reached by regression. I believe that in many cases what is called "gambling addiction" in fact is a part of a wider depressive illness. With this client I'm going to deal with the causes of the depressive thinking, and deal with the gambling problem that way.

                    In our next session I'm going to teach her self hypnosis so that she can learn to cope with her anxieties. Then I will teach her some thinking exercises so that she can learn to deal with the destructive thoughts. And finally I will show her how to deal with the childhood issues she came from the fact that her mother also had black and white thinking and took it out on the children.

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                    Enough exercise

                    Are you getting enough exercise?

                      Stress is probably the most common problem in modern life. And yet, how to deal with stress is well-known and easily achieved. You avoid stress by getting enough sleep, keeping your attitude positive, and working towards your long-term goals. 

                      The question of course, is how to achieve those three things? It has been proven over and over that the answer is exercise. Regular consistent exercise is possibly the single most important thing in keeping your mind and body healthy.

                      Benefits of enough exercise

                      Exercise does not only benefit the body. It also has a direct effect on the mind. Regular exercise lift your mood, and leaves you feeling relaxed and calm afterwards. When you feel relaxed and calm, you are better able to deal with stressors as they arrive.

                      A healthy body actually leads to a healthy mind. Exercise releases any emotional tensions held in your muscles. Releasing muscular tension releases anxiety. Relaxed muscles help you sleep better. Relaxed muscles prevent you generating the hormones associated with stress. Serotonin, dopamine, noradrenalin and other hormones all affect our perceptions of stress.

                      Those hormones enter the bloodstream, are taken to the brain, and make you feel worse. They maintain the primitive fight or flight responses in your brain, and keep you keyed up, ready to take on any threat. Constant anxiety tends to fill your mind with negative thoughts. These feed on themselves, make you more anxious, because more stress hormones, which then makes you feel even worse.

                      The way out of this vicious cycle is to get regular strenuous exercise. Exercise creates a different set of hormones that tend to make you feel good. Feeling good, makes you think positive thoughts. Positive thoughts lead to positive attitudes. And your positive attitude makes you immune to the things that normally trigger stress in you.

                      Most people just do not get enough exercise.

                      Do you?

                      As well as telling your clients how to improve their mental balance, perhaps you should be prescribing a healthy dose for yourself as well?

                       

                       

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