The body is like a puppet in the hands of the mind, the puppeteer. The problem is that the mind is split so the puppet’s actions and conditions seem erratic.
The body reflects the state of mind so the more conflicted the mind the worse the state. This is why illness exists. All illness emanates from the puppeteer so all illness is mental illness. The mind projects itself on to its own body and the bodies of others. This has its advantages and disadvantages depending on what is being projected.
Do Not Judge Lest You Be Judged
As a Hypno-Psychotherapist it does not serve me or my clients to project my illness on to those who seek my help. The only way for me not to project my own illness on to my client is for me to suspend judgement and seek agreement. By deliberately choosing not to judge and actively seeking common ground for me and my client to agree upon the ego is circumvented.
Resolving Conflict Through Agreement
Rather than attacking the client’s self concept I question the beliefs my clients hold about themselves. Questioning a belief with sincere interest will not be perceived as an attack especially if rapport exists between client and therapist. In fact the therapist affords the client the opportunity to reveal his self concept and all its defences. When eventually the client can trust the therapist enough, he will endow the therapist with the characteristics and qualities of the illness he suffers from. This will be symbolised by someone from the client’s past with whom issues still remain unresolved.
We must keep in mind here that when this stage is reached the therapist may also be doing the same to his client. Freud describes this as transference and counter transference. The client is now afforded the opportunity to work through a conflict in mind that is projected on to the therapist. Conflict can only be resolved through agreement. The therapist and client then seek a goal they can both agree upon.
Seeking the Guidance of Higher Consciousness in Therapy
For the therapist to impose his own agenda at this point would be to allow his or his client’s ego to direct the therapy. Since it is ego that created the conflict in the first instance allowing ego to direct the therapeutic process would only complicate matters and cause further conflict.
If on the other hand client and therapist seek the guidance and direction from a consciousness higher than their own, then the ego of each has no way in. Calling on this Higher Consciousness is the most important ingredient and essential for true healing free of ego.
The way I do this is to set up a triangle of light between me and my client with the Higher Consciousness at the apex. I don’t tell my clients in the beginning I am doing this until a stage is reached in the therapy when I seek their active cooperation in seeking the guidance of the Higher Consciousness. I usually devote a full session to this. The book ‘Cutting the Ties the Bind’ by Phyllis Krystal describes this process in detail.
Once the client joins the triangle and actively seeks the direction of the Higher Consciousness the therapy takes on a whole new perspective because it becomes far easier to reach agreement without the ego of either interfering.
The degree to which therapist and his client agree determines the degree of healing achieved. The goal becomes the goal set by the Higher Consciousness and normally lies outside the conscious awareness of both client and therapist.
When psychotherapy is approached in this way I have always found it to produce miraculous results.
Catharsis and the release of repressed psychic energy
The essence of repression as described by Sigmund Freud consists simply in the act of turning – and keeping – something away from the conscious. Repressed material exerts continuous pressure from the subconscious mind, where it resides, toward the conscious mind which repressed it in the first place. This continuous and constant psychic pressure from the subconscious has to be held in equilibrium by an equal and opposing constant unrelenting counter pressure. It follows then that to maintain a repression requires a constant expenditure of energy.
Freud insisted that the purpose of repression is the avoidance of what he termed unpleasure. The repression consisting of thoughts and feelings will have done its job if the negative feelings associated with it are not experienced. Therefore to release a repression those very feelings one sought to escape from must be fully experienced and the thoughts filed as experiences.
Once filed as an experience without the emotive charge the once repressed experience can now be used like any other experience to help us cope should the same or similar challenge ever face us again in the future.
Without the necessary emotional resources being available and on file in the subconscious a child experiencing a traumatic event may find the normal mental processes being suspended. This will of course occur unconsciously and the event is said to be repressed. This is a survival mechanism used by a mind overwhelmed by an experience that cannot be be dealt with at the time. The event is not forgotten but kept in a kind of ‘cold storage’ to be dealt with when the necessary mental and emotional resources have been acquired. In order to ensure that the repressed material is not forgotten or ignored forever the gap, in what was supposed to be learned from the experience, is replaced by a physical symptom somewhat like a calling card.
What happens in session
In Analytical Hypnotherapy the client is guided into a relaxed state of mind with conscious analytical mind in suspension. While in this light state of hypnosis the client is then instructed to report whatever thoughts, feelings and memories that emerge. The client is reminded to report what emerges in the order in which it is revealed and to refrain from excluding any of the associations on the grounds that they are judged too trivial, irrelevant, shameful or secret. Success of the therapy depends on the client complying with this fundamental rule to reveal everything that emerges.
It is rare for a therapist to come across a client who does not try to reserve some area for himself – a no-go area if you like. Therapy is prevented access to this area of the mind classed as off-limits. This is done subconsciously by the client in an attempt to protect the repression and is is called resistance by Freud.
Resistance is an inevitable and important part of the therapeutic process. It is disappointing to a therapist if unable to provoke these resistances and demonstrate them to the client. In fact overcoming these resistances is an essential function of therapy.
The most important ingredient in Hypno-Analysis or Analytical Hypnotherapy is rapport between client and therapist. It is this trust that encourages the transference of feelings on to the therapist and thus giving the client the opportunity to resolve emotional issues that have been repressed. The therapist takes on the qualities of the person with whom the client needs to resolve these issues and it is common for the client to see saw between admiring and loving the therapist to feeling outright hostility toward the therapist. It is by means of this phenomenon that transference becomes a powerful tool to access the the no go areas and to secure repression release.
Psychotherapy by ~briggsdj2
When a repression is located the client may report it the way a TV reporter would report from the scene of a crime. The client therefore describes the traumatic incident in the past tense and as if it had happened to someone else. The therapist would then direct the client to relive the incident in the present as if it is happening right now. The client would then regress in time and experience the incident fully this time without any interruption to the normal mental processes which occurred when it did happen all those years ago and resulted in the debilitating symptoms the client is now presenting.
The client would then be directed to experience the incident over and over again until every scrap of emotional charge is released and the client sees the incident as just another experience without any of the emotional response that once accompanied it. The first time through the incident may see the client crying uncontrollably and with each subsequent reliving of the incident the therapist will notice the client revealing more and more detail. Eventually the client will run through the incident without showing any emotion and in a bored kind of tone. This is normally the signal that all the negative emotion associated with the repression has been released and it is not uncommon to see the client let out a sigh when it is complete.
The role of the therapist
It is not therapist’s job to advise the client, offer any explanations evaluations or judgements during this process but rather allow the client to fully experience the emotions that emerge without interruption and be kept on task. The therapist must at all times recognise that the client is the supreme authority in his own world and the therapist has not authority to tell the client what anything means or how the client should or should not interpret what comes up. Any therapist that does so is not serving the client but his own ego. The therapist is like a guide on a safari. He ensures that the client is on the right path, has bullets in his rifle and is safe. When the time comes it is the client who is paying to shoot the lion not the guide. A good therapist will ensure that the client feels safe and is fully engaging in the process and not just reporting from a safe distance. Though the therapist will not be advising the client about how to view or interpret anything that emerges in session he will often question the client to clarify what is said and to cause the client to question beliefs stubbornly being held on to.
As part of my own training as a Hypno-Psychotherapist I was required to undergo the therapy before receiving my qualification. How else could you gauge the effectiveness of the treatment you intend to administer if you yourself have not experienced it? I found it a very rewarding and insightful experience during which I released a number of repressions and as a result I cured myself of a number of conditions I had suffered from all of my life.
Following are just some of the conditions my wife and I treat at our private practice in Peel, Isle of Man:
Depression, Panic Attacks, Anxiety, Sleeping Difficulties, Post Traumatic Stress, Underachievement, Lack of Confidence, Fears and Phobias, Irritable Bowel, Smoking, Eating Disorders… and many more.
For more information about me and my work as an Analytical Hypnotherapist please visit my website Setanta Hypnotherapy Clinic.
Following are links to articles I have written on topics related to this post:
What Can be Treated with Hypnotherapy
My wife Mary and I run our own private Hypnotherapy Practice in Peel, Isle of Man where we employ a combination of Hypnosis and Psychotherapy to treat conditions with an emotional root cause. To see a list of some the conditions we treat please [...]
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The problem was buried in the subconscious because the client did not have the emotional resources to deal with it when it occurred in the [...]
Photo Credit to: Nicola Oliver
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The definition of eating disorders is ‘a range of psychological disorders characterised by abnormal or disturbed eating habits’. Most people are familiar with the disorders Anorexia and Bulimia but are less familiar with Binge Eating Disorder (without purging), Compulsive Overeating and Orthorexia [...]
Faulty Self-Concept
People usually do not enter psychotherapy with the goal of changing their perception of self. On the contrary most people who enter psychotherapy are completely unaware that it is their faulty self-concept that is at the root of their suffering. They initially seek to preserve their perception of self [...]
Why Hypnotherapy is so successful for children
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Photo credit to: Dr Akilah El – Celestial Healing Wellness Center
Success Stories
Bill Munro from Michigan USA was in his 70′s when he developed melanoma ( the most dangerous type of skin cancer ) and at the same time he also suffered from prostate cancer. Rather than opt for conventional medical treatment [...]
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Setanta Hypnotherapy Clinic Hypno Gastric Band Therapy
Setanta Hypnotherapy Clinic is now offering a Weight Loss Program using Hypno Gastric Band Therapy. The therapy consists of five sessions and each client is presented with a Personalised CD to reinforce the work done in session at home.
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Firstly, a detailed [...]
Finding your Soul Mate is not as random as many believe
We all have, at one time or another, felt lonely and wished that we had someone we could share our lives with. Many who made this wish found their perfect partner, others are still alone to this day and yet [...]
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