Reduce Anxiety with Hypnotherapy
How quickly can treatment make me feel different?
Many people need to reduce anxiety in their day to day experiences. Anxiety is a really useful survival tool designed to help us respond to danger immediately; even before our conscious awareness is able to. However, if our alertness is too often triggered then we can lose the ability to feel relaxed, calm and refreshed. Despite having anxiety long term using my tailored therapy, anxiety can reduced massively and give you the skills to self manage and take back control of your unhelpful feelings.
After 5 weeks working to reduce anxiety this is what a client reported.
"When I first came to see Dave I didn't understand why I felt so anxious all the time. I just knew that for the past 10 years or so I had felt progressively more hopeless and disconnected from the world and I knew I had to try to do something about it. A friend had told me about Dave after having a successful treatment for a phobia. So on her recommendation I went along for a consultation. I can honestly say that it is one of the best decisions I have ever made. Dave listened to me and worked with me to identify the root cause of my anxieties and has taught me essential skills that I can now use to live my life in a positive and satisfying way. I am writing this after session 5 and in this short time the way in which I see the world has changed immeasurably. My self respect and confidence have grown massively, I am communicating more effectively which has helped to strengthen my relationships and as a result my life is already richer and more fulfilling than I can ever remember it being. I would encourage anyone who feels they are not living the life they want to seek Dave's help. I feel that this has been the wisest decision I could possibly make as I now have the hope of a bright, positive and satisfying future and 5 weeks ago I would not have dreamed that this would be possible".
Can treatment reduce anxiety quickly?
I have yet to work with a client who has not made significant reductions in their experience of anxiety. the rates of progress vary form person to person but most people report that the combination of therapies and the tool kit I help you develop allows almost immediate progress. Most clients report that they feel calmer, more confident and more independent within a few sessions and most people leave treatment within the 4-6 session range reporting that they feel how they wanted to feel.
Anxiety is an over-experienced state
This sense of underlying fear and preparedness to escape was very useful in the days of Sabre Toothed Tigers that stalked us, however in the modern era anxiety can be over experienced. Bills, traffic jams and deadlines trigger this response.
Prepared for battle
As part of anxiety our bodies instinctively adopt a survival strategy. Some of the physiological changes include, our hearing becomes very focused, our pupils dilate, to see clearly where the risk tour life is. The body increases the heart rate so that there is more oxygen circulating, giving more blood and energy to the muscles in case we need to fight or run away. The body often prepares to empty the bowels as this is easy for escape. The muscles also tighten, getting ready for battle.
Temporary Feeling
This response is intended to be temporary. The body should use up all the extra energy in this Flight or fight situation, by dealing with the threat either by running away or fighting. Otherwise it should find a constructive way of releasing this body tension by being active.
Surplus energy can be exhausting
After periods experiencing this flight or fight response, surplus energy needs to be used up, or exhaustion is possible.This surplus energy impacts on the ability to get good quality sleep, to feel calm and to get adequate rest and recuperation. Too much anxiety will result in feeling constantly on edge, uncertain and confused. Long term mental illness is possible, if excessive anxiety leads to constantly being on edge.
Generalised Anxiety Disorder
If we have spent too much time on edge, doctors can diagnose a condition called Generalised Anxiety disorder (GAD), whereby the patient has forgotten how to relax. People who experience this are permanently on edge, finding decision making debilitating.
Vicious Circle of Anxiety
This condition has major implication for health as many of the chemicals which work together to create this sense of anxiety, when too prevalent in the body, can have massive implication on the life expectancy of someone experiencing GAD. The increased heart rate stemming from the release of adrenaline puts increased pressure on the heart. This increased energy also impacts on the patient’s ability to have uninterrupted sleep and may use these sleepless nights to dwell on their source of anxiety. This dwelling, ironically, creates the release of even more adrenaline and leads to a vicious cycle of further anxiety.
Debilitating and treatable
I have been supporting people by teaching self awareness to reduce anxiety throughout my career. I have worked with people who have been so debilitated that they were unable to leave their homes without experiencing panic attack episodes.
Anxiety can often be associated with a particular issue for a patient. As part of my career I have supported people to identify and address their specific anxieties around individual issues and supported patients by using therapeutic techniques to be able to function at their full potential.
Effective Anxiety Treatments
Effective techniques to reduce anxiety include Cognitive Behaviour Therapy, appropriate medications, graded exposure therapy, effective questioning, alongside a range of self esteem, stress management and motivation building techniques.
End panic and anxiety with hypnosis
Hypnotherapy is a very effective treatment to help you reduce anxiety, get back in control and feeling calm and confident again. Anxiety hypnosis can support by training the patient to stay calm, aiding with breathing exercises to avoid panic and also to access positive feelings when they are most needed.
Positivity and Persistence defeats anxiety
Alongside this I would equip the patient to recognise the positives in their lives, to identify what is going right and focus on this whilst giving the patient the confidence and motivation to keep moving forward and trying when the challenge of addressing their anxiety may appear overwhelming. My extensive professional experience with working with anxiety issues has allowed me to work with some challenging patients where I have had incredible and life changing results.
As part of the treatment to reduce anxiety I will help you develop the skills to recognise your unique anxiety triggers and support you to practise managing in a new more effective way until it becomes natural and your anxiety is minimal. Anxiety is a difficult condition which can be long term and debilitating. With the right support anxiety can become manageable.
Need more specific information?
Use the resources below to learn more
Exam nerves are really common. For some people it is for every test whilst for others they preform ok during their mocks and then can't hold it together during the exams proper. I have a had a long career teaching people to study and how to use their own skills, psychology and physiology to maximise their potential to get the results that they are capable of. This page will include many of those tools to help you manage any perfomance anxiety, make better use of your revision time and reduce any exam nerves on the day.
Preparation to reduce any exam nerves and anxiety on the day.
Before the test manage your exam nerves by:
1: Learn anxiety reduction and management skills and practise them ahead of the day:
By learning anxiety management skills and practising them ahead of the exam then you will have a lower level of anxiety and also be less likely to experience exam nerves on the day as you will be able to automatically manage them.
- Take a walk or exercise to burn off anxiety:
- Listen to relaxing music:
- Use distractions like computer games or reading to take your mind away from worrying:
- Plan a nice thing after the event to focus on this if you find you keep worrying about the exam before it comes up:
2: Use hypnosis and self hypnosis to learn and practise your test and to manage your anxiety and practise feeling confident.
Hypnosis is very effective at speeding up tips 1 and 2 and I use it for all treatments not only exam nerves but also addictions, anxiety, self harm, and any compulsive behaviour because it is so effective. Hypnosis is also great for helping to study more effectively, recall information and be more disciplined and motivated around studying.
3: Use visualisations of you doing each question in the exam.
Visualise from the very start, where you are sitting down, writing your name on the paper, answering the questions, taking a sip of water, taking time to think about and plan your answers to the end of the test when you paper is handed in or collected.
By visualising any task from start to end this helps to make the act more natural and reduce the opportunity for any test nerves to occur. As you visualise the exam it will also help you maintain your revision. Hypnosis will teach to do this easily.
4: Plan your revision:
Revise early and effectively. Practise each thing until it feel natural.
The more you practise any task the more you can do it without thinking and the more you do it without thinking the less space there is for test nerves to develop.
By planning your revision around your needs it will make a more effective learner and as you become more confident with your revision it will reduce any performance anxiety on exam day.
This may seem one of the most basic ways to feel better on exam day but is often neglected.
When you revise find the best way for you. Consider the time to study, how long to study, how to assess how much you have learned through that process and then to reward yourself for each section that you learn.
Unique revision needs? Are you a morning person, do you like to write and repeat or would it be easier if you were asked questions and by answering and explaining the answers would that help you cement your learning? Many Science type topics may involve practise not only learning formula but also practise using them.
Assess your progress: By the end of each block of revision it would be useful to be able answer a key question instead of saying I have spent two hours or I can demonstrate I can use that formula.
4: Plan a reward:
Plan a nice thing just after the exams or the test so that if you find yourself focusing on the exam and it gives you unhelpful feelings, then you can instead focus beyond that and be aware that a few hours later you will be doing something that gives you good feelings. You can sooth yourself by saying "No matter what happens that day i will be sat doing (this nice thing) at (time), with (who you will do it with).
The night before the exam or the test:
Get good yourself in a state of relaxation so that you can get quality rest and be ready and a positive frame of mind by the morning by:
1: Prepare for the Exam or test:
Plan everything that you need, including resources, pens or specialist equipment. Check times and venue of the exam centre and make a list to tick off in the morning so you feel completely ready.
2: Relax:
Spend time with friends so as to stay calm and be slightly distracted away from the exam. IF alone get a bath or anything that helps you relax.
3: Getting quality sleep:
Follow this link here to find our how to establish good sleep hygiene.
The morning of the exam and before entering the exam hall or test centre:
It's normal the wake with anxiety. It is not only normal to have exam nerves but also very useful as these feelings are there to help you feel alert and perform at your best. When you are over alert and too aroused then you are less able to focus on what you are doing and end up incapacitated. So it is vital that if you are too anxious as you wake you are able to manage this feeling so that you are operating at the best level for you.
1: Thank your anxiety:
Calm your self by acknowledging the anxiety and feeling thankful that it is here and helping you to perform at your best and that you are now going to manage it to the level that will help you the most.
2: Do a muscle relaxation:
This will help you to remove the physical effects of anxiety and also refresh you so you will be more focused during the day.
3: Listen to some relaxing music:
This will help relax your mind and you can keep listening to this right up until you enter the exam hall timing exam nerves.
4: Walk off any anxiety:
If you are able to walk in a natural setting such as a park or woodland or near water before the exam, this will help calm and focus you more.
5: Adopt an upright posture:
Adopting an upright posture, as you start your day and on the way to the exam hall will help you feel confident and calm.
6: Do a breathing exercise:
Adopt a soothing breathing exercise for example slow down your breathing and focus on making your out breath taking longer than your in breath. Or focus on making your abdomen go in and out as far as you can with each in and out breath.
7: Have a light meal:
Eating a light meal before you leave will give you the energy your body needs to fucntion, after all your brain consumes 22% of your body's energy, so it needs fuel for peak performance. A light meal will energise whilst not making you sluggish.
8: Plan your arrival time:
Reduce anxiety by planning to arrive in a manner that is just right for you. You may want to be early and check venues seating plans etc or want to arrive so that you are not in a big group. If you prefer not to be rushed arrive early, get the information you need then take a walk. To much hanging around raises anxiety levels in some people.
9: Use distraction techniques:
If you are kept waiting before your exam, then anxiety levels can often rise due to the unplanned delays. By planning distraction techniques including chatting, playing music, a muscle relaxation, a computer game on your phone or a bit of extra revision.
10: Positive self talk:
By using positive self talk you can enhance your mood and diminish any unhelpful emotions and restore a calm, confinement manner. You can tell yourself "I am feeling calm, I am feeling relaxed, I am doing my best and will express myself will in this task".
You can also talk to others with positive self talk too. "I am nervous and that is healthy" or "I am prepared and looking forwards to seeing how I get on."
10: Adopt an open posture:
By adopting a body posture that is open, research has shown that just doing this makes a huge impact on how you feel. Adopting an open posture makes people feel powerful, capable, confident and in control, but also how they perform, as people perform better in any challenging tasks like exams and interviews. So take back control of exam nerves by learning and using these techniques as well as using hypnosis to feel the way you want and perform to the best of your ability, today and for tasks which await you in your life.
Managing exam nerves during the exam:
During the exam you may find that you need to manage your exam nerves. Here are some tips to hale you stay in control throughout the exam.
1: Plan and prioritise:
Slowly use the time for the reading of the paper and plan what questions ou will answer and in what order.
If you still feel tense then you can use the following tools reduce that tension and keep focussed.
2: Muscle relaxation:
Even at the your desk or workstation you can do a subtle and effective muscle relaxation. You can do this whilst you are reading and planning your tasks so it does not have to eat into your time. By doing a muscle relaxation whilst you read or plan your answers you will both sooth and become more focussed at the same time.
3: Pain:
If you feel panicky during the test then by clenching your fist or digging your nails into your flesh until you experience a quick sharp pain, you can quickly reduce the anxiety you are feeling and restore your focus. Over time this technique will be redundant as you learn to apply the others and develop the skills to reduce the frequency and intensity of your anxious moments.
4: Breathing:
Use of breathing techniques can be used to deal with immediate anxiety so practising in advance will allow you to develop this skill ahead of an exam.
5: Drink water or chew a sweet:
Sooth yourself and reduce any anxiety to a level that helps you stay focused can also be done by taking slow gentle and deliberate sips of water as you focus on the task or by chewing a sweet or some gum. Sweets also help give you energy from the high glucose content.
To manage your exam nerves and exam stress eat, sleep, and play.
Eat - Healthy meals that keep your mood stable, Limit refined sugars and keep meals at the right size so that you do not feel bloated, sleepy or irritable so that you can do your best revision and so reduce exam nerves and exam anxiety.
Sleep - You are human so plan your studies so that you have time to rest. A lot of your effective studying is done whilst you are resting, so plan for this. When you are properly rested the time you use to study will be most effective.
Play - To reduce anxiety, have variety in what you study but also beyond studying too. So plan time for breaks during studying, days off, socialising and time just for you to take a walk, a bit of gym time, recreational reading even gaming. Play is essential to give your mind a break. Get this right and you will find your studying will be a pleasure, effective, your confidence will grow form it and and you will notice how your exam anxiety falls in proportion.
Driving test nerves causes so many people to struggle during their driving test, postpone or even cancel it. The pressure that people taking their test put on themselves under results in reduced performance, anxiety, panic and another retest.
These tips and tools here can help you to reduce your anxiety on the day of your test and can also be used for a wide range of events including exam nerves, interview anxiety and any event where you want to perform at your best. Being organised and choosing not to leave things to chance helps you remain in control. So use these tips to stay in control, beat driving test nerves and enjoy making the most of your potential.
How to reduce the test nerves on your driving test?
Before the test:
1: Practise and practise each thing until it feel natural.
The more you practise any task the more you can do it without thinking; and the more you do it without thinking, the less space there is for test nerves to develop.
2: Use visualisations of you doing each task from the very start to the end of the test where you stop the engine safely:
By visualising any task from start to end this helps to make the act more natural and reduce the opportunity for any test nerves to occur.
3: Use hypnosis to learn and practise your test, manage your anxiety and practise feeling confident:
Hypnosis is very effective at speeding up tips 1 and 2. I use it for a wide range of treatments, not only exam and driving test nerves but also addictions, anxiety, self harm, and any compulsive behaviour because it is so effective. Use hypnosis to help you grow. A hypnotherapist can help you also to learn self hypnosis, so you can also auto-hypnotise whenever you need to in the future.
4: Enjoying knowing that you have lived this long without your driving license and that you will be fine whether you pass or fail today.
By being realistic that this is only one more day in your life and there will be many, many more opportunities to get this done, then you will reduce the significance of this particular event to a simple task that you will resolve even if you do not do it today.
5: Plan for the worst hope for the best:
As part of tip 4, think beyond this event and even plan when you will re-book the next test. By doing this it will remind you that there will be other times to solve this, if it does not happen today.
6: Focus on the day as just another day instead of building it up:
Keep the test to yourself. The more people you tell the more pressure you will feel as you know others will ask if you have passed or failed.
On the morning of the test:
1: Do a muscle relaxation to absorb all the extra energy in your body:
By doing a muscle relaxation your body will feel all calm and relaxed and you will perform at a much better level just because your body is rested and soothed, leaving you feeling fully in control.
2: Walk Tall:
By keeping your posture upright and tall before entering the test centre, you will feel more confident and calm. This will overshadow any driving test nerves and instead leave you feeling calm and confident during the actual driving test.
3: Plan your arrival time:
Turn up at the centre in good time, but not so early that you are waiting an uncomfortably long time. This may mean arriving at the test centre early if you are on public transport and then taking a walk round the block. Waiting around too long can magnify anxiety.
At the Test Centre:
1: Adopt an open posture:
Change your posture whilst you are waiting to open posture, as a closed posture creates feelings of weakness and a sense of powerlessness. Whilst an open posture gives the feeling of power and a sense of being capable and successful.
2: Manage your breathing:
Do a breathing exercise to soothe you. Take slow deep breaths where your out-breath is slower than your in. Breathing slowly will lower your heart rate and sooth you, making you feeling calmer and focused.
3: Burn off any tension by taking a short walk:
Take a walk instead of pacing up and down. This will help clear you head and reduce the tension in your body.
4: Listen to soothing music:
Plan some soothing music that you can listen to on the way to the test centre and also that you can listen to as you wait for your turn.
5: Distract yourself away from unhelpful thoughts:
Take some distractions like a magazine, send a text or play an absorbing game on your phone so that you are not focused on the test and prevent any test nerves from growing as you wait to take your test.
During the test:
1: Express yourself to take back control:
Express how you feel if you feel anxious. By communicating this you will feel more in control and less anxious. So before you start tell the examiner "I am nervous today and I am sure you have see that before as it is normal".
By using all these tools you will find it easier and easier to manage any test nerves until you are barely aware of them happening. Managing anxiety is successfully is about accepting it will happen and then viewing it positively whilst adopting strategies which allow you to reduce its physical and psychological effects.
Even medics mix the two up
Stress and anxiety are often words to describe the same condition. The words are often used interchangeably. It is common to find health professionals diagnosing stress or anxiety as if there is no difference. As part of my practise I regularly treat GP's who report that they do not know the difference between the two conditions and that they would typically prescribe the same treatments anyway.
Real or Imagined
The difference between anxiety and stress is pretty straight forwards. Stress is the feelings stemming from real events and those events actually happening as your body creates stressful feelings, whilst anxiety or severe anxiety is the effect of thinking about an event. This can be made more complex for people with severe anxiety because then they think about the fear, the feelings of being fearful and this can be enough to create the release of the survival response. So for some people with panic, agoraphobia, OCD or social anxiety, by thinking about how they felt it creates its own over fearful response. For poeple who have these conditions they can live in a constantly exhausting cycle of fearing fear and with it creating the flight or fight response.
The flight or fight response is the same for stress and anxiety
The confusion comes from how the body deals with these two conditions. Regardless of whether it is a severe episode of stress or anxiety, your body will behave in the same way. This is because your brain cannot tell the difference between what is real and what is imagined.
So if there is a stress creating event happening right now, for example a bear is in front of you, then your brain will respond correctly, releasing the survival chemicals, because there really is a bear in front of you. Whilst if you were thinking about going to a place where there could be bears and if you are imagining this as if you are looking through the your own eyes, as if you could actually see the bear in front of you, your body would respond accordingly. It would still release the chemicals that are created to help you escape from danger or have the energy and alertness to fight and preserve your life.
Being too stressed or too anxious is the problem.
Both stress and anxiety are useful tools in the world of survival, The way your body responds to stress is deliberately designed to help you deal with an immediate, challenging and typically dangerous situation whilst the anxiety response is designed to help you plan for an event in the near future so that you perform at your best. The problems for both stress and anxiety come from being too alert, either being too sensitive to events which surround you and constantly responding to them as stress or because you are in an environemnt which has too much stress going on. whereas for severe anxiety, you are releasing the anxiety, alertness response too frequently for you body to fully restore. Either way there things that you can do to help you deal with too much stress and anxiety. There are some simple things you can do to treat severe stress or debilitating anxiety find out more throughout the site.
By creating your own positive affirmations you can take control of anxiety and stress. Self affirmations are vital messages that people with low self esteem, anxiety and confidence issues can use to help change their thinking patterns.
Why we use Affirmations
What we say to ourselves has a massive impact on how we think about ourselves. This impacts on the way we feel about ourselves, leading to how we behave now and in the future.
To improve what happens in the future, to reduce anxiety, stress, and increase the positive experiences in our lives what we tell ourselves is an easy way to make long lasting changes.
How to make your own self affirmations
1) Decide how you would like to be different and use these goals as your foundation for your affirmations. this could be wanting to feel calm, stop smoking, be less annoyed with people, be less forgetful, be more organised, whatever is is that is important to you. Here are some affirmations that might help. To format your affirmation create simple clear statement as outlned in the following steps.
2) Always talk in the present tense, using short and snappy statements.
e.g. I am feeling calm and relaxed
I am eating calmly and confidently
I know when I am full
I stop eating when I am full
3) Say it like you mean it….. Use the Act As If Principle to support you. First act as if you mean it and the feelings will follow if you focus your attention.
4) Say it and act is as this will allow you to completely immerse yourself into the new way of being and acting. A delivery with passion and conviction, engaging body posture tone and focusing on how you are at that moment in time.
5) Always speak and think in the positive. Say what are doing instead of what you will be stopping doing.
Positive Affirmations
Negative
I’m not smoking. I don’t swear I’ve stopped over eating I don’t crash diet anymore I don’t panic I will not get anxious I wont worry I am aware of my world and enjoy it. |
Positive
I am enjoying being healthy NOW I am speaking politely NOW I am controlling my eating NOW I am eating sensibly NOW I am in control right NOW I am calm and relaxed NOW I wont worry I am aware of my world and enjoy it. |
6) Repeat and enjoy watching the new you become you. Repeat your statements daily and integrate them into your pattern of behaviour alongside using the other tools and enjoy the positive changes that will follow.
Mindfulness
Mindfulness is a brilliantly simple technique to help you manage your awareness so that you fully experience all your emotions and sensations. This is a great technique that helps those with any issue which has an emotional connection to get back control in their lives. I have used the techniques to raise awareness with clients who have issues as diverse as addictions, anxiety, compulsions and weight management problems.
LIVE IN THE MOMENT
Some clients report that their issues and worries come from always thinking about things that were not good for them in their past or thinking about something in the future and worrying about what may or may not happen. This constant seeking out negative thoughts affects their confidence, motivation, increases their sense of helplessness and anxiety.Learning to live in the moment will change this way of thinking.
A MORE USEFUL WAY OF THINKING
This technique is about being acutely aware of yourself, your breathing, all of your senses and about being in the moment, responding to the things that are real, occurring right now. It is a different, more useful way of thinking, instead of thinking about the events which you have no control over, which either occurred in the past or in the future. This technique teaches you to not only be aware of the here and now but also to treasure it, value it and be thankful for what you are truly experiencing by focusing on the event.
Being mindful beats addiction, anxiety and depression
People who use these techniques are more able to appreciate their lives, report lower anxiety and report less intense experience of depression. When in early recovery mindful awareness by using the techniques described below have been found to make those early difficult steps more successful.
Fill up on mindfulness not snacks
Research has shown that those who eat whilst watching tv report their food has less flavour than those who focus on their food. Research also shows that those who are distracted will eat more as they do not feel as satisfied by their food. By being more aware of what you are doing right now instead of being distracted connects you more with your mind and your body and serves to give greater satisfaction and contentment.
Mindfulness Techniques
Basic techniques include:
1. Use all your senses:
Focusing on your breathing to the exclusion of everything else. Notice your chest rising and falling. Notice how each thought affects you. Be alert to thoughts, and how they can deny you the experience of the here and now.
2. Slowing down:
Take time to experience things in detail. Notice all When you eat, take only small mouthfuls and focus on the sensations of the food or drink in your mouth.
3. Concentrate on each sensation fully:
Notice the colours, shape and textures of what you see. Notice what you can smell. Notice what you feel, hot, cold, smooth, rough, soft, hard, but also your internal sensations too.
4. When looking at something, seek out the detail:
Notice the different colours, textures, tones, different hues, size shape of everything that you look at.
5. Be aware of the unique experiences of life:
AS you use your senses be aware only you are seeing PRECISELY what you see. Explore the unique things you find in life.
6. Explore internally:
Close your eyes and raise your awareness of what is happening within your body. Notice, warmth and cold, tingles and twitches, dull aches and soothing sensations. Fully immerse yourself in the moment both externally and internally to feel calm and able to make emotion free decisions.
Reduce Worry
Regularly practised, it will help you to reduce unnecessary worry but also offer more positive thoughts and feelings as you explore and appreciate living and being in the moment more and more. So start today, the benefits are immediate. Get more info on Mindfulness Here
Shyness Strategies
Shyness can be addressed very successfully with hypnosis as it is a form of social anxiety. Shyness can be very debilitating in itself but also for the development of confidence and motivation to make long lasting life changes.
To sustain self esteem it is important to have time to yourself to connect with your own thoughts and find a spiritual connection in your life. Just as importantly to the growth of self esteem, is to have social contact with others. It is important to have contact with others because social contact allows you to express yourself, give and receive praise and affords the opportunities to share your skills and demonstrate kindness.
Social Isolation
One key indicator of low self esteem is social isolation. When we experience low self esteem we feel least worthy of social interaction nor have neither physical or mental capacity to socialise. As social isolation takes hold, social interaction techniques can dissolve. However, to restore self esteem it is imperative to engage in social interaction.
Tips to beat Shyness
Techniques to promote interaction can start with undertaking simple chores, like going to the shops, speaking to your neighbours just maintaining those social links. To return back into the community start by establishing a routine so that you bump into the same people or if you are a dog owner develop a routine for walking you pet. Research tells us that dog owners are more likely to be both acknowledged and chatted to by random people than those with babies or those carrying deliberately “curious conversation instigating” objects.
Beat Anxiety by choosing to ask for help
A useful simple goal to set yourself if you feel shy is to go somewhere you know well that is safe but where you are not known and ask for directions to somewhere you already know the answer to. This could be a shop just round the corner or a local street that you have just passed. The answer is not important here it is the practise of communicating and of asking for help from others.
As you address your shyness you feel a bit more confident and are ready to return back into the social environment you may consider joining local groups, studying, join a local fitness group like a dance class or a walking group. At a broader level, if you find you have started to isolate, volunteering offers opportunities for social interaction and also opportunities to offer your skills. By being altruistic by for example showing kindness and encouraging others less fortunate than ourselves we learn to value ourselves again and further promote our self esteem.
Self esteem comes from how we feel about ourselves. This in turn is made up from internal messages but also from the messages that we receive from others. So to help grow our self esteem we need to have positive feedback from others. During a typical day a person with a mix of social interactions may experience, praise, physical contact in the form of hugs and pats on the shoulder, visual greetings and warmth through smiles and auditory interaction through laughter, a change in pitch and questions about their well being.
Without social interaction, this and much more is missing from the portfolio of esteem resources, and so as people socially isolate, their social confidence falls so too does their enthusiasm and energy to address this self esteem loss.
Hypnosis for Shyness
Hypnosis is a very effective treatment for hypnosis. treatment for shyness takes about 4-6 sessions and will involve trying out the new techniques between sessions but in such a short time a lifetime of fear and avoidance may make you life more interesting, exciting and fulfilling. Try out the techniques which are scattered around this website and keep trying them until you notice the changes that they want.
Sleep well to feel well and perform well
Sleep is vital for effective functioning. Without effective functioning we are more likely to under-perform, make mistakes and lose sight of our own competences because of our sustained failures in simple talks. Ultimately this under-performance, due to these deficiencies will serve to undermine our self esteem.
Sleep for motivation and self esteem
Just like food rest is essential for giving the rest and recuperation necessary for effective interaction during the day. Insomnia can result in poor quality rest, massively impacting on self esteem because, without it, someone will not have the energy or the mental stamina to effectively take on the challenges of the day. It is these challenges and your effectiveness which will help sustain and build self esteem. Exhaustion will result in people feeling under-motivated, unwilling to take on those challenges which, once completed, offer the sense of accomplishment necessary for self esteem growth.
Sleep problems can lead to isolation
Insomnia will result in someone being unable to start their day, unable to get up and will start to evolve anti-social resting patterns which results in them progressively becoming less and less able to interact with their support networks and lead to social isolation, which in turn enhances their sense of low self worth and sense of disconnect from their own lives.
No More Counting Sheep?
To address this deprivation and instead have good quality recuperation there are steps that can be taken to enhance this. This programme of enhancement is often referred as Good Sleep Hygiene.Build good habits now and they will last a lifetime giving you long lasting refreshing rest, allowing you to make best use of your waking hours.
Be disciplined, be organised and treat insomnia as part of your whole lifestyle regime. To get the best out of life you need to eat well, be active and just as importantly, you also need to rest well too!
Tips for a restful night
Some simple tips to improve your effectiveness and decision making by getting quality rest can include, establishing a routine, regular bedtimes and rising times. Use naps to recharge during the day instead of staying in bed late, as this will disrupt your routine. Melatonin is the hormone that regulates sleep and the brain uses light levels to manage it’s release, so expose yourself to plenty of light by taking a walk during the day and if you are comfy with it allow your bedroom to let light in to wake up naturally. At night reduce light in your eyes by turning tvs off and listen to the radio. For more tips follow here.
Get organised and exercise
Lifestyle can impact on wakefulness, so find ways to manage your stress and anxiety, regular exercise is good, talking through issues which give you concerns with colleagues and friends. Get organised, rest can be disrupted by worrying about the unknown so make lists, keep a diary and build a structure in your life to limit those nagging feelings that you have forgotten something.
Avoid stimulants like caffeine
To prepare for quality recuperation, have light meals, have your main meal early, don’t over hydrate, avoiding alcohol, caffeine and stimulants like nicotine.
Your bedroom is for sleeping!
To prevent insomnia, you should keep tvs out of the bedroom and use your bed for specific relaxation, not working or using computers in. Keep bedrooms free from distractions, noise free and have soft lighting for bathroom visits.
LET YOUR SELF ESTEEM FLOURISH
Feeling refreshed will enhance your experience of life during your waking hours and so will allow your self esteem to flourish the more you enjoy your day to day living.
The Act as If Principle. Get motivated fast.
Act as if is an easy to use technique to create instant motivation to do something or build motivation when you are having a dip in your motivation. It is one of the simplest forms of positive hypnosis or self hypnosis conducted out of trance.
This technique is the process of acting like you want to do something, even though you may not feel like doing it. To use this motivation building trick, you adopt the posture, tone, physical approach of someone who you imagine would like doing the activity that you are struggling to motivate yourself to do. Then start the activity in that manner and maintain this acting approach. After a short time the positive feelings which you would like from doing that activity if you really were keen and motivated to do it start to emerge naturally. So the act of pretending to enjoy doing something actually creates the positive feelings of doing it. Sounds too good to be true, so Act as if you believe me and try it out.
Instant Motivation
By learning the Act As If Principle, people with little motivation can become motivated and achieve more which in itself will result in raised self esteem. The act as if principle was first written about over 100 years ago by William James who outlined how to create motivation to do things people are reluctant to do. The Act As If principle is still used extensively today within all motivational change work from addictions, weight management, anxiety management and through to undertaking tedious task when experiencing a depression condition.
ACT LIKE YOU MEAN IT.
James suggested that you should adopt the manner, facial expressions, pace, tone, posture, dress whatever is typical of someone who is keen to do the task and set about doing this and in a short time anyone acting as if they wanted to do this would soon get the feelings which would be associated with someone who really wants to do this.
Build confidence and friendships with Act AS IF
This simple form of self suggestion or self hypnosis is key to developing self esteem and confidence as you can pretend to be excited about doing a task instead of anxious or scared. Equally you can use this technique to build peer networks if you are socially isolated. If you are anxious about meeting new people Act as if can give you the confidence and motivation to meet people and build support networks by just Acting like your are confident in new social settings.
Many professionals use the act as if principle when they have to deal with difficult situations or ones which lead them to feeling vulnerable and nervous. For example some professionals like nurses and police officers will appear very calm in dangerous or unpredictable situations despite feeling the opposite but by giving a confidence appearance leads them to feeling confident. Equally when teachers have to deal with a difficult class or a social worker has to deal with new situations they will adopt a calm and confident manner which helps them feel calm and confident.
If it Only Takes a Minute Technique
QUICK WINS IN 60 SECONDS
The only takes a minute technique is a simple tool to help combat motivation issues which also builds self esteem so it is great at treating depression, anxiety and any motivation sapping conditions.
Getting simple tasks completed, which takes a moments have massive health benefits.
Beat anxiety and depression with the only takes a minute technique
When experiencing anxiety and depression or feeling overwhelmed it can be hard to find the energy and drive to motivate yourself to do anything. This lack of drive has serious impacts on the mind and body. Using this technique encourages you to physically accomplish more. The process of being active helps to have a natural endorphin release which will help you to feel happier and better about doing other things and so raise your motivation.
BREAK DOWN TASKS TO BUILD MOTIVATION
The technique works by doing any task which only takes a minute to do instead of putting things off for another time as soon as you are aware of the task. So instead of trying to tidy everything or doing all the domestic chores or making a host of phone calls do them straight away if they only take a minute. This stops tasks becoming a worry and allows for lots of success during the day.
Beat Depression with a little organisation
Firstly List all the tasks that need to be done and if any task only takes a minute, do them without delay or complete them as you pass them whilst doing other things. A little organisation is really useful to keep your home tidy, file paperwork and helps to establish routine whilst combating procrastination. This technique is brilliant for treating the effects of depression and aiding the growth in self esteem as it is often little things getting neglected which leads to worsening mental health. Ignoring the small routine tasks results in feeling de-motivating for some people and the prospect of addressing these becomes overwhelming.
The technique should be used in conjunction with being reflective for example the one thing I have done well today and one thing I have learned as it is easy to neglect to recognise the many little jobs that this technique addresses and in order to get most therapeutic benefit from this it is important to reflect on the effectiveness that a person has been during the day by getting little formally overwhelming jobs done.
Get Anxiety Help by Seeing the World Differently
Anxiety help comes in many forms. People access hypnosis treatment for anxiety because it is so effective and has many different tools to help people fully recover. If you are looking for anxiety help then you can find lots of tools on the site to help you move forwards. You can find out about how you can offload anxiety by reducing the effects that anxiety has on your body, you can take even more control by adopting how you think about the world and also how you explain the world to yourself and others is a key part of that. So before you do anything else find out how to change the way you experience your world even before you change anything else...Because if you experience it differently, like that calm person you want to be then you will feel more like the way you want to.
One key motivational and anti-anxiety tool is a technique called reframing. Reframing is a Neuro Linguistic Planning technique which adopts out of trance hypnosis to see and experience life in new, more motivating, anxiety beating ways.
REFRAMING
Reframing is using your creativity to see all situations in a positive light. This technique is especially useful for people experiencing any self esteem related conditions such as depression, anxiety, anger, addictions and self harm but is useful for all aspects of life where motivation would help sustain the changes when obstacles appear.
Realistic but positive viewpoints beat anxiety
When working with clients who need anxiety help and experiencing depressive behaviours or anger it is common to hear clients talk about things in a very negative perspective such as “nothing ever good happens to me” or “I have never been lucky.” This pattern of seeing the world is de-motivating and also a form of reframing i.e. seeing the world by one perspective (only in this case negatively, which creates anxiety).
Reframing is a simple approach of expressing the world we all experience by looking realistically but seeking and finding the positive.
Reframing techniques
To do this you must first believe that there can be a positive in any experience, even if the event is not pleasant. Here are some examples:
I have been diagnosed with a terminal illness. why does this happen to me? or:
I have been given the incentive to focus on what is important to me now and use my time left to do that. I am lucky that I can now get my affairs in order instead of leaving everything in a mess like others do.
"Stuck in traffic. Nightmare, I will be late!"
"Longer to plan the day. I can take stock. I never get to look at the buildings round here, as I am normally rushing past."
Over time, those who use this technique, are able to have a very different life experience where they see opportunity where other see change. The technique is a simple out of trance hypnotic technique which allows any one who practises to feel more resourceful, more motivated, optimistic, less anxious and better placed to deal with the challenges of life.
Set your anxiety free, be happy and calm
Reframing is the skill of choosing to see the world in a new, positive yet still REAL perspective. by doing this you are also choosing to be an anxiety help, managing your anxiety and finding more useful and enjoyable ways of experiencing the world.
ANXIETY FREE
Give it a go and Get motivated. Use reframing to set your anxiety and negativity free, it has done it's job. Let it have a rest. The more you practise the sooner your anxiety will be gone.
More anxiety help here.
Breathing tools: By learning to use breathing techniques to offload tension from the day you will feel more life you want to.
Exercise: Get regular exercise alongside the hypnosis that allows you to operate the way you want and you will feel the calm return in only a few weeks.
Mood foods: Eat food high in tryptophan to feel calm such as Turkey but also use the most natural diet you can access as this will stabilise your moods.
Connect with nature: Get outside if you can and if not bring house plants into your home. the more you feel connected to nature the more you will feel calm.
Connect with others: The more you connect with others the more you will feel calm and secure so keep close toe you friends even though it can be hard when you are anxious.
General Anxiety Disorder. Understanding it and treating it quickly
General Anxiety Disorder or GAD is a really common mental health condition. It is a constant feeling of being on edge and stems from you always feeling like something unpleasant is about to happen, often despite there being absolutely nothing to worry about.
People with GAD often find their condition very frustrating because they are anxious and yet as they look around instead of identifying reasons to be anxious find instead reasons that indicate they should be happy and and content.
If you experience GAD, it can be so invasive into your life that even pleasant and happy events are tainted and destroyed by feelings of worry, panic and an overbearing sense of dread which stops you enjoying holidays, family, friends and special occasions.
How to overcome the worry of General Anxiety Disorder?
GAD is just a part of a thinking a process that is intended to keep you safe. At some point your ability to recognise the difference between what keeps you safe and what is a threat has been so confused that you are no longer able to separate out the two vital aspect of your life. Anxiety is there to tell us to stop doing something because it may be harmful to us or others. The journey back to taking back full control is relearning what is useful and what is destroying your quality of life.
Typically those who mix up the two things do so due to loosing a sense of what they are capable of and so fear anything. Relearning what you are capable of is part of this journey. As you read the next sections you will learn that to address your anxiety you really have to understand how you choose to experience your world, even when you are unaware that you are choosing because you have been doing it for so long.
Taking responsibility for yourself and not for the thoughts and feelings of others.
People who struggle with General Anxiety Disorder, or panic and many phobias often feel overwhelmed by the burdens of life and never consider if these burdens are really theirs to carry. A key element of treating GAD is to learn to take responsibility for the things you are personally responsible for and push back responsibility for others and let others experience the consequence of their behaviour as this will reduce the amount of tension in your life.
Learn to manage guilt
Learning to manage guilt properly will support you to let things go instead of revisiting them and as you revisit old, historic events, that are no longer real, they will no longer give you negative feelings which in turn you then project onto up and coming events in your life and so you feel fearful about what could be a happy occasion and yet you are still feeling very anxious.
Learn to speak to yourself the way you speak to others
Learning to speak to you with the kindness and respect you speak to others will help you feel less anxious as you will learn to be more accepting and think in a more accepting way about yourself instead of an unhelpful judgemental way.
Access Accelerated therapy for Anxiety
Access a skilled therapist who can make you aware of how you think, speak and manage events of the past invites anxiety into your life today. By accessing skilled therapy, you can become aware of how you behave and also be given effective coping strategies that would lower your anxiety within a handful of sessions and help you to take back full control of your life in a couple of months.
How can I expect to change if I access therapy and do the work?
Clients with an anxiety disorder tend to arrive with a GAD score in excess of 16 and typically report that this has fallen by at least half after a handful of sessions and go on to report sustained changes as they learn to let go of anxiety and operate feeling more in control and relaxed.
Book a free appointment anywhere in the world using Skype
Sheffield Hypnotherapist Phobia and Anxiety Treatment
As a Sheffield hypnotherapist, Phobia and anxiety have been something which I have a long history of working with. Phobia and anxiety in all its other many forms is something which I have been very successful in treating.
How quickly can I get rid of my phobia?
Phobias can be very easy to address. When you have had a phobia or severe anxiety for a long time it is easy to believe that because it has been present for so long then it will be impossible if not very difficult to address. With the right therapy you can make huge progress in a very short time.
I tend to make significant progress after three sessions and many phobias are completely addressed after four sessions. We are all different and so I say that 4-6 sessions is the norm to address phobias and anxiety. See the home page for an example of my anxiety work.
FEEL ANXIOUS AND SILLY
Anxiety has a huge impact on the lives of some people. My clients have experienced Panic Attacks, isolation, unemployment due to anxiety or phobias. Phobic responses are often doubly damaging to your life because clients often report how silly they feel too.
FIND THE RIGHT THERAPIST TO CURE YOU
As you search for the right Sheffield Hypnotherapist to treat your phobia or your anxiety it can be confusing to know what key tools they will use to support you to find the skills to cure your phobia or address your anxiety.
Learn to manage your feelings of panic and dread with hypnosis
Anxiety is key to keep us safe, we need it to know when to be alert to danger. Yours has just become over sensitive to a particular stimuli or set of events that take you back to a time where you felt very vulnerable.
I use a successful mix of hypnotherapeutic techniques which allow you to better manage your Phobia and anxiety. These techniques work to manage the overwhelming feelings or panic, dread and fear.
Grow your motivation and self esteem to beat anxiety
Anxiety and Phobia often leave clients with low self esteem, lacking the confidence to reach their potential. This results in some clients choosing a safe, risk free life, where their jobs, relationships and lifestyle is not rewarding or fulfilling but it does not present any real challenges. Using specialist motivation tools and techniques in a supportive and person centred approach, I can support you to grow your motivation and self esteem, allowing you to aspire and reach your potential.
BE MORE RESOURCEFUL
I also use hypnotic techniques so that your thinking patterns around the thing which leaves you feeling anxious becomes less and less negative and eventually you become more resourceful. This will allow you to grow and change so that you respond to the thing which triggers the unpleasant feelings in a positive way, now and for the rest of your life.
REACH YOUR POTENTIAL
Cure of your anxiety you will be able to live life to the full with more and more opportunities to reach your potential in life. Your social life will grow, work life will be more exciting and you will have greater earning potential. Treat your anxiety and live the life you deserve.
The website will offer lots of tools which you can use independently of a practitioner. Key thing to remember about any anxiety source is that it is natural.
Stress Free Living With Hypnosis
Stress free living is an ambition for many today. Stress is such a common experience in our lives that we take it for granted. Imagine a time in your life when there was no stress, no tension and nothing that woke you up in the middle of the night. Hypnosis can release you from these feelings.
Don't be a martyr to stress
Through effective therapy that time can be restored again. Stress is so pervading in life that it is something which is worn as a badge of honour by some people whilst others act as if they are martyrs to stress, complaining but never doing anything about it. They promote how stressed they are as evidence of how important or busy they are. In reality they have lost their stress management skills.
Learn to deal with stress instead of ignoring it
I have been working in the field of effective lifestyle management for over a decade. The challenges of our lives are often non-negotiable, however how we deal with these events, especially if we are unable to relax and feel rested can and should be improved.
Control your stress
The goal of a permanently stress free life is unrealistic as stress is a valuable tool to motivate us. However when stress stops us performing it is time to take control. Using the tools on this site your can learn to deal with stress instead of ignoring it. Take control today.
For many people stress, the lifestyle of experiencing the pressure of life without managing the stress is raising the risk of a shortened life expectancy, through high blood pressure, sleepless nights, poor diet, excessive alcohol or related drug use, long hours and poor quality relationships.
Hypnotherapy for stress
Hypnotherapy for stress would give you the skills to unwind as well and see the bigger picture instead of fixating on the source of your stress. By using the wealth of coping techniques, some of which can be found throughout the website you will be more able to manage more easily, even in times of crisis.
Restore your health
As a therapist I can help you to broaden the range of approaches that you currently employ and use your inherent creativity and passions to identify the source of stress and also use this creativity to burn off excess adrenaline and energy in a constructive manner to support you to fully restore your health, allowing you to return to a more balanced more stress free lifestyle.
Improve your life by managing your stress
Hypnotherapy to treat your stress, alongside effective therapeutic techniques can offer you the skills to identify and manage stress more effectively, improving your life expectancy, improve your relationships and also by getting you the rest and clear head that you need, would also make you more effective in the workplace.
Stress Management Hypnosis in Sheffield
Stress management hypnosis in Sheffield is available through my own Positive Hypnosis practice. I am highly experienced at treating stress by using hypnosis and practical skills to help you to evolve effective coping mechanisms to dealing with stress.
HYPNOSIS CAN REDUCE STRESS SIGNIFICANTLY
Stress is a condition which hypnosis is very effective at managing and treating. Firstly it is vital to understand what causes you to feel stressed and then get it under control using a range of hypnosis techniques.
Stress management techniques
When treating stress I will support you with hypnosis by using techniques to have a more positive emotional response to the stressors which are currently affecting you. I will also offer hypnotic tools which will result in you being better equipped to respond practically to the stressors which are affect, whether it is family life, financial issues, health, relationship issues or work stress.
BUILD YOUR CONFIDENCE
Using hypnosis I will also help you grow your confidence and self esteem as stress evolves from feeling unfulfilled and failing to have the confidence to do things which lead to a life of fulfillment. to assist this I will also help you develop your assertiveness.
Have realistic expectations
I have a long history of helping people to prioritise their lives more effectively as well as to recognise their own needs and act on them. When we neglect our own needs we do not fully relax or feel fully restored and so stress persists.
Stress also evolves from unrealistic expectations, either unrealistic timings or expectations of others or unrealistic expectations of themselves. I will support you to re-balance these expectations so that you reduce the amount of self created stress in your life.
Communicate better to get what you want
Stress is often sourced from poor communication. Poor communication can either happen by being too aggressive in communication or being too passive. I will develop your assertiveness skills to help limit the stresses which develop from communication.
BURN OFF ANY NORMAL STRESS INSTEAD OF STORING IT UP
If you access hypnosis in Sheffield through my practice I will also support you to manage your stress by aiding you to discover new and innovative ways for you to burn off any existing stress so that you can more effectively manage any normal, day to day stress that you experience.
Hypnosis in Sheffield for Stress
Whether you chose or are even able to access hypnosis in Sheffield, the Positive hypnosis website offers some of the tools which are vital to manage stress. Please look at sections on Addictions, motivation, Confidence and Anxiety.
CBT Cognitive Behaviour Therapy. Think and feel differently to succeed.
CBT or Cognitive Behaviour Therapy is a very effective therapy which uses the links between what you think, how that way of thinking impacts on how you feel and how that feeling impacts on your behaviours. This therapy is very effective for change work and is something which you can use on yourself to impact on anything you would like to change about your self.
This therapy is often used to deal with issues including addictions, weight management, anger, self harm, stress management, self esteem and most motivation related issues.
An example of how this therapy makes the links with your thinking (cognition) and how that impacts on your actions (behaviour):
A student may lack confidence and so THINK that they will fail an exam. This negative thought makes themFEEL nervous and even DE-MOTIVATED. This demotivated and nervous student then ACTS like they expect to fail. So they spend very little time revising, as they distract themselves from reminding themselves of the exam. The time spent studying is not effective and is distracted time, largely due to feeling anxious every time they open their books. This lack of effectiveness further impacts on their learning. They enter the exam expecting to do badly. Resulting in their performance on the day being poor.
A new way of thinking about this situation is to look at what the client can already do. This demonstrates that they have learned things before and so they should adopt the approach which worked for them last time. Further to this, they can use this exam as a measure of what they will need to revise next time if they were to fail. This leads to the person feeling more positive and confident about the revision process. The behaviour from this is that they were focused on their exam preparation resulting in them succeeding.
FEEL DIFFERENTLY
The main role of CBT, when looking at changes, is learning to think differently (see reframing techniques to support you with this) and be more resourceful with life's events. Approaching life in the right frame of mind leads to better outcomes.
It is possible to use this technique backwards using the Act as If technique to change how you think about a situation. For example you think that you do not want to do a mundane task like making a healthy meal instead of eating junk food, because right now, you find this mundane or too difficult. If you start the task whilst pretending you are really enjoying it this can result in actually getting the positive feelings you need and lead you to think that you enjoy doing this task so that you continue to do it.
Online CBT
I offer online therapy for people all over the world using Skype. As long as you have access to a computer you can find out more about accessing therapy, whether it is CBT, mindfulness, psychodynamic approaches or hypnosis to achieve your goals contact me today.
Treating Low Confidence with Hypnosis
Low Confidence is an issue which affects most people during their lives. Though many like to present themselves in public as though they are very confident; for many this is just a symptom of many of the messages about being able to cope which we have been given in our youth.
Confidence depends on what we are doing
Confidence is something which is not fixed, at times we have high self esteem and at others we have little confidence. We can be very confident about one thing and lack confidence about doing something else. For example you may be confident about driving a car but be fearful about driving a lorry.
Unnecessary Pressure to feel confident
This misunderstanding of how we experience confidence can put unnecessary pressure on someone because, instead of allowing someone to be honest about their confidence, they are told that they are just being silly or in a more macho environment they are not even able to say that they are not confident.
Self fulfilling prophecies
Doing any task when you experience low confidence, puts added pressure on you. If you feel confident and expect to perform well, the outcome becomes a self fulfilling prophecy. “I am good at this. I will do great,” becomes the norm.
The same is true for when you feel unconfident. The idea that you are not able to do a task, that you will make a mistake becomes a reality. This becomes a self-perpetuating cycle and so practise makes imperfect and reinforces that you cannot do something.
Low self esteem can come from a single traumatic event, the long standing messages of an individual or a combination of events, resulting in a person avoiding discovering their own true potential.
Throughout my entire career I have been working with people who have experienced issues around confidence and self esteem. When working with people with low self esteem I work to help the individual recognise their own potential, identify a safe and appropriate arena where this confidence can be nurtured and support the person to recognise and explore their potential.
Hypnosis and other tools
There are lots of ways of building self esteem, this site will suggests a host of different techniques and approaches that I use and you can adopt to nurture your self esteem and allow your confidence to grow day by day. Alongside these techniques, can can use hypnosis for life long changes.
What can you do to treat low confidence?
Treatment for low confidence is really effective and usually takes around 4 hours to make a significant difference. Treatment includes a mix of changing how you think, both about the task that you struggle with but also how you think about your self plus a strategic analysis of how you go about the task that you feel lacking in confidence with and offering more effective techniques for you. The typical things that you can find help for on this site and via therapy include low confidence around exams, driving tests, relationships, the workplace, dealing with others.
The specialist tools I offer include assertiveness training, which includes learning language techniques to stop people make yo do things that you do not want to do. language techniques to get what you want without getting manipulated or frustrated, public speaking skills, dealing with personal put downs by others and negative ways of talking about yourself. Other techniques include, CBT, NLP, Hypnosis, planning skills, amongst many more.
Need instant confidence for driving test or exams? Use hypnosis.
Hypnotherapy is very effective at helping deal with self esteem and personal performance issues. Hypnosis is used frequently to support someone to sit a driving test, sit academic exams and to give presentations. At a more general stage, it is very effective at helping someone to boost their underlying confidence, sense of themselves and ability to value themselves in the world.
Build Confidence with a success diary
Build Confidence and self esteem by keeping a diary of some of the positive aspects of your day. This is a great way to reflect on your day whilst focusing on the great things that you have achieved.
RECALL YOUR SUCCESSES
It is common when people have low self esteem that they only notice and recall the things which remind them that they are not successful or worthy of praise. By keeping a simple victory diary, only recording things, that have gone well today, that you have done that you are proud of and things that they have learned today, your self esteem will grow and grow.
Create a success diary that is personal to you
TAKE PRIDE IN YOUR SUCCESSES
If you use a paper diary, start as you mean to go on have pride in your successes by getting a journal or diary that you really want to write in that represents your personality and physically feels nice for you to hold and use.
Build confidence by being specific about your successes
You may consider a special pen to your write your entries in. The diary is intended to record your successes and the things that you have done that you are proud of each day. How you record them is up to you but put feelings in your diary express how you felt about each success. Be specific as it is intended to remind you about things that matter to you and you are proud of.
Build confidence by keeping a record of these types of successes
In your success diary, record:
Things you are proud of that you have achieved.
Things you have done today even if you did not achieve perfection
Nice things you have done for yourself and for others.
Goals that you have set yourself and progress on there goals
Feedback from others. Feedback from others can often tell us more about our progress then we are able to identify by ourselves. This is especially true when we focus on the outcome instead of the progress were are making and if it is a big goals such as loose a lot of weight or to step back from an addiction.
Success diaries can hugely impact your success when you are making big changes.
KEEP FOCUSED ON YOUR GOALS
To help you meet your change goals the diary should include any personal goal targets that you have made progress on. When dealing with self confidence and self esteem a key area for development centres around how you communicate with others, if you use your assertiveness tools and if you express your own needs clearly so that you get your needs met. Using the diary to record progress and allowing you to reflect on the next small step to reach your target will help you to make long lasting permanent changes in your life. The diary will also help grow your self esteem and motivation by being a record of how different your life has become.
Revisiting success is essential for self esteem as it raises awareness to your successes. This process is a way of re-programming your brain to seek and find positivity in your life.
Beat Low Self Esteem by finding positivity every day.
Low self esteem can undermine any thoughts of changing, even before you have done anything to try to change. One of the simplest and easiest ways of growing your confidence is learning to be positive and pat yourself on the back everyday. The One Thing You Have Learned Technique is a cost free tool which I teach my clients to value themselves and put the foundations in place to start those changes as soon as they come into therapy.
This simple out of trance hypnotic technique helps you see and experience the world in a more positive perspective, which in turn gives you the drive and self esteem to take on the challenges which have held you back so far. Each day find time to positively reflect, by asking yourself to identify one thing you have learned plus one thing you have done well.
Find positivity in your day
By making time to find positivity in your day, your thinking will become more positive and still remain realistic giving you the mental resources to make positive changes and the resilience to maintain those changes when times get difficult.
Reflective techniques do not have to be arduous. This technique is really effective at identifying the things that you should be proud of every day. People with low self esteem and a negative view of themselves have learned to reject or ignore anything that they could and should celebrate about themselves and this simple and easy to maintain therapeutic tool is excellent at reigniting that passion for valuing yourself and building your self esteem.
Self esteem is an essential ingredient to successful changes, whether you want to beat addictions, lose weight, address a depressive condition or want to end self harming.
Use tools that help you reflect on your successes honestly
Challenging your low Self esteem using by growing your own confidence is vital to find the emotional resources to keep your motivation going for the full 66 days in order to reach your goals. During that period there will be knocks to your confidence or your plans and it is the ability to source the resilience to keep the changes going.
Using the One Thing I Have Learned tool forces you to recognise that your day has helped you to grow. When people first use this tool they anticipate learning something very big or an academic type of learning. The purpose of this question is to be aware that had you not been present in the world today then you would not have learned something that you learned today. This can be as simple as someone’s name, their age or a hobby that they have. The tool is to recognise that unique to this day you have had an experience that you can share with others. This tool therefore allows you to have a point of personal growth but also gives you something to talk about to others as you grow your social resources.
One thing I have learned technique
After answering the One Thing I Have learned question you should answer The One Thing I Have Done Well question, which is again, unique to you and again it's purpose is to notice your own place in the world. The things that we can celebrate about ourselves should only be things that we value so if we have turned up on time, an issue for some addicts, have kept to our eating plan, an issue for those on weight management plans, or asked someone a question, a target for those who are working on their social anxiety then we can use that to celebrate our success today.
To further support this work these positive events can be added to our success diaries and can be integrated into goal setting and small step approaches to change.
Repeated practise of these tools will rapidly grow self esteem and build the resilience and confidence to work on other more demanding life issues.
Boost Confidence by being kind
To boost confidence and raise your self esteem there are a whole host of techniques to adopt. A simple and enjoyable way of changing how you feel about yourself can be achieved by helping others. Helping others, whether by a small act of holding a door for someone or a more significant one of helping them through troubled times is a major way of growing self esteem; which in turn is vital to have the resources necessary to deal with any challenges when making major lifestyle changes.
Self esteem is all about how we feel about ourselves. One major contribution to growing self esteem is how we are able to improve the lives of others.
OFFER A HELPING HAND
By helping others, in any capacity, from being an anonymous helping hand to coming to their rescue when there is a major crisis, improves how we see ourselves and value our contribution to the lives of others.
Self esteem is enhanced because you will get immediate feedback about how they valued you at this point. However, there is self esteem development stemming also from the knowledge that you did a positive action which supported someone for all the right reasons.
ADVICE AND ENCOURAGEMENT
Helping others can range from giving someone advice, encouragement or advice to doing something. If you are shy you can use social media like email, or Facebook to offer advice so despite this shyness, you are able to build your own self esteem. See Shyness for more support.
MANY WAYS TO SHOW KINDNESS AND BOOST CONFIDENCE
Another way of helping others and also boost confidence can be doing something nice which is not necessarily solving problems but just showing kindness like preparing a meal for friends or babysitting.
Whatever you do, make sure that you are doing it because you want to and not for negative reasons such as trying to impress others.
AS you do more for you and share your talent, accept yourself and talk kindly to yourself then you will find that you will improve your confidence in yourself, and also give a boost to everyone around you. Enjoy knowing that your positivity will be infectious and others will benefit from your improved wellbeing so .....
1: Be kind to yourself.
2: Talk kindly to yourself and others.
3: Do things that you really want to do and step back from things that are not right for you.
4: Help and enjoy helping others. Do this on your terms or your are vulnerable to burning out.
5: Reflect on your day and find the successes in each and everyday. Use an attitude of gratitude to help you do this.
Self Awareness
Self awareness is vital for growing self esteem and getting control of your life back. How can you change anything if you are not aware what needs to change or what effect that behaviour has on you and others?
This process of reflecting about how you think, feel and behave, alongside the feedback you get from others allows you to reflect on your progress and you are able to build new strategies to keep your change plans on track.
To get started you could decide what you would like to become. This could be confident, calmer, less angry, more honest about your true feelings, more relaxed, happier etc. Then, as you interact with others you could ask for feedback and ask people how they feel you are doing. Listen to the feedback objectively, ask how they suggest you could adapt, reflect on whether that suggestion could help you and try it.
Implementing change is difficult, so if you get feedback or notice that you revert to an old way of doing things. Stop yourself, mid-sentence or after you have done the thing you are learning to change. Apologise, explain that you are doing things differently then replace that behaviour with the target behaviour.
For example: You may want to become calmer. You may get feedback that you raise your voice. This upsets everyone including you. You notice you have raised your voice to someone. As soon as you notice, you apologise, explain that you are not happy but despite this you did not intend to raise your voice; and then, go on to explain your thoughts or feelings in a calm manner. If communication is an issue for you use the assertiveness techniques to take back control. This will very quickly help raise your self esteem as you will learn to take control and responsibility for your behaviour instead of having regrets about what you do, without ever managing those feelings.
Get Feedback to Develop Self Awareness
Feedback is essential to self awareness. People will give you feedback about your behaviour and your performance all the time, even if you do not realise it. Feedback is the response people give to you about any interaction that takes place. To make best use of feedback you must first decide what feedback you have been given. It is easy to assume that feedback which is positive is correct whilst any negative feedback is something which is built on the prejudice or negativity of the person giving it. The best way to have accurate feedback is to ask for it and encourage as open a dialogue as possible and use the information to make personal changes.
To build as honest and specific feedback as possible you should ask directly "Is there anything that you did which you would change and anything which you would like to maintain?"
Also you could ask people "How did my behaviour make you feel?"
This will given people a chance to have a clear picture of what needs to be changed and also how your behaviour impacts on others
Sometimes getting feedback is painful and difficult to hear to use reframing techniques to see feedback as always useful and productive. If you receive feedback that you have done something wrong view it as being aware of what you still have to work on to reach your target. As long as you are actively working to make changes you will find that you will reach your goals.
Use part of your day to reflect on your goals and how much progress you have made on them. This will allow you to identify any displacement activities going on which are undermining your change plans.
To further enhance this use the One Thing I Have Learned and keep a success diary too.
Beat Low Esteem with Spirituality
Low esteem comes from a poor sense of self, sense of not being worthy, capable and low expectations of how others see you. To change this anyone with low self esteem needs to feel complete and have a life with purpose. Self esteem rests on feeling fulfilled. This fulfilment is based on life being in balance and many of your needs being met. The website has different ways to address each personal need. Some of the issues to raise self esteem include more social contact, learning assertiveness, changing the negative message that yo say to yourself as well as meeting one of your basic needs of feeling spiritually connected to your world instead of just a observer. This does not mean specifically god or gods, though for some it does, but a much broader personal sense of being a significant member of their world.
What does being spiritually connected really mean?
What spirituality means here is a deeper sense of connectivity to the world that you live in. There are a range of ways that someone feels spirituality connected with their world. For some people it is having ties with their own family and especially their children. This allows them to feel connected with their own children but also connects them with their own ancestry and their own connection to the world they live. They are also able to feel connected to future generations and feel connected beyond the here and now and have a deeper sense of belonging in their world. to raise your won self esteem you could reconnect with your family, spend more time talking and listening to them or you could go and research your local history or family history. Feeling connected is vital, so you could just connect with your community just by volunteering. You know what is right for you.
Beat low Esteem by reconnecting with nature
Some people feel connected spiritually by connecting with nature. You could meet your spirituality needs by walking in the country, climbing mountains or watching wildlife. For some people, who feel connected with nature they experience the extremes of the season with relish. So maybe take a Walk in the rain, snow, wild winds and feel a sense of connectivity by the might and power of the forces of nature during floods, gales or the serenity of a sunset.
Make time to fulfill your spirituality needs to beat low self esteem
Other ways in which people feel spiritually connected include religious connectivity and meet their spiritual needs through reading religious texts, performing and participating in religious observances and having a shared religious identity.
To prevent low esteem there is a need to recognise how your own spirituality needs can be met and to find time in your life to meet those needs. Being able to meet your own spiritual needs helps build personal motivation and resilience during crisis.
Confidence Hypnotherapist in Sheffield
As a hypnotherapist in Sheffield I have worked extensively with confidence and self esteem and am able to support you to grow your confidence too. I am aware how lacking in confidence can have such a massive impact on the lives of many people I have worked with.
GET WHAT YOU WANT OUT OF LIFE
Low confidence leads to people not expressing what they want out of life. This results in dissatisfaction with relationships, or even failing to start relationships due to fear of rejection or a sense of not being good enough for people that they have feelings for.
IMPROVE YOUR EMPLOYMENT PROSPECTS
Low confidence also impacts on the employment prospects of people, with some failing to apply for roles which they are well suited for or find the interview process too daunting.
This can lead to lifelong dissatisfaction with their careers or being stuck in a role which saps motivation, drive and a desire to use their skills and potential.
My work has been instrumental at supporting clients have the confidence to move forwards in their relationships and go out and meet new people or restate the terms of their current relationships so that they feel happier.
CONQUER PUBLIC SPEAKING
Within employment I have supported people to speak up in meetings, give presentations, speak to their managers about getting a pay rise. With some people successfully moving on from their current roles, some moving to new locations and others progressing to more satisfying roles within their organisations.
STOP FEELING LIKE A FRAUD
Another way in which low confidence has impacted on my clients has been with the "High Achievers" who appear to have demonstrated their ability by having good relationships or good careers
Yet within themselves, some high achievers feel like they are frauds and that they will be found out any time soon. This group are very good at rejecting support and instead direct their attention to constantly striving to do better, unconvinced that they are worthy of the praise, salary or respect that their ability and effectiveness generates.
Treat negative thoughts and feelings with hypnosis
Hypnosis can help you to identify the origins of any negative feelings and once identified can offer direct treatments to allow you to accept yourself and free you from the pressures and worrying about the opinions of others and instead be yourself.
LIVE THE LIFE YOU WANT
Through simple self esteem building techniques, including developing assertiveness, learning to self appreciate and to live with realistic expectations I will support you to be less hard on yourself and have the confidence so you can live the life you want and deserve.
Wide ranging experience to support your needs
Prior to my work as a hypnotherapist in Sheffield, I have worked in a range of roles, including teaching, working with children who run away from home and supporting those learning to live in recovery from alcohol or drug addictions. My career has given me extensive work supporting people who have low confidence and during that time I have developed many techniques to allow you to grow your self esteem and give you the support to adopt these skills away from the therapy room so that you can live independently.
As a highly skilled, patient and caring hypnotherapist in Sheffield, my kind and respectful approach will allow you to grow in confidence throughout your treatment.