by Alan B. Densky, CH
Posthypnotic suggestion, thanks to television shows and movies, the very word conjures up the visualization of a beady-eyed hypnotherapist swinging an old watch and droning the words, "You are getting sleepy."
Do an MSN search, and you will find hundreds of thousands of web pages focused on the subject, especially weight loss hypnosis. Unfortunately, many websites that sell pre-recorded hypnosis programs for weight loss make unsubstantiated postulations. I've been a hypnotherapist since 1978. So I think that I'm more than competent to set the record straight on weight loss hypnosis.
First of all, self-hypnosis is a tool, just like a scalpel is a tool. Just as different surgeons have varied skill levels in the use of a scalpel, novel hypnotists have diversified skill levels in the use of hypnotism for weight loss. And to complicate the matter, there are many different forms and types of hypnotism. Here are some of the wild assertions about weight loss hypnosis that I've seen on websites, along with the truth of the matter:
"Hypnosis for weight loss will speed up your metabolism." If you want to know the total truth, the fact of the matter is that weight loss hypnosis won't speed up your metabolism. But it can be very useful at helping to program your subconscious with increased motivation to exercise, and exercise will increase your rate of metabolism. Similarly, self-suggestion to speed up the metabolism for quick weight loss can be effected by programming the unconscious to motivate the intake of increased amounts of protein, because that intake will step up the metabolism.
Hypnotism will make you become thinner. This is false. But weight loss hypnosis can be used to help eliminate your appetite, so that you eat less, and eating less can help you to lose some weight.
The average person's appetite and urges are caused by two unconscious programs: A. When you pair eating with any other behavior, the other behavior will trigger cravings for food and a strong desire to eat. This is called a conditioned response. For example, if you eat when you watch socialize, you will automatically get an urge to eat each time you see other people eating.
B. When you feel tense, you feel a strong desire to put food into your mouth for relaxation and pleasure. This is the result of programming that you received as an infant. When you got uneasy, your mom put a bottle in your mouth. You got distracted, relaxed, and probably fell asleep. Now when you get cranky (anxious or tense), you feel compelled to put something into your mouth for relaxation and pleasure.
C. There is a third unconscious program that is present for some people. It's called emotional eating. Emotional eating takes place when a person is motivated to make him or herself fat, because by being overweight they will protect themselves in some way.
For example, if an individual got their heart broken in a relationship, their subconscious will usually force them into an action that would prevent them from getting their heart broken again. Example: They are motivated to become overweight to keep them out of new relationships, because that will cast out the possibility of another broken heart.
D. I have written several articles on hypnosis for weight loss and emotional eating that are available on my website. There are some powerful ways to use posthypnotic suggestion to reduce or eliminate emotional eating.
So just how can weight loss hypnotic suggestion fix the above problems? Let's cover them one at a time.
In paragraph "A" above: Conditioned responses can be "wiped out" easily using a methodology that I call the "Flash." The flash trains the unconscious mind to setup a new set of responses. In the above example, the subject had unconsciously interrelated the image of food in the hand, with the TV. Each time he / she sat down to watch the TV, the subconscious mind filled in the missing part of the impression: It "Flashed" the picture of the food in the hand, and the subject felt a craving, and an urge to eat.
The Flash is a scheme that enables us to program the unconscious to use the depiction of the TV as a trigger for the mental impression of yourself watching TV without eating. When we lose the mental impression of the food, we lose the cravings.
When we momentarily disassociate (see ourselves from the point of view that someone else would), we are not able to sense our feelings (cravings and urges).
When we see ourselves in a behavior (watching TV without eating), we feel an urge to engage in that behavior. So the subject loses the cravings, and actually gets an urge to reject food.
In paragraph "B" above: The subject is eating and drinking for relaxation and pleasure. We teach the subject self-hypnosis for weight loss, because the very essence of the hypnotic state is deep relaxation.
And we utilize the "Flash" to program the subconscious to use the mental images that are triggering feelings of annoyance and stress, as triggers for secondary mental images that will trigger feelings of relaxation instead. When the subject feels greater relaxation overall, oral urges are greatly diminished.
In paragraph "C" above: We discussed compulsive eating which makes the person overweight. The "behavior" of being overweight then provides some sort of emotional protection. So we use a discipline called an NLP reframe, which programs the subconscious to be responsible for making the subject automatically substitute some other larger acceptable behavior that will provide the same emotional protection, in place of being overweight. And that reframe will cast out the urge to eat for emotional purposes.
Self-hypnosis for weight loss can be a very powerful method. I can only uncover the tip of the iceberg in this short characterization. Please see my website for more comprehensive articles and information.
About the Author:
Alan B. Densky, CH opened his hypnosis practice in Feb. 1978. He is the inventor of Neuro-VISION appetite control & stop smoking video hypnosis, which received a US Patent because of its effectiveness. Visit http://www.neuro-vision.us/ to receive Free hypnosis mp3's, or subscribe to one or more world-class hypnosis newsletters.
Article Source:http://www.goarticles.com/cgi-bin/showa.cgi?C=421924
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