Most people hit plateaus in their life from time to time. What not all of them realize is that attitude often plays a role when people feel stuck in life or like they haven’t reached their true potential. Thankfully, self-hypnosis offers the tool they need to unlock their minds’ power and reprogram their lives.
How It Works
Some people think of hypnosis as being mystical or mysterious, but recent research has shown exactly how it works. When someone listens to self hypnosis audio sessions, they induce a hypnotic state. This state is one in which the person is awake but relaxed and much more focused than usual on inner experiences rather than on their outer environments.
Self-hypnosis usually involves initiating intentional feelings, thoughts, or mental imagery. Self-guided sessions help people change the architecture of their minds by manipulating these factors by using prompts or suggestions. The beneficial effects should then continue once the person re-enters a normal waking state, although it can take multiple sessions for the suggestions to take hold fully.
Uses for Self-Hypnosis
Self-hypnosis sessions can be used in a variety of contexts. Some people use them to quit smoking cigarettes or cut back on drinking or unhealthy foods. Others self-hypnotize to help boost their self-esteem. Improving sleep quality is one of the most popular uses for self-hypnosis, although the techniques used here typically combine the technique with mindfulness meditation, a related but separate practice.
How to Induce a Hypnotic State
The best way to self-hypnotize is with the help of an audio session that specifically targets whatever aspect of the mind the person wants to change. Although there are no universally accepted practices for self-hypnosis, most programs follow some variation on these basic steps:
- Find a quiet, secluded, and comfortable spot and remove distractions like phones to create the right environment.
Pinpoint a specific goal.
Adopt an inward-focused state that induces relaxation.
Visualize a positive scene.
Visualize a scene that exemplifies the goal.
Spend around five minutes on goal-directed imagery.
Exit the hypnotic state.
This entire process is much easier with the help of guided self-hypnosis sessions.
Can Everyone Self-Hypnotize?
Although most people derive great benefits from self-hypnosis, it doesn’t work for everyone. About a decade ago, researchers at Stanford discovered that whether people are highly hypnotizable varies depending on the structure of their brains. People with less attention and executive control are generally harder to put in a hypnotic trance, and some may not be able to do it, at all.
Most people can employ self-hypnosis, even if they have a hard time entering a trance state at first. As with any new skill, self-hypnosis is easiest to adopt when people make it a practice. Spending just 10 minutes a day listening to guided sessions is usually all it takes to start noticing positive changes over time.
Commit to Positive Change
Once people realize how easy it is to gain more control over their subconscious minds for the sake of implementing positive changes in the way they think, developing a regular self-hypnosis routine is a no-brainer. Get started today by checking out some self-hypnosis audio sessions. Reputable hypnotists often offer one, or even several, scripts for free to give people the chance to see if self-hypnosis will work for them, so there’s nothing to lose by giving this popular mind-altering technique a shot.