Thursday, November 12, 2009

Changing the Habits That Weigh You Down

By Theresa Johnson, CH

The doctors, the dietitians, the nutritionists, the fitness books all say "eating right and exercising more is the key to losing weight." So why isn't it that easy? Through my experience as a certified hypnotherapist, I have found that the main reason why the diets and fitness fads have not helped you to create permanent weight loss changes is because you have not truly made a lifestyle change.

When changes are made in the subconscious mind where your long-term memories, beliefs and perceptions are stored, you in turn make changes to your thought process. Change your thoughts and you change your life! That's right, and as a result, you can actually change your behaviors and your reactions easily with little to no conscious effort on your part.

"How can you do such a remarkable thing?" you may be asking. The answer is with hypnosis. A trained professional hypnotist can assist you in accessing your the powerful subconscious mind to help you make your desired changes.

Hypnosis is a state of altered consciousness, similar to daydreaming. For the purposes of hypnotherapy it is used as a process that crosses the critical, analytical, judgement part of the conscious mind in order to access the powerful subconscious mind. The subconscious mind is the part of the mind where your long-term memories are stored, hence, where "perception and belief programming" is stored.

Studies have been done that estimate that 75% of our beliefs about ourselves have been imprinted into our subconscious by the age of 7. Therefore, the majority of our personality is determined by the time we are 7. In a hypnotic state an individual can experience age regression, a mental journey back into their past safely and objectively to look at their framework of beliefs that were established at a young age. Then the hypnotist will guide you forward (age progression) bit by bit to review what other beliefs were established based on the original beliefs. These beliefs or perceptions can then be changed as necessary to create beliefs that are in line with one's conscious desires. Future progression often follows, so you can imagine and experience your life with the changes already in place.

If your subconscious mind has been fed negative information, by others or yourself, then that is what it has been programmed to perceive and belief. The subconscious mind takes in whatever in has been given and the conscious mind acts upon it. So if you believe you are fat or worthless, your thoughts will reflect that belief, and your behaviors will reflect and reinforce your thoughts. One may overeat or refuse to exercise as a reaction to the original beliefs that have now been reinforced through thought and action (or non-action). Now you can begin to understand that what you are feeding your mind is as important as what you are feeding your body.

In hypnotherapy, the hypnotherapist presents positive suggestions to your subconscious mind. Those positive suggestions are what you want for you, not what the hypnotherapist wants for you. We work together to clarify what it is that you want for yourself and we put that in the most positive language possible and feed it to your subconscious mind. Once that new information is in place in the long-term memory of the subconscious, your conscious mind can begin to act upon it. Ultimately you will then act in the new way that is in balance with your conscious desires.

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