Are you one of those who mortally fears flying in airplane or getting into an elevator; are you one of those people who would rather live on take out food for days if you found a rat in your cupboard while cleaning? Then it seems to me you have a phobia. But before you start hassling yourself with it, let me make it clear that a phobia is very different from fear. Fear is a rational feeling, which is driven by the instinct of survival; let’s say fear of falling or fear of touching sharp things. You are afraid of them because you know you might hurt yourself with them. However a phobia is an irrational feeling, it is a grave fear attached to an object or situation, which in reality might not harm us after all! Something like a fear of water, dentists, blood, driving etc. they might not harm us but we are mortally scared of them in any case. Can you identify yourself with any of the phobia situations? Then its time you looked at hypnotherapy for phobias to help your situation.
Imagine this, you have been offered a lucrative position of a hotshot executive at a premier company; the profile looks irresistible, the pay is exceptional and it has the makings of the perfect job you imagined. There is only one hitch…the profile requires you to jet set around the world at frequent intervals, and you are petrified of flying. What would you do; would you give up a dream job because of your phobia? In most cases, a phobia is a negative emotion; your mind tells you that what you are scared of might not be rational and plausible, but your subconscious will just not allow you to override the fear. In such cases, you end up losing on a lot of opportunities which you might regret later; worse still your phobia might adversely affect your career, family and love life. This is where hypnotherapy for phobias comes in. A hypnotherapist will ideally work with you to discover the issues which led to the formation of such a phobia. Most of these phobias are born in our childhood, and our subconscious mind detaches the fear from the situation. What it carries on in the adulthood is the irrational fear, with no recollection whatsoever of the situation which instilled this fear in us. Hypnotherapy for phobias will let you reconnect with the past and identify the root cause of your phobia.
Now that we have established the cause of the phobia, there are different ways on which it can be approached. For example, there is a method we hypnotherapists call Cognitive hypnotherapy, which helps your mind realign the reactions to the fearful situations. In other words, these techniques help you to form a behavior pattern when faced with the situation or object you fear. Let’s say if you are water phobic or are scared of driving, this method of hypnotherapy for phobias will teach you to have a calm reaction when faced with a situation, and teach you to relax with the help of visualizations.
In some other cases, hypnotherapy for phobias works on the theory of making the subconscious mind realize that the phobia is irrational. This is done with the help of auto suggestions and positive enforcements. The subconscious is made aware that though the fear might have served a specific purpose in your childhood, it holds no relevance in your life as an adult; by being fed these suggestions on a regular basis, your subconscious will learn to distance itself from the fear and eventually discard it for good.
There is a common factor between phobias and hypnotherapy; they are both related to the subconscious. However, while one is irrational and undesirable, the other is all about self discovery and self innovation.