If we postulate that we are both mind and body integrated into a living
and breathing being, we are able to more readily understand how hypnotherapy can
be effective in healing illness, emotional disturbances and bad habits.
The human being is constantly striving for an equilibrium in most all
facets of life, conscious and unconscious. When a negative force interferes
with the equilibrium of the being, a counter-force normally occurs,
creating a ridge of pain or emotional upset within the individual. The
upset may manifest itself as illness and the person will likely remain ill
until the ridge has been "taken
apart" or collapsed through abreaction.
Most of our life is "lived" at the unconscious level. It has
been calculated by some psychologists that we can accept about 126
bits of information into our conscious mind per second. Meanwhile our
unconscious mind is aware of over one million bits of information per
second. Generally speaking, we do not regulate our breathing at the
conscious level. We do not regulate our pulse and heartbeat at the
conscious level. We do not normally regulate the action of our brain
functions, seeing, hearing, smelling or tasting at the conscious
level. Most of our living is done at the unconscious level.
Meanwhile, the conscious mind is attempting to deal with the internal
and external forces in the environment that are our of equilibrium, in
attempt to bring them to equilibrium. As the conscious and unconscious
minds compensate to these stimuli, imbalances will and do occur. These
imbalances cause illness with a wide variety of symptoms and
manifestations.
With some degree of regularity, these imbalances seem to manifest
themselves at physical locations in the body where previous illness or
injury has occurred. If someone had broken an arm many years ago and the
person comes under great stress, there is a likelihood that the location of
the previous injury will again become painful. Other times, there is no
easily identifiable link to previous injuries and illness with the current
symptoms.
Another key consideration in learning how we become ill is the fact
that identical traumatic situations will effect different people in very
different ways. The death of a parent may trigger depression in one child,
anxiety in another and trigger no negative upsets in another child. It is
normally not possible to discover why this specific stimulus triggered one
set of symptoms in one person and not another without the use of hypnosis.
Once the cause has been discovered, it is very possible to eliminate the
illness using hypnotherapy.
We know that many illness are the result of bacteriological infections
and viruses. We will leave these forms of illness for the medical doctor to
diagnose and treat in most cases. Occasionally hypnotherapy will
"clear"
this kind of illness, but hypnotherapy is more likely to be beneficial in
illness of a psychophysiological nature. Illness that are psychosomatic in
nature most often are predictable with this formula:
Predisposition + stress = psychosomatic illness.
"Predisposition" can be understood to mean the individual's
history of health, mental fitness, and environmental influences.
"Stress" can be understood as a sum of fears, anxiety and
worries, real or imagined. Environme ntal stresses include traumatic
events immediately before the onset of illness. Death of a loved one,
war, financial problems, relationship problems and the like, can all
be stressors that ignite within the individual predisposed to illness.
Common psychosomatic illness seen at the dawn of the 21st century
include panic attacks, anxiety disorders, depression, environmental illness
and a host of symptoms with no apparent pathology. Using (some but not
all) depression as an example of psychosomatic illness, we find some common
roots. Many clients have repressed guilt and/or hostility as the key to
their depressive illness. In these instances, hypnotherapy can be used to
create an equilibrium within the individual and the depression often
disappears.
Symptoms and illness are the manifestations of the "ridges"
noted above. Many cases of headaches, stomach aches, tinnitus,
environmental illness, panic, anxiety, depression, irritability,
insomnia, and so on are caused by these ridges. One side of this ridge
you have the dynamics of the unconscious mind pushing toward the
ridge. By eliminating the dynamics and pressures in the unconscious
mind, the ridge collapses, and the illness disappears or becomes
significantly less impairing.
One significant element in helping an individual heal is simply allowing
the person to have the insights that are discussed here. When the client
understands that his illness may be psychophysiological in nature, and
acknowledges this fact, healing can begin. Without the acceptance of this fact,
healing is far less likely. It is absolutely critical that the client pursues
all possible physical pathologies to his illness for two reasons.
First, if there is a physical pathology it should be medically treated. Second,
when no pathology is found this will aid the client in being certain that his
illness is psychophysiological in nature.
The next significant element in healing is for the client to
understand the necessity of the therapist. It is very rare that an
individual is healed through his own efforts. It is far more likely that
heterohypnosis will be the most useful tool for healing. The reason is that
it is difficult to self-regress and self-abreact. The individual's cause of
illness is in the unconscious mind and not the conscious mind. Clients
often believe that if something is psychophysiological in nature it should
be easy to "get over it." This is simply not the case. People die
every day from psychophysiological illness. Will power and intelligence are
relatively insignificant in healing.
Doctor James Watkins, the eminent hypnotherapist of war victims stated
this axiom,
"The
more resistance he (the client) naturally feels towards accepting a
concept or idea, the more likely it is that the idea is approaching close to the
true heart of his illness."
As each layer of the cause of the illness is revealed, the person
feels better and better. Each unconscious causal relationship is
integrated into the conscious mind for the individuals cognitions. Insight
of the specific cause of the clients illness becomes the largest piece of
the healing puzzle. As the final layers of the cause are revealed, the
individual reaches a significant level of healing.
Unfortunately, not everyone is completely healed with this degree of
hypnotherapy. There are other factors at work. One of them is called
"secondary gain." Another factor in healing is "the desire
of the person to get well." These critical issues will be discussed in
a future installment of Hypnosis and Healing.
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