Hypnotherapy for anxiety and worry
Some people feel anxious about a specific situation or event like
- taking a driving test
- sitting exams
- meeting new people (social anxiety or shyness)
Others have generalised anxiety disorder which may not have an obvious cause or may cause you to worry about almost everything. Severe anxiety can restrict your activities and be physically and emotionally debilitating.
Whatever form your anxiety takes, hypnotherapy aims to help you relax, improve your confidence, reduce worrying and start to enjoy life again.
Why do we get anxious?
Anxiety is one of the ways in which our mind tries to keep us safe. If we were not anxious about anything at all, you can imagine we'd get into some very dangerous situations. Anxiety which is in the right place and at the right level focuses our mind and makes us careful.
Being careful about handling knives, crossing the road or walking alone through a rough area of town whilst wearing expensive jewellery (!) protects us. That's fine and really quite useful.
Unfortunately, sometimes we lose the ability to put the real danger of a situation in perspective. Our mind reacts as if everything was very dangerous whether or not it actually is. We may not even be sure why we feel anxious because logically we can see that there's no danger. At this point, anxiety becomes a problem.
Physical symptoms of anxiety
The physical symptoms of anxiety can be unpleasant and scary, including
dizziness tiredness pins and needles
irregular heartbeat (palpitations) muscular aches and pains headaches
shortness of breath insomnia stomach ache/nausea
diarrhoea or constipation changes in the menstrual cycle (periods)
Reducing anxiety
There are some things you can do yourself to help reduce anxiety and worry - see my blog on the subject. But if that's not enough, a course of hypnotherapy might help. This might involve helping you to find new ways to challenge your anxious thinking, to relax and feel confident instead of worrying and perhaps looking at when and why you first became anxious. Every course of hypnotherapy is different because every person is different.
As you'll have seen elsewhere on this site, a hypnotherapist cannot simply click their fingers and compel you to change. You'll need to practice and use the techniques you learn in the sessions. But if you are willing to do this, anxiety can be overcome.
Some of the signs of stress mentioned above can also be caused by physical conditions that need to be treated by your GP; if this applies to you it's wise to get them checked out.
Then contact me to see how I can help.
