Understand why people usually make and break New Year resolutions

1. The Three Levels of the Mind

To understand how hypnosis can help with New Year Resolutions, one has to understand how the mind works. Some people may use ‘subconscious’ and ‘unconscious’ interchangeably but in my school of thought, which is Cal Banyan’s 5 Path Advanced Therapeutic Hypnosis, we identify three layers of the mind. They are the Conscious Mind (CM), the Unconscious Mind (UCM) and the Subconscious Mind (SCM).

All three levels are functioning simultaneously. It is the CM that most of us use in our everyday lives. It is rational and analytical but its memory power is only temporary. And our normal waking consciousness rests at the unconscious level which remains idle. The most powerful part of our mind is the SCM which acts as the storehouse of all our thoughts, feelings, sensations and experiences that we have ever had. The SCM, unlike the CM, has permanent memory and accepts every input that it gets, whether good or bad. This shows how highly suggestible the SCM can be.

2. What is Hypnosis?

The word, ‘hypnosis’ is derived from the Greek God of sleep, ‘Hypnos’. However, hypnosis is not sleep. In fact, if a client sleeps while in hypnosis, healing work cannot be done. Hypnosis is a state where we tend to be relaxed, physically and mentally, while still remaining aware of everything going on around us. This is a state where our subconscious minds can be utilised for healing purposes.

3. Hypnosis is Natural

The process of hypnosis is completely natural. Most people may get into this state everyday without even realising it. For example, when someone daydreams during class, or when someone is engrossed playing video or computer games, or when we sit in front of the television and are so glued on the screen or even when we drive along the highway and reach a particular destination without even consciously remembering which route we took, are all examples of how we get into a light state of hypnosis.

4. One has to be Intelligent enough to be hypnotized

One thing which most hypnotists and hypnotherapists are agreed upon is that every normal intelligent human being can be induced into hypnosis. And for hypnosis to work, the client must be a willing party and agree to be hypnotised. And the client must understand the language of the therapist and be willing to follow instructions. Without such compliance, the client cannot be hypnotised and healing work cannot begin. Hypnosis works with the principles of the mind to empower people. Another thing that can hinder hypnosis is fear, so a good hypnotherapist will usually work on the fear factor before beginning serious therapeutic work.

5. Why Most New Year Resolutions Fail

Every year, people make New Year resolutions but by the end of the year, they begin to realise that they have not achieved them. Another New Year comes and hope is re-kindled and New Year resolutions are made again just to be broken. Many have problems keeping their resolutions or carrying them through successfully. So you see, people usually make and break resolutions! This is because they rely on their will power to help them achieve their goal. Unfortunately will power resides in the conscious mind which is limited.

Another main reason for people making and breaking resolutions is that deep within their SCM, they do not believe in themselves. Years of negative input, negative feelings and negative self-talk like “I don’t think I’m good enough” or “I’m a failure” have been imprinted deeply in the SCM. And since the SCM is also lazy, it does not easily accept positive affirmations just once a year. Feelings that reside in the SCM were formed through repetitive experiences and through believing ‘authority figures’. So, merely making New Year resolutions each year hasn’t worked for most people.

6. The Vicious Cycle of Relying on the Conscious Mind

And if their New Year resolution is to lose weight, most people find out albeit too late, that if they rely only on their will power to help them lose weight, the initial enthusiasm fades and all their old habits return as if in vengeance. These people have great difficulty trying to hold onto the resolution.

7. How a Qualified Hypnotherapist can help

This is where hypnosis gets into the picture. When a therapist induces a person into hypnosis, he or she works with the client’s SCM. For example, if the client’s New Year resolution is to lose weight or to quit smoking, then the therapist will guide the person in hypnosis to picture himself or herself achieving their goal, imagining the fun, healthy activities that they will do as a non-smoker or a healthier person and how they can feel more confident of themselves. A new pattern is thus created in their minds and once this idea is accepted by the SCM, it comes true and the person inevitably becomes a non-smoker or a healthier person.

8. How Hypnosis really Works – Harnessing the SCM

Hypnosis is definitely the answer! However people must realise that hypnosis is not magic and it cannot make a person do anything contrary to his belief system. What makes hypnosis work is that it is a deep state of relaxation and intense mental focus that allows suggestions to work on the SCM, thus helping one to re-programme old attitudes and belief systems that hinder change. And for this to work, the client must want to make that change. The good news is if the client walks in through our door, seeking our help, it means that he is committed to change. It is then up to us to ensure that he does make that change.

9. What a Client Needs to Know

We have to inform our clients that if they continue the way they have been doing all the past years by relying just on their CM to help them change, it doesn’t happen. This is because they are relying on the will power of the CM, which was never meant to create permanent change.

If permanent change is desired, one way is to harness the power of suggestions given to the SCM through hypnosis. It can be done either with the help of a therapist who works with the client or the client can choose to learn how to do self hypnosis. Once self-hypnosis has been learnt, it is theirs forever and they will be able to achieve any goal they set their mind to. Self Hypnosis is the tool to help them achieve their New Year resolutions without fear of failure.

10. How can Self Hypnosis Help

Most of us go through life trying to handle the stress that we face daily. Most of it is external stress that comes and goes, like exam stress, stress related to monthly bills, graduation and weddings. Most of us are quite good in handling such stress. However there is another kind of stress that ‘eats’ us away silently. This is internal stress that may be chronic in nature and is with us constantly. Many people are unable to deal with such stress on their own mainly because they have not been shown how to do so. The way is to do self hypnosis. When a person is able to withstand internal stress, then he is also disciplined enough to make a resolution and then keep it. But this discipline needs to first take root in the subconscious mind.

11. Self Hypnosis- A Confidence Booster

Many people, after going through such therapeutic work, suddenly realise that they had the power within them to do this work. It shows them who they really are and they become more confident individuals. Such individuals usually have no problems keeping their New Year resolutions.

Before therapy work, many people are like hot furnaces, ready to ignite. Whatever that happened or believed to have happened in the past, and whatever that is imagined to happen in the future, resonates with whatever an individual experiences in the present to cause the internal stress to worsen. Because of this, many people overreact and have extreme emotions such as uncontrollable anger or grief.

We live in a society that teaches us to suppress our emotions from young. People have over the years suppressed countless emotions that have never been dealt with openly. These are the emotions that tend to haunt people when they least expect it and cause problems in their lives. For example a person who had had a bad experience with a snake in the past may develop an irrational fear of all snakes. That person may try to avoid situations where he or she will come face to face with snakes, but the fear is still there deep within that individual. That same person may also have other suppressed feelings like anger, sadness or guilt. All these suppressed feelings eventually turn the mind into a minefield, ready to ‘explode’. According to our terminology, the cup is full or overflowing.

We, therapists will be able to help such people get rid of their irrational fears and misconceptions. In other words, we teach them to empty the cups. The therapists will also be able to help them understand their feelings. The premise on which we work is that ‘All feelings are good”. This is because any feeling that is based on reality is good. It is all right to feel anger when someone stabs our loved ones. It is all right to feel sad when we lose someone.

What we do is we UN-teach or re-programme their minds by teaching them how they can come to terms with their feelings without harming themselves. People who understand their feelings are less likely to look for ways to distract themselves from uncomfortable feelings. These are the people again who look forward to a New Year with renewed hope.

12. Is Singapore ready for Hypnosis?

When I first started doing hypnotherapy in Singapore many years ago, many people were unaware of what hypnosis is and how we could use it to help ourselves overcome a number of challenges in our lives. People were not aware how they could make and keep resolutions by programming their minds while in a state of hypnosis. Those days I spent quite a fair bit of my time giving free public talks on hypnotherapy and the benefits that can be accrued using it. Nowadays things have changed for the better. People are now more knowledgeable and hypnotherapy is gaining more popularity as people realize that many ailments are stress related and can be alleviated using hypnotherapy rather than medication.

13. Take Action Now!