By William Bullock CHT, BVA
Hypnotherapist & Stress Management Consultant
Practical ideas and techniques to help you or people you know to deal with stressful situations.
First of all, there is good stress and bad stress.
If you had a simple effective technique to deal more effectively with your stress, would that make a difference to your life? Combine that with techniques for changing your mind and thinking more positively and you have some of what an effective Hypnotherapist has to offer. Below, you will find some of the simple techniques I use everyday at work.
Good stress helps you get things done.
Bad stress stops you, sometimes in your tracks!
Good stress motivates you to get up in the morning, do your chores and go to work and to follow your hobbies and interests.
Bad stress interferes with that process by keeping you frustrated or focused on negative things in your life.
As a Hypnotherapist, I look at it as all “being in the mind”. Now obviously, there can be physical causes for stress but that conversation is for another time. The way I see it is that if you think about what you don’t want, you have a pretty good chance of getting it. On the other hand, if you think about what you do want and are active about achieving it, you have a pretty good chance of getting that. So, you might as well think about what you do want. This way of thinking has benefits in every single aspect of your life.
I have had clients come to me, and when I ask them how I may be able to help, I have actually had people say to me “I just want to be happy and contented!” as if that is some permanent state that can be achieved and more impressively, maintained in our ever changing world. Many things don’t turn out the way we imagine them. Every day you get out of bed is a good day, but more importantly, every day offers new possibilities to change your mind and subsequently your future. YOU have to choose to do it. It is OK to give yourself affirmations and create vision boards, but just because you have read a book that says everything will just come to you by doing those things (unless you are one of the 1%), the chances are that you are going to have to apply yourself and put in a great effort.
The same applies to dealing with stress and anxiety. Learning to relax is an art form and it takes practise. It is much easier than most people think and some quite simple techniques can improve your ability to relax very rapidly, if you practise. Like anything worth doing well.
In fact, let us start right now. I recommend you read through the next paragraph once and then come back and do what is described.
I would like you to sit in a comfortable chair or couch, or lie on your bed. Get comfortable. Close your eyes and let your body be supported by the chair or bed. Then you take three deep breaths. Now, these first three deep breaths are special because I would like you to do it like this. Breathe in and out through your mouth. At the same time as you breathe in, consciously push your tummy out. Breathe in as deeply as you comfortably can and then hold the breath in for a few moments, not to the point where it gets uncomfortable, just to the point where you feel you just naturally want to breathe out again. When you are ready, take your second deep breath and do the same thing and then your third. After the three breaths in and out through your mouth, just breathe normally for you. Then I would like you to just allow your body to relax, to sink down into the chair or bed. Starting at your toes and very gradually moving all the way up through every muscle set of your body. You feet, your legs, abdomen, stomach and chest. Let your back and shoulder muscles relax. Then your neck and all the way to the top of your head allowing your jaw muscles and eye muscles to relax. Just allow every muscle to relax in turn. Imagine your whole body gradually sinking down. Give yourself three or four minutes to do this. When you have gotten all the way to the top of your head, take another nice big deep breath and gently open your eyes.
If you have followed the instructions in the preceding paragraph, you should already be feeling much calmer than you were when you started reading this essay.
Now, if you have done any yoga or meditation or practised martial arts like Tai Chi or Qi Gong, this kind of process could be quite familiar to you. If not, you have just discovered a very quick and easy way to begin dealing with stress and anxiety.
Some of you may be surprised by the idea of breathing in and out through your mouth for your first three breaths. This may go against your training, but I have good reason for suggesting you do it like this.
A simple explanation. When you breathe in through your mouth like this and push your solar plexus/tummy out, you maximise your in-breath by pulling your diaphragm down and expanding your lungs as much as possible. As you breathe out like this it allows all the muscles in your whole torso to relax as well. It is very beneficial to learn to breathe like this, for the first three breaths. More than that and you may hyperventilate and we don’t want that. Three deep, calm breaths, in and out through your mouth and then breathe normally.
Many people only use about a third of their lung capacity in everyday breathing, so if they get stressed about something they are more likely to feel anxious and may find themselves in a Fight, Flight, Freeze response.
They will only be getting a limited amount of oxygen being pumped through their body and particularly into their brain.
I’ll explore more on the FFF aspects in another article.
As an example, let us imagine you are in a situation where the above FFF responses are going to cause real problems. Perhaps you are at work in an office meeting. The boss has just asked you a question you don’t know the answer to and you suddenly feel inadequate and stressed. Perhaps you can feel your heart suddenly start pounding in your chest, or you go clammy, or you can’t even think clearly. Your body is telling you to escape this unpleasant situation, but it is not acceptable to run out of the meeting room. You attempt to suppress the flight response and on the outside you might look reasonably OK. But on the inside you know you are a complete mess of feelings and emotions. Heart pounding, shallow breathing, perhaps even tunnel vision, dry tongue, sweaty palms, brow or underarms. This autonomic nervous system (instinctual survival) response can arise in a split second. It can be completely overwhelming for some people. If you have a simple breathing technique like the one above, that you have practised, it is more than likely that you will be able to easily take back control and calmly deal with the situation by giving yourself a moment or two to relax. You can take a few deep breaths and move on. That few moments of relaxing will quite possibly help you to formulate a suitable response. By practising, you might even find yourself enjoying the confidence of handling previously stressful situations confidently. Imagine how good that would be. Just because someone, even the boss, has asked you a question, it doesn’t mean you have to answer it immediately. In fact if you take your time to construct your response and remember to breathe, you will probably be perceived as being more thoughtful in your response, rather than someone who just shoots from the hip. In the long term this will benefit you.
If you find your-self in situations of stress similar to what I have described above, it is a good idea to practise the exercise. When you have relaxed to the top of your head, imagine the kinds of situations that make you feel stressed. Imagine being able to handle it in a very calm relaxed way, the way you would really like to be able to do it.
Practise when you don’t need it, so you have it when you do need it.
I used to be a psychiatric nurse. I have assisted in preparing a few bodies after their passing, I can tell you, the only people who are truly relaxed are those who have passed on. However, that doesn’t mean we can’t improve on our situation and be more relaxed in everything we do. If you are not stressed to some degree about something, you are dead!
The word “STRESS” is used to mean many things today. It may manifest as tension, anxiety, fear, doubt, worry, all this and more. Indeed, the word anxiety is also becoming more commonly, and probably improperly used. Anxiety or panic “attacks” more prevalent. In many ways stress and anxiety are interchangeable for our purposes. Some people wear their “Panic Attacks” as a badge of honour or an excuse to avoid things. It is not. And you can do something about it.
As a hypnotherapist I teach my clients how to manage stress more effectively in their everyday lives. It is important as a therapist to be calm as well, so I use all these techniques everyday myself.
Whether a client comes to quit smoking, for nail-biting, PTSD or “panic attacks” I have a process I follow that allows me to effectively assist the people I see quickly and effectively.
My fundamental approach is teaching all my clients at least a simple form of self-hypnosis or relaxation like the one above. From their very first session they have simple tools to assist them in every day life. Of course, it is up to them to practise it. Building self-hypnosis into every session creates a solid foundation to work from.
If a client says, “I haven’t got time to relax!” .
My response is “You haven’t got time NOT to relax!”
Life is too short to be spent constantly in a state of worry or anxiety.
No one likes to admit to being stressed. Usually they attempt to cover it up in the hope it will pass unnoticed, at least from the outside. Often the internal suffering of this coverup is unbearable and can lead to long term problems. Everyone gets stressed at some time or another for some reason or another. Remember there is good stress and bad stress. And, of course, you and everyone you meet, has their own ways of dealing, or not dealing with it.
The most important and quickest way to deal with stress is to remember to breathe.
That’s it! Everything else is refinement.
After all, the single most important thing you can do as a human being is keep breathing. Some Indian yogis believe that you are allocated a certain number of breaths at birth. That’s one of the reasons they practise breathing techniques to help them breathe more slowly.
You can last about seven days without water in good conditions; forty days without food, without sex... who knows? ... And without breathing, for about 3.5 minutes. No oxygen to the brain causes brain death in most people very quickly. This obviously makes breathing a high priority.
Reading this right now you might think “but I am breathing.” And you are correct. You must be, but, how are you breathing?
Take one slow deep breath now, in through your mouth and out through your mouth. Notice any changes, physical or mental. Were you fully breathing as you sat in front of your computer or went about your business?
Take another slow deep breath now and be conscious of your breath. Those who study yoga, martial arts, meditation, etc., pay heed to their breath as a matter of course.
Take one more slow deep breath now.
If you are a bit overweight or ill, if you find it difficult to catch your breath after a brisk walk or a little jog then some conscious breathing practises will help you!
You need to breathe.
The trick is to find a practical way to breathe that helps you relax more, manage stress, and allows you to thrive.
Also, don’t worry that people will notice you taking your breaths. Everybody has to breathe. If they can’t handle you breathing that is their problem.
If you took all those breaths that I suggested as you read this, you are already noticing the positive effect of breathing... you feel more relaxed and less stressed!
Just give yourself the time and space to practise and you will quickly notice positive changes. After all, worry evokes thinking about what you don’t want. Instead, focus on what you do want and don’t get stressed about relaxing ...remember to breathe.
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William Bulllock has been a Clinical Hypnotherapist and Stress Management Consultant in Australia for over thirty years. His father and two of his siblings were also Hypnotherapists. He is the Past President of the Professional Clinical Hypnotherapists of Australia, a member of the IHF and a photomedia artist. William is available for consultation via his website.
All images in this article are by William.