by  Farzana Jaffer Jeraj       www.clearmindhypnosis.com

Do you have your own Back? Or do you instead berate yourself? Are you hard on yourself? Do you tell yourself that you are lazy or not good enough? When you are moving towards your dreams, is your inner voice telling you not to bother trying because you're never going to get there anyways?

Let's get brutally honest and real for a moment. If our friends said to us what we say to ourselves in our minds, they wouldn't be our friends for very long. One more time in caps?

IF OUR FRIENDS SAID TO US WHAT WE SAY TO OURSELVES- IN OUR MINDS, THEY WOULDN'T BE OUR FRIENDS FOR VERY LONG.

Our friends are smart. First of all and most importantly, they want us to keep being friends with them. Why? Because we're awesome and they love us! Secondly, on some level our friends know that criticism is not going to assist us in moving towards our goals.

I'll let you in on a secret. We're friends to people too! We too know the aforementioned to be true or we would criticize our friends instead of encouraging them. Deep down we all know criticism without redirection and positive feedback to be debilitating to motivation, progress and growth. That's why we don't dish it out to others. Why then do we do we do this to ourselves?

I'm going to hold on that question, as I'm sensing some of you may be thinking that if you let go of that inner critic you will begin to fail, so I ask now what have you been accomplishing? Has it been a fun journey along the way or do you always feel like a failure? The more you pick on yourself, the worse you feel. The worse you feel, the more difficult it is to accomplish things. The more difficult it is, the worse you feel. Since you feel awful and you are not accomplishing things at a desirable rate you start to pick on yourself more. STOP! Be kind to yourself. In this moment, say to yourself what your most supportive friend would say to you!

Why do we do this to ourselves? Because our subconscious learned at a young age that it would work for us. The subconscious is like a dog with a bone. Once it's found a good hiding spot, it keeps using it. That's great! When we were children, it worked well, as our greatest challenges were dealing with the alphabet and simple mathematics. Now we are dealing with mortgages, jobs, taxes, relationships and much more. Forever can be spent in thinking about why. Take action now! Use self-hypnosis and task your subconscious mind and voice to support you. Update it's programming. Choose now to consciously engage and be 'relentlessly kind and loving' to yourself today and make your inner voice your friend.

by: Farzana Jaffer-Jeraj of Clearmind Hypnosis

Is Hypnotherapy Anti-God??

Just to stir the pot a bit...

What’s more logical?

The belief that we can transmit our thoughts via prayer to an invisible all powerful, omniscient God?

Or

A practice that does not exclude the existence of a God and the ability for that God to hear one’s prayers and wishes, but that also scientifically and methodologically allows a person to use the biologically natural power of their mind in such a fashion that they are able to help themselves achieve their dreams?

Many people shy away from conversations about hypnosis because they were raised to believe hypnosis goes against religion and God. Some of my closest friends felt precisely this way. They found this information useful and upon their urging you’re getting it.

Let’s start at the beginning.Once upon a time, hypnosis was seen as a practice of mysticism. It was thought of as a power of mind control or mesmerism. In some cultures, people used hypnosis in their religious practices to enhance visions while other religions and cultures viewed hypnotism as a black art, one of witchcraft and shamanism. Over the years hypnosis has had many faces and still does today. The main question people wonder is if hypnosis (aka. the trance state) goes against God or religion?

As with any tool, the use of hypnosis varies based on the intention of the person who wields it. We all have different belief systems and Hypnotists and Hypnotherapists are no different. Really, I mean it, we are not all eccentric, new-age, crystal/indigo children! Okay, some of us are and the truth is that hypnosis can have spiritual and metaphysical applications; however, constant among all practices of hypnosis is science, specifically the science around normal healthy brain functioning.

What is a normal and healthy brain? There are many answers to this question, but the answer most related to the hypnosis question being discussed, is a brain with healthy circadian rythms. Each day a normal healthy brain will transition through various brainwave frequencies. There are four frequencies. Beta, Alpha, Theta and Delta. The only frequency that doesn’t involve hypnotic trance is the Beta frequency. All other frequencies take people into trance. Alpha being the lightest level of trance and Delta being the deepest. You may have heard of deep delta sleep being very important for a persons’ overall health physically, mentally, emotionally and arguably spiritually. A person with a healthy brain will experience all of the various depths of hypnosis daily as they move through their natural waking and sleeping cycles.

This is a scientific and naturally occurring process that if interrupted can cause significant distress in a person’s life beginning with insomnia, anxiety and depression and the list goes on.

What many people do not realize is that each time an individual does any of the following things their brainwaves register them as being in a trance state or in a state of hypnosis. People enter into trance anytime they:
• attend a prayer service and participate in scripted dialogues
• pray with deep emotional intensity and/or intention
• pray or meditate with mantras or chants or use incantations (i.e. pray the rosary)
• engage in repetitive physical activity (i.e. cycling, running, tribal dancing, spinning in place like Whirling Dervishes)
• use relaxation techniques with visualization in sports training to play in ‘the zone’
• listen to music where they zone out (i.e. any favourite tune, tribal drumming, trance/dance, Gregorian chant...)
• drive a car or bus to work without realizing how they got there
• zone out in meetings, presentations or when people are having long conversations with them
• pass into hypnosis for a few moments during the process of falling asleep

Did you know that all children spend their childhood in a light state of trance that begins to lessen around 6 to 8 years of age and diminishes around the age of 14. Children’s sponge-like ability to learn is often attributed to this trance state. As you can see, the trance state of hypnosis occurs naturally as part of our biological development as well as during many activities including religious practices. Hypnosis is nothing more than simple brainwave frequencies that people experience everyday. It is biologically natural and thus occurs naturally all the time, especially during prayer and worship.

I digress but with purpose. Let us now return to what many fear about religion, hypnosis and hypnotherapy. The most common fear is that it is sinful and goes against God’s will.

It is hard to believe that something that naturally occurs when people are praying could be viewed as a practice that is against God or that is ‘satanic’ in origin. In fact, when people are asking for things such as faith and patience in their prayers, they are biologically shifting into a light state of trance (that is scientifically measurable) and are self-hypnotizing themselves (even if they didn’t know it) with the very things they would like to have more of. Simply put, thoughts given attention to in the trance state take hold and can bring about change. Such is the nature of hypnosis as is the nature of prayer and meditation. However, in prayer also taken into account is the belief that prayers, thoughts, and intentions are being sent to God or Whomever or Whatever one prays to.

Almost all religions and spiritual practices promote meditation. Meditation actually occurs at the same brainwave-frequency as Hypnosis!

However, if we believe that God designed us from top to bottom, then perhaps we should be asking why we were designed to experience hypnosis on a daily basis. Should we not consider that perhaps these naturally occurring processes were in fact intended for our daily functioning, our spiritual and emotional health and betterment? If its naturally occurring within us, isn’t it probably there for a reason?

The recent articles about the new Hypnotist that was hired to do a session in a Montreal girls school with only 14 hours of basic training has raised a lot of questions with the public.Let me answer some of them for you.

Basic Hypnosis training requires a minimum of 40 hours of classroom training and additional 10-15 hours of home study and practice.  And that is just the basics. And even after this amount of training I would NOT recommend that anyone be working a stage hypnosis show.  

We hear the term often- but what does it mean?  Is it religious, or not?

At one point in the history of our continent it would definitely have been connected to religious beliefs.  And often those religious beliefs were strong, and unbending. 

Coastal Academy of Hypnotic Arts and Science, School for Hypnosis and Hypnotherapy, BC, Canada- by Leslie McIntosh

  My question today is:  What the heck happened to the expression, "You are welcome".