The unconscious mind

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The unconscious mind

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Have you ever wondered about The unconscious mind?

First published July 11, 2012

This is big subject of which we haven’t really tapped into its full potential. We know that it comes from the Limbic System part of the brain which has been shown to activate on MRI scans in this area.

So what is it and what does it do?

I look at it as the programming for the body and mind which is there to protect us. It is far more powerful than the conscious part of the mind. Within the unconscious mind there are parts that do particular jobs and tasks than run the programs in our mind and bodies. As a hypnotherapist is my job to work with this part of the mind to help you the client to overcome or change the programs that you maybe running that are not working for you. Imagine the brain as big computer that will only work as well as the programs we put into it. Sometimes we program the wrong programs into our mind and the conscious then unconscious mind takes on this new behaviour.

I always use this example to people who ask about how big is the unconscious, if you were to see on a neurological perspective it doesn’t look that big compared to rest of the brain. If you put your fists together next to each other like a boxer that is about the average size of a brain.

The unconscious is far more powerful so in this case size does not matter. To get an idea I say get a golf ball and put it next to a football. The golf represents the conscious mind and the football represents the unconscious mind!

Research is still on going into this but we know for sure is that it plays a massive part in our lives every micro second of the day of our life.

Here is a bit of information on the Limbic System of the brain.

The Limbic System sometimes called the “emotional brain” or “Old Mammalian Brain” is the next part of the brain to have evolved in the more primitive mammals about 150 million years ago. This is where our emotions reside, where memory begins and where these two functions combine together to mark behaviors with positive or negative feelings. It’s where mostly unconscious value judgments are made. Information going through the Limbic System are filed under “agreeable or disagreeable”. It also plays a role in salience (what grabs your attention), spontaneity and creativity. Located in the Limbic System are:

  • The Amygdala

Its name is Latin for almond which relates to its shape. It helps in storing and classifying emotionally charged memories. It plays a large role in producing our emotions, especially fear. It’s been found to trigger responses to strong emotion such as sweaty palms, freezing, increased heart-beat/respiration and stress hormone release.

  • The Hippocampus

This guy is all about memory and a little about learning. It’s primary role is in memory formation, classifying information, long-term memory. Like the RAM in your computer it processes and stores new and temporary memory for long term storage. It’s also involved in interpreting incoming nerve signals and spatial relationships.

  • The Hypothalamus

It should be called the Hypothalamus because it does so much. It’s linked closely with the pituitary gland to control many of the body’s functions. It monitors and controls your circadian rhythms (your daily sleep/wake cycle), homeostasis (making sure your body is running smoothly), appetite, thirst, other bodily urges and also plays a role in emotions, autonomic functions and motor functions.

  • The Thalamus

The Thalamus is THE relay station in the brain. Most of the sensory signals, auditory (sound), Visual, Somatosensory (from your skin and internal organs), go through this organ on their way to other parts of the brain for processing. It also plays a function in motor control.

I hope you enjoyed my blog and thanks for reading them !

If you want any help or advice please contact me HERE

Adam Cowming

Website www.blhypnotherapy.co.uk

Taking Action

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Why taking action Taking Action should be important in your life !

First published on June 27, 2012

There a lot of people in the self-help industry that say the magic words if you want something “Take massive action” to get it. Now as someone who coaches people how to have better lives and improve themselves I agree with this to a certain level. People also say nothing is impossible, I disagree.

My Dad is 70 years old, now would he be able to become an astronaut? The answer is no! If he wanted he could pay to go up on a special aeroplane and experience 0 gravity or even go on one of the flights to the edge of the earth’s atmosphere and that would be pretty close for a civilian. To become a real astronaut he would have to pass many tests set by NASA for example then spend some length of time in space so what is my point.

Take action but make sure that your goals are realistic and achievable! When a client asks me to help we sit down together and draw up a plan of action. Here is how I do that

What do you want to change? (The now)

What do you want to achieve? (Future Goal)

How are we going to get there? (Setting the plan)

When setting a plan it is important to takes steps every day to help achieve the end goal. Break it down into small tasks and set your end goal in a realistic time frame. Small steps even if they seem silly are still a step in the right direction. It is important to research your goal and find out as much as you can beforehand so you will have the right information to hand.

Set daily or weekly goals and don’t set yourself too much at once to do. Remember you may have a family to consider and to make time for as well. Fit your goal around your life and don’t make the goals your life but a part of it. Remember that there may be bumps in the road and it may not go as planned all of the time but accept this as part of the process.

Taking action means consistency

I have recently set myself a goal of becoming a full time hypnotherapist, up until now I’ve have been ticking along seeing clients on a part time basis. So what have I been doing to ensure this happens?

I first of all ordered 5000 leaflets and delivered them myself and with help from my family. A lot of people will say leaflets are  a waste of time and no one looks at them, well from the phone calls and interest I’ve had I would say they are wrong ! How do people know about my business if they have never heard of me? I’ve done about 6 miles of small steps every day! lol

I have invested in having an up to date website built by a professional web designer, check it out for yourself.  www.blhypnotherapy.co.uk

I have also had a meeting at a local pharmacy which wanted a hypnotherapist to work in the shop, so I’ve hired the room from them and they book in the clients for me and do all of the marketing within the shop, this will hopefully lead to me working in their other shop as well. All of this because they saw one of my leaflets and I went into see him on the same day and had a meeting.

I haven’t done anything incredible or amazing all I have done is follow my own advice that I give to clients. Little steps but the results are now coming though with an increase of clients and local awareness of my business. I set myself 2 hours a day to do leaflet drops and did them all within 10 days. I also approached local businesses and put my leaflet in their shops, no one said no they were all happy to help promote a local business.

Life will not come to you, we have to go out and get what we want. If you want to achieve something in life but find yourself sitting on your butt all day complaining how the world is unfair and how you never get a break, ask yourself what have YOU done today to help yourself so far???

Take action but do it in a realistic way!!!!!!

Thanks for reading my blog and if you like more information on my coaching services contact me HERE

Adam Cowming

Website www.blhypnotherapy.co.uk

Personality Types

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What are Personality Types and how do we spot them in people?

When I have clients come to see me they sometimes use phrases such as; “part of me wants X the other part of me wants Y”. This is what we call parts conflict.

So what do they mean and how do I as a therapist explain what is going on in their minds in an easy to understand down to earth format?

I tend to use the Transactional Analysis model created by Canadian-born US psychiatrist, Eric Berne. Berne devised the concept of ego states to help explain how we are made up, and how we relate to others and Personality Types . They categorise the ways we think, feel and behave and are called Parent, Adult, and Child. Each ego state is given a capital letter to denote the difference between actual parents, adults and children.

Parent (“exteropsyche”): a state in which people behave, feel, and think in response to an unconscious mimicking of how their parents (or other parental figures) acted, or how they interpreted their parent’s actions. For example, a person may shout at someone out of frustration because they learned from an influential figure in childhood the lesson that this seemed to be a way of relating that worked.

Parent has 2 parts to this personality type

Nurturing – Nurturing (positive) and Spoiling (negative).

Critical – Structuring (positive) and Controlling (negative).

Physical – angry or impatient body-language and expressions, finger-pointing, patronising gestures. Sympathetic expressions, hugging, stroking.

Verbal – always, never, for once and for all, judgmental words, critical words, patronising language, posturing language. Soft, supportive voice and wording.

N.B. Beware of cultural differences in body-language that may appear ‘Parental’.

Adult (“neopsyche”): a state of the ego which is most like a computer processing information and making predictions absent of major emotions that could affect its operation. Learning to strengthen the Adult is a goal of TA.

Adult remains as a single entity, representing an ‘accounting’ function or mode, which can draw on the resources of both Parent and Child.

While a person is in the Adult ego state, he/she is directed towards an objective appraisal of reality.

Physical – attentive, interested, straight-forward, tilted head, non-threatening and non-threatened.

Verbal – why, what, how, who, where and when, how much, in what way, comparative expressions, reasoned statements, true, false, probably, possibly, I think, I realise, I see, I believe, in my opinion.

Child (“archaeopsyche”): a state in which people behave, feel and think similarly to how they did in childhood. For example, a person who receives a poor evaluation at work may respond by looking at the floor, and crying or pouting, as they used to when scolded as a child. Conversely, a person who receives a good evaluation may respond with a broad smile and a joyful gesture of thanks. The Child is the source of emotions, creation, recreation, spontaneity and intimacy.

Child also has 2 parts to this personality type

Adapted – Co-operative (positive) and Compliant/Resistant (negative).

Free – Spontaneous (positive) and Immature (negative).

Physical – emotionally sad expressions, despair, temper tantrums, whining voice, rolling eyes, shrugging shoulders, teasing, delight, laughter, speaking behind hand, raising hand to speak, squirming and giggling.

Verbal – baby talk, I wish, I dunno, I want, I’m gonna, I don’t care, oh no, not again, things never go right for me, worst day of my life, bigger, biggest, best, many superlatives, words to impress.

So here is what I sometimes say to the client that these parts clash for example part of them says go and have fun

(Free Child) and other part of them says they better not do that and stay at home(Critical Parent).

I find that people who tend to listen to their “Critical Parent” too much sometimes have a lot of negative internal dialogue in their mind. Now we all have this critical side and it is an important part of us that can protect us but it can also overwhelm people as well and can be very hard to override for the client. Other people have too much “Free Child” i.e. they go and do things without thinking of the consequences at all and this can also be as bad. It is all about getting the balance right.

People who drink too much or take drugs (addicts and functioning addicts) are doing so to override the critical parent and get into the free child state, they are shutting out that critical voice/memories that may have in the past reminded them of past experiences or overly critical voices they would rather not remember.

I know I have done things many years ago in the past that when I’ve had a beer too many and I was in the free child state. I did things I wouldn’t normally do, like walk home with a traffic cone on my head. In the morning my critical parent kicked in and I have laid there in bed with a bad head slightly embarrassed thinking, why I did I do that? At the time I was having fun with my friends but in the morning I thought I was a bit silly.

If you would like to read more about this subject of Personality Types I would recommend you read Eric Berne’s first book called “Transactional Analysis in Psychotherapy”, “I’m OK You’re OK” by Thomas A. Harris and also “Games People Play” again by Eric Berne, they can be hard going for those of you without a background in Psychotherapy but they explain things in much more depth.

Thanks for reading my blog on Personality Types .

If you wish to book a conslutation or for more inforation on my therapy serivces contact me HERE

Adam Cowming

Website www.blhypnotherapy.co.uk

Phantom Limb Pain

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This is a story of how I help a memeber of my family with “Phantom Limb Pain”

First publish on March 17, 2012

Hi, my name is Adam Cowming and I’m a fully qualified hypnotherapist and this is my blog to tell you about some of the cases I have seen and people I’ve helped. I hope it will help other therapists and people who are interested in the power of the mind.

My Dads cousin Ken has been suffering from Phantom limb pain and asked for my help so of course being family I said yes.  So what is a Phantom limb? A phantom limb is the result of a limb that has been amputated. The person still feels the limb and in this case, pain in the limb. It’s important to first find if the (Phantom) limb is O.K. and not for example twisted in an odd position. If it is mirror therapy can be very effective in some cases. Mirror therapy has been widely used in the USA to great affect but still not so well know in the U.K with results being disappointing but I believe more research is being done by V. S. Ramachandran and D. Rogers-Ramachandran who are brilliant neurologists. Also the results are based on information Ken was told by the doctors in NHS cases and not private practices. The more we understand the better the science, theory and  technique will develop.

Here is a link to a series of lectures on BBC Radio 4 on the subject

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00ghvck

Ken had Phantom Limb Pain and wanted to try hypnotherapy.

Here is how the session went. I’ve only outlined the important parts of the session to make it easier to read.

I first did a very gentle induction and deepener to relax Ken and also to allow the unconscious part of his mind to come forward. I also set up a safe anchor in case of any abreaction. I decided to use a technique called parts therapy to start with.  Parts therapy basically allows me to speak direct to the part of the unconscious mind that controls the limb. I set up a signal on each hand, a finger for yes and a finger for no (ideo – motor finger signals), so the unconscious part of the mind could communicate with me by lifting or moving the fingers. Always allow the mind to choose which and fingers to use, never force your will on it.

I asked the “Part” if it knew the leg had been amputated and was no longer there, it moved the finger for no. This what I hoped would happen as my thoughts on it were that maybe the “Part” was still doing its job because the old limb had  lost the blood circulation, so I think it may be trying to heal the leg as it was before it was amputated and needed updating to acknowledge the limb has gone and give the part a new job. I think the part maybe still doing its job because the old limb had a blood clot, so I think it may be trying to heal the leg as it was before it was amputated and needs updating to acknowledge the limb has gone and give the part a new job

I then asked if it would like some new information I had for in concerning the limb, it signalled yes. I told the part the leg was now missing and that if it would like to continue to help Ken I have a more important job for it to do, again it signalled yes it was happy to take on this new job.

I first wanted the “Part” to see the limb had gone. I had asked Ken to take his prosthetic leg off before the start of the session. I told the part that I was going to count to 3 and on 3 I want it to open Ken’s eyes and see that the limb had been amputated and was not longer there. So on 3 Ken opened his eyes and I asked the part to look to where the leg had been amputated, I then asked for the part to close the eyes and take on this new information. I asked if the part now understood the leg had gone and again it said yes.

Now in hypnosis we call it fractionation when you get the person to open their eyes then to close them and the reason for this is person goes deeper into hypnosis but that is not what happened to Ken as the he didn’t consciously open his eyes but the unconscious “Part” did and he was not aware of that during or after the session and was surprised when I explained what had happened. After Ken closed his eyes I again asked the “Part” if it saw the leg had gone and now understood that there was no need for any pain in a leg that wasn’t there. It signaled yes again.

The idea to open the eyes had come from a discussion I had with Nick Davies who trained me to be a hypnotherapist (www.wsoh.co.uk) and we both thought it was a great idea if not a little different, we were both unsure if it would work but after the session Ken said he didn’t have any knowledge of his eyes opening during the session. So the part saw the missing leg not the conscious mind of Ken, it was a great move!!!

I then gave the part a new job of stopping any future pain to the phantom limb to which the part said it was happy to take on this new role, again also saying that if the body needs Ken to look at the leg that is still there and healthy to let him know because pain is the bodies natural signal that something is wrong so I don’t want to stop that happening. It also agreed to this.

I then told Ken I was going to lift his arm out in front of him (arm catalepsy) and for the arm to support itself. I then asked the unconscious part to go and update itself with all the new information and when it had successfully done this to allow the arm to drop nice and gently back into Ken’s lap, this took around about 30 seconds.

I then did some basic pain relieve with him and anchored a imaginary pain controller on his hand by squeezing his thumb and finger together so his body would release a natural and safe dose of pain relief. I also told him that to have this controller was a great responsibility not to be miss used and only to be used when it is necessary .

I then bought Ken out of trance, he said he felt wonderfully relax and that he know the limb somehow felt different about the old Phantom Limb Pain.

I advised Ken to now go back to his GP and explain that he had under gone a Hypnotherapy session using the “Parts Therapy Technique” and that we were confident the brain has now all the new information it needs. I have also agreed to be contacted by the GP if she has any questions about the session. Ken said he now wanted to reduce the pain killers he was on WITH the GP advice and guidance to see if the pain had gone. I will wait for the results from Ken and keep you updated to his progress on this journey but from a personal point of view I am confident that I have helped Ken remove all of the problems he had.

I hope you enjoyed and learnt a little from this post and I will continue to write and tell you about the interesting cases and also about the different therapies I use for different things

I was waiting before writing this to find out how effective the session has been for Ken and I’m please to report the following that Ken is very please with the progress so far.

Note from Ken “Pleased to report definitely some improvement this week with the phantom problem so will see what happens next week and will let you know”

To book an appointment please go HERE

Adam Cowming CPNLP,CMH ,HPD

Beautiful Life Hypnotherapy

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