Contrary to popular belief, depression isn’t a synonym for feeling sad. And anyone who’s experienced depression knows this all too well.
Depression is a serious mental illness, and its many sufferers – 1 out of 4 people in the UK will experience daily bouts of hopelessness, fatigue, a racing mind, aches and pains. In other words, it’s much deeper than just sadness – depression hijacks the mind and body. As the charity Mind reports click here for more information.
Now, you might be wondering: What does hypnotherapy have to do with depression? Can something as simple as hypnosis really offer relief for depression?
To answer that question, we have to dig a little deeper into the subconscious mind.
Knowing how the subconscious works can help us understand why hypnosis is effective for depression (and depression’s underlying causes).
Depression and the Subconscious Mind
Many of our beliefs, emotions and memories reside in the subconscious. Everything we experience gets filtered through this repository of information.
Most of the time, the subconscious is helpful. We see a butterfly at the park, and we’re able to identify it instantly. That’s because buried up there in the subconscious is a lot of useful information. We filter our experiences through this database, and in a fraction of a second, the subconscious helps us make sense of the world around us.
But the subconscious can hold a lot of unhelpful information. Negative filters can become deeply embedded in the subconscious. And these filters can then influence our moment-to-moment thoughts and feelings.
How we respond to stress, for example, is controlled almost entirely and automatically by the subconscious. If a stressful event drives you to anxiousness, or anger, or frustration and that’s probably how your mind tells you to feel.
The good news is we can train our subconscious mind to be more supportive, more helpful and a better friend.
And specifically for depression, we can reprogram the subconscious to better manage and release many of the underlying causes of depression, like stress and worry, or negative self-talk.
Hypnosis for depression helps us release many of the negative thinking patterns, bad habits, and suppressed memories that negatively limit the mind. At the same time, hypnosis can improve our coping abilities, help us get in touch with past positive memories, and enhance the effectiveness of traditional depression treatments.
How Does Hypnosis for Depression Work?
Hypnosis is a highly relaxed, focused state of mind that we the majority of people can reach by following a few relaxation and focusing techniques. Being under “hypnosis” is a lot like practicing meditation.
But there’s one key difference: Hypnosis has a goal.
This highly relaxed state allows us to shed the conscious, critical mind. And when we’re under hypnosis, we can speak directly to the subconscious. Research brain research suggests that under hypnosis the mind becomes highly susceptible to new information and new ways of thinking. Click here for more information to support this.
That means we can feed the subconscious mind information during hypnosis, like suggestions and positive affirmations. We can reteach the subconscious how to make sense of the world around us.
We’re entering this state not to just relax the mind and body but also to reshape our unconscious thoughts and promote positive thinking.
For depression specifically, hypnotherapy offers a few key benefits.
Hypnosis for depression allows us to retrain the subconscious. We can override those automatic thinking patterns that keep habits, negative thoughts and irrational responses (all factors that can contribute to depression) in place.
If you would like to book your Free Hypnotherapy Consultation to discover how I can help you please get in contact.