When we feel anxious, depressed, stressed, overwhelmed, it can feel like there’s nothing we can do to change how we’re feeling. But imagine if you could change the way you’re feeling, and in a relatively short amount of time. Do you think it would give you some hope that life could feel a little easier, a little better?
This is exactly what I help my clients to do using Solution Focussed Hypnotherapy (SFH). Utilising the brain’s ability to change and adapt – neuroplasticity – to change dysfunctional patterns of thinking and behaviour, and develop a new mindset.
Neural pathways are the connections between brain cells (neurons) that ‘light up’ when you think of something. Every time you learn to do something new, your brain creates a new connection. And when you repeat that thing, the connection is reinforced.
Here’s an analogy I often use with my clients to explain neuroplasticity, and how they can, with practice, cultivate new and better ways of thinking. Imagine a field full of long grass. There’s a path through the field which has been worn down to the bare earth through lots of use. But that path goes to a place that you’ve been to many times. And you don’t want to go there anymore. This path represents well-established but unwanted, inappropriate ways of thinking. In SFH we are in the business of changing those unwanted patterns of thought, for example, changing your way of thinking so you don’t always catastrophize and think of the worst-case scenario.
During therapy, we’ll explore those new ways of thinking. In our field of long grass analogy, this new way of thinking represents a new route across the field to your new, preferred destination. But there’s no pathway there yet. So, you make your way through the long grass, it’s harder to walk this way at first, but you successfully make it to the other side. You look back and the grass has been trodden flat. You now know that the more times you walk via this new pathway, the more established the path will become. The long grass will separate, the path will widen, and eventually you will move more easily to your desired destination. Meanwhile, the old path becomes overgrown, and redundant.
And so it is with new ways of thinking, where new neural pathways are formed, and – with practice – new patterns of thought or behaviour are established. The more you do it, the easier it is. In SFH, I can help you to discover your desired destinations, and help you navigate the new path to get you there.
Imagine if you really could change the way you think so that you can feel better. Well, you really can. You can change unwanted habits and foster new ones. Because your brain can change, you can respond to stress, anxiety, and overwhelm in a more useful and appropriate way. Which can help you to break unwanted and unhelpful thought and behaviour patterns.
Whilst there are many things in life that you can’t control, remember that you can control the way you think about those things.
Which is how neuroplasticity can give us hope.
Mary Bannister Hypnotherapy. Helping you to… THINK BETTER, FEEL BETTER, DO BETTER.