Guest post by Brenda Williams, BCH, CHP, a Board Certified Consulting Hypnotist
Question: I’m thinking about using hypnosis to stop smoking, but I’m not sure what to expect. How does it work? What happens in a stop-smoking hypnosis session?
As a Board Certified Consulting Hypnotist with Awaken Hypnosis, nicotine and smoking cessation is often one of the easiest issues I work with. When someone genuinely wants to cease nicotine/cigarette use, hypnosis gives us a way to directly work with the related underlying expectations, beliefs, associations, and automatic behaviors.
Sometimes the nicotine habit is all that needs to be addressed. Other times, the smoking, pouches, etc., connect to deeper emotional patterns, and the work becomes about much more than nicotine. These clients are often surprised by just how much they get from the process.
The Pre-Hypnosis Interview
Every session, for smoking and otherwise, starts and ends with an interview. I like to start my first session with a client by setting goals, fine-tuning the precise benefits they came to me for: “I want to smell better. I want my sense of taste back. I want to physically feel better—better breathing, circulation, improved sex life, better skin, etc.” Dialing into the specific benefits and problem areas for an individual client allows me to personalize the session with suggestions specific to their behaviors and goals.
Hypnosis Questions & Misconceptions
Most people have many questions (and likely misconceptions) about how hypnosis works, and covering these questions adequately is crucial to a client’s success. Everyone should know that hypnosis is a safe and natural state of focused attention that they go in and out of every day. As both a teacher and certified hypnosis professional, I observed it in the classroom many times. However, teachers call it engagement.
About Nicotine
For smoking cessation, a crucial discussion point is to dispel ideas that nicotine has to be extremely difficult to kick. In other words, it is often the belief that quitting will be difficult that can help keep you stuck in this expensive habit. Smoking is more than a chemical dependence: beliefs, expectations, habits, and sometimes an emotional regulation cycle can all be part of the pattern. Either way, the advanced hypnosis techniques used at Awaken Hypnosis are effective for eliminating the cravings and patterns.
Smoking as Distraction
As I interview a prospective client for smoking cessation, I’m always on the lookout for signs that a client is smoking to distract themselves from a feeling they don’t like. To combat this, Awaken Hypnosis’s clients will learn about the Feel Bad/Distract Cycle and how to satisfy their feelings without distractions. Too much eating, smoking, shopping, or exercise are all behaviors that can fall into this cycle. My goal for every client is to help them satisfy their feelings without the need for a crutch such as nicotine. Sometimes this may take more sessions, whereas a client who smokes occasionally as a bad habit can complete their work in 1-2 sessions.
Inducing Hypnosis
When the interview is completed, we begin the hypnosis part of the sessions with many suggestions for relaxation. By now, my clients are excited about the changes they are going to make, committed to the process, and confident of their success, so they go into hypnosis quickly and easily. After suggestions for relaxation to induce the state of hypnosis, they experience a hypnotic phenomenon, such as, “You try to lower your arm, but you cannot.” This inspires confidence in their eventual success, and their suggestions then become about the goal they came to me for.
Suggestions for Smoking Cessation:
Opening to Possibilities
To change a deeply ingrained habit is a kind of crossroads, and my clients step into the possibility of life as a nonsmoker. Next, they consider and experience themselves living the contrasts between continuing the old behavior and choosing a life without nicotine and cigarettes. First, they experience the negatives of continuing with the old habit and then all of the benefits: breathing freely, smelling good, enjoying food, stamina, the money they are saving… feeling clean, healthy, proud, and in control. They mentally visit these two possible futures one year down the road, then five and even ten years down the road.
Breaking Patterns and Associations:
All of the suggestions given are aligned with the client’s goals. But there are associations surrounding cigarette (or nicotine) use, such as after eating, in the car, in a particular place, and when dealing with stress. The suggestions now shift to breaking those old associations and situations. A new identity is established: “smoking is something I used to do.” This idea reinforces freedom, health, confidence, and recognition that “There is always something better to do than smoke.”
I Am Now a Nonsmoker!
Finally, my client’s new identity is repeatedly reinforced: “I am now a nonsmoker, and I’ll be a nonsmoker for the rest of my life.” To support this, and to break thought patterns, we install and reinforce a new response in hypnosis–when they think about having a cigarette, instead they make the OK sign with their fingers, take a deep breath, hold it for a second or two, and slowly exhale… and the thought fades away. The hypnosis deeply reinforces this response, interrupting the old patterns which will fade in time. Mental rehearsal and reinforcement of the new identity and behaviors allow my client to move forward with confidence and feeling comfortable without needing cigarettes.
Emerging:
Every hypnosis session ends with the specific, customized benefits the client came in for, the reminders of why they are doing this, the positive changes they are making and all of the lasting benefits of the work we do at Awaken Hypnosis. My clients learn self-hypnosis at the end of every session, and emerge from hypnosis with suggestions of how good they will feel and success. Posthypnotic suggestions reinforce the idea that, “Yes, I really was hypnotized”.
Post-Hypnosis Interview:
The client reviews their benefits, any homework we may have agreed on (such as reading and self-hypnosis) and the session ends.
The Second Session:
Typically, we will schedule two sessions within a few days. This allows the client to reject the perceptions stored in their subconscious mind regarding the very first cigarette–a reality check. She or he revisits their earliest experiences with smoking from their present-day perspective. They now understand cigarettes very differently, which allows us to reprocess the feelings and beliefs from that earliest nicotine use. Assisted by their present perspective of wanting to quit, this change goes deep.
When a Client Needs More
Some clients have a deeply ingrained pattern of using smoking to distract themselves from feelings or situations that they don’t like. I may recommend 5-6 sessions so we can address the underlying emotional patterns that are driving the nicotine habit. The goal isn’t simply to stop smoking or replace cigarettes with another distraction like food or shopping. The goal is to develop healthier, more productive ways of responding to life’s stressors.
For related nicotine research, see:
Brenda Williams, BCH, CHP, is a Board Certified Consulting Hypnotist with Awaken Hypnosis. She is board-certified with the National Guild of Hypnotists and a Certified Hypnosis Professional with the 5-PATH International Association of Hypnosis Professionals. Based in Chandler, Arizona, she works virtually with clients seeking to change deeply held beliefs, emotional patterns, and behaviors that have kept them feeling stuck. Her background in education influences her practical, explanatory approach to hypnosis. Awaken-Hypnosis.com
Comments
Post a Comment