What is it with spiders and snakes? High places? Enclosed spaces? Wide open spaces?  What brings on those full-blown panic attacks that can be crippling in their terrifying intensity? It’s more than just a natural aversion to being bitten, or falling, or being trapped, or seeing “too much” sky. These might make us uncomfortable, but we can usually move past the momentary discomfort and continue with our regular activities. When it becomes impossible to do this - when our normal functioning is seriously impaired by terror which overrides our rationality - this is when we need help.

A phobia is a fear that has gone beyond reasonable expectations. Naturally, we accord a tiger in its native habitat a high degree of negative respect. That is, we would all agree that a tiger might reasonably be expected to pose a serious hazard to our physical safety, if not restrained by the bars of a zoo cage. But what if our fearful reaction to a tiger were of such intensity that we felt incapable of even visiting a zoo? What if the very thought of a tiger sent us into a paroxysm of trembling anxiety? When we experience this latter type of fear response, that healthy and reasonable negative respect - a rational consideration for our personal safety - has expanded beyond reasonable expectations and become a phobia. Or, even more inexplicable, what if this intense, incapacitating fear were triggered not only by tigers, but by any cat at all, even a docile domestic feline, or a small, playful kitten? (It’s called ailurophobia, and a surprising number of people suffer from it.)

Phobias are, by definition, irrational fears. The word “irrational” in its essential form simply means ‘experienced outside of the intellect’. Phobias, therefore, are fears that have no intellectually perceptible origin, so it is virtually impossible to confront them at the conscious level of mind. You could sit down with a friend, who is deathly afraid of earthworms, and patiently point out the innocuous, harmless, and indeed beneficial aspect of earthworms until both of you grew exhausted and fell asleep, and be no closer to a solution to your friend’s phobic reaction than when you began.

An irrational fear has, by its very nature, an irrational origin, and it requires a creative approach - a therapeutic solution that is outside of the intellect, just as the source of the fear lies outside of the intellect - outside of the conscious level of mind. With hypnosis, irrational fears are successfully confronted at their place of origin - the subconscious level of mind. And what is revealed there is often quite surprising and certainly fascinating, because, invariably, the genesis of an irrational fear turns out not to be what we might, rationally, have expected.

Perhaps it was no more frightening or life-threatening (to an adult, at any rate) than a tumble out of a playpen at the age of 18 months. But to a child, whose ability to analyze degrees of danger is still quite limited, this tumble can be horrifying and inexplicable - a fear well outside of his or her rational scope of understanding. The feeling produced thereby is experienced as an irrational fear. Later, this feeling may become attached to an adult concept, such as flying in an airplane, or venturing into deep water, and while neither of these is unreasonably dangerous, the irrational fear mechanism is triggered and a phobic reaction is the result.

By a gentle, systematic process of hypnotic recall, our therapists are able to help clients locate that actual sensitizing event. Then, through various interactive methods of suggestion and encouragement, clients are empowered to defuse the fear-inspiring qualities of the original event, so that its impact on the nervous system subsides appreciably, and the phobic response at the conscious level is nullified. Generally, this is accomplished in a single session that lasts approximately two hours. An important and valuable aspect of hypnosis is the speed with which it achieves the intended goal, and the subjective sense of confidence it confers on the client, who not only experiences immediate relief, but also a realization that the solution has not come from “outside,” but from an integral part of his/her own thought process.

In alleviating phobias, facilitating behavioral modifications of all sorts, and improving quality of life and general well being, hypnosis utilizes the most efficient goal-achieving mechanism in existence - the subconscious mind - to effect powerful, lasting changes in the way we perceive our world. It allows us to use our minds creatively in the service of our own personal fulfillment and happiness.

For more information and to schedule an appointment, please call us at 303.424.2331. At Eastburn Hypnotherapy Center we have your success in mind.