Are You Ready For Shark Week?

Written by: Debbie

It’s Shark Week! Discovery Channel is hosting the annual week of (mis)information about sharks. Don’t get me wrong, there is legitimate information shared, but unfortunately there is also a lot of myth that is shared. This disappoints marine biologists like Ellen Prager. To quote an article posted on npr.org, “Ellen Prager, a marine scientist who has taught at the University of Miami and writes books for children about sharks, says she and her colleagues have a list of things that drive them crazy about Shark Week, such as the emphasis on sharks attacking people and feeding frenzies.”

I too, have a concern. While I am not a shark expert and I do have a healthy respect for sharks, I am of the opinion that the media will forgo fact for the sake of ratings on many occasions. This feeds into fears and phobias. Recent media reports of shark attacks along the coast of North Carolina and Florida have everyone believing that we are in danger practically as we park in the beach parking lots.

About a year ago I was walking along the causeway with a friend when we looked down from a bridge into the waters below. There were sharks swimming around and fishermen on shore trying to catch them. I found this fascinating. My friend couldn’t get away fast enough. Even from this safe distance, she was afraid. Now, unless you believe the ridiculousness of the Sharknado movies, it’s obvious that the sharks were not going to rise up out of the waters, fly above a bridge and bite us. That did not make her reaction any less real to her. The sight of those creatures started her pulse racing more than the fast pace of our walk ever did.

I understand completely how that feels. In the past I had a phobic reaction to snakes as a result of an unfortunate encounter I had with a rattle snake while on a school camping trip. I held onto the sensations and fears for almost 20 years. It wasn’t until I realized how that phobia was holding me back that I was even willing to address it. I offered to help my friend with her shark phobia, but for now, she is not ready to release it.

The problem with holding on to fears that are not rational is that it can lead us to make decisions that are bad for us. For example, a fear of flying can greatly affect a person’s ability to perform their job if air travel is required, the same with fear of driving. I have worked with people who feared public speaking. Imagine that fear being so great that a simple elevator speech in a networking group becomes too much? I had a client who was so phobic about elevators he had to turn down a promotion because it meant he would have to climb 15 flights of stairs. After our working together, he was able to not only take the elevator, he could take the promotion!

If you watch Shark Week…

If you watch Shark Week and all the hype, enjoy. Remember to check facts, to keep aware of the difference between reality and fiction. If there is anything that seems to cause an intense reaction in you, breathe deeply though it. Should you have any phobias that are holding you back, now might be the time to eliminate those sharks from the murky waters of your deeper mind and begin to live freely again.

Overcoming Phobias

Written by: Debbie

I was recently asked if hypnosis could help one overcome a phobia of spiders. This individual had tried to do some searching online, but only came up with sites of hypnotists who included pictures of the spiders! Really, this is how you help someone? By scaring them off with visuals? Funny, that wasn’t a part of my training.

Hypnosis does help with fears and phobias. It is how I overcame a phobia of snakes.

What is a phobia?

First of all, let’s define what a phobia is. According to the Mayo Clinic website:

A phobia is an overwhelming and unreasonable fear of an object or situation that poses little real danger but provokes anxiety and avoidance. Unlike the brief anxiety most people feel when they give a speech or take a test, a phobia is long lasting, causes intense physical and psychological reactions, and can affect your ability to function normally at work or in social settings.

So, while phobias may not post a real threat to one’s safety, they can create a lot of havoc in one’s life. I have worked with many people who have phobias. Often they are embarrassed by their fears. What has happened is that in meaning to help; people tell them all the logical reasons that their phobia is wrong. The problem with that is that if in fact it was just logic, they would already be over it. The first thing I try to express to my client is that they are not crazy or all that different. In fact, most people have some form of “irrational behavior”. I mean really, is it all that rational for a ball player to have to put on his right sock and right shoe before his left sock and left shoe in order not to jinx a game? Is it rational that if things don’t go perfectly, we decide we are a failure? Yet, people have irrational thoughts and behaviors every day.

How to handle phobias?

Once the individual realizes that they don’t need to be embarrassed, we work on relaxation techniques. Deep breathing and muscle relaxation will help one understand that they are in control of their body, not the panic attack. It gives them a renewed sense of self control and a method to use during stressful situations. From there we can begin to challenge the negative thoughts. First by putting them into a category, such as fortune telling (the spider is going to crawl on me and bite me), over generalizing (once a dog bit me, so all dogs will now bite me) or catastrophizing (the person next to me coughed, they probably have Ebola and now I will too).

From there we work the “magic” of trance. It is during this time that we can imagine being in the presence of whatever causes the phobic reaction as calm and in control as if we were enjoying a day at the beach (or park if you are phobic of water). Giving the person a physical reminder of being calm and in control such as touching their ring finger is a useful tool for after the session as well.

Not all sessions go exactly the way I have described above, each session is as different as the person in the chair. What is a common thread however is that when leaving my office there is a much calmer and happier person than the one that first arrived.

Walt Disney’s Secret Fear

Written by: Debbie

Yes, Walt Disney had a fear that seems improbable today. Keep reading to find out what it was.

Halloween is a time that we seem to celebrate our fears. We set up scary scenes and haunted houses. We tell ghost stories and watch zombie movies. The instant thrill of fear can be very compelling, we seek the thrill. Some even become addicted to the thrill, but that is for another time and another post. So, what about those who are unhappily consumed by fear?

Fear can be productive; a warning to keep us safe if there is a hungry tiger ready to attack. This would be an appropriate signal for the fight or flight response. Fear can also be upsetting and limiting. We often fear situations that aren’t life or death. We can easily learn to overcome fear, although it may take time. When fear crosses over into phobia, it becomes life altering and that may take the help of professional using tools such as hypnosis.

Here are some simple steps to overcoming fear.

· Cultivate Awareness. It is important to recognize that fear is limiting your enjoyment of life in order to begin the process of overcoming it. It’s easy to get attached to your thoughts and feelings.

· Identify what exactly you’re afraid of. Notice the pictures in your head about the situation. What is happening in those scenes? What are you really scared of?

· Be curious, about what thoughts fuel the fear, where you feel it and how you react to it.

· Breathe in a sense of calm and imagine the fear as a cartoon. With each breath in, relax, with each exhale and imagine the fear as a cartoon.

· Have fun with it. Find or print out a picture that represents your fear. Punch, kick, or do whatever helps you feel better as you tell the fear that you are bigger and more powerful than the fear. Perhaps you can imagine beating it the way a gamer beats the “boss” in a video game.

· Imagine how you would be without the fear. What would be different about you? How would you talk, walk, hold yourself? Imagine you are free from the fear and practice being that person.

It has been reported that Walt Disney had musophobia or a fear of mice. That leads me to wonder if the creation of Mickey and Minnie and eventually the whole kingdom/world of Disney wasn’t in fact an attempt to overcome his fear. He certainly imagined his fear as a cartoon and had fun with it.

If your fear has become a phobia, you know it isn’t rational, yet nothing you try seems to help eliminate it then it might be time to seek help. Hypnosis is a great tool for changing fearful into powerful!

Franklin Delano Roosevelt said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Maybe it’s time for you to release the fear and live fully!