EFT and Hypnosis

I have recently taken a close look at EFT (Emotional Freedom Training).
Now I have been an advocate and practitioner of hypnosis for many years, and, as such, I was a little skeptical of the claims of EFT.
Hypnosis has a long history, admittedly a little tarnished in places, but is nowadays widely accepted as being a proven and viable form of treatment for ailments, enhancement of performance and general means of relaxation. It is even accepted as being a science by many.
EFT on the other hand is a relative newcomer in the mind-energy field.
EFT is glowingly recommended by its proponents (who are many), and yet merely dismissed by others as a simple example of the effects of positive-thinking.
The only way of validly commenting on EFT, I figured, was to try it for myself. After all, there is no difficulty in finding both supporters and detractors of EFT, but whom do you believe?
I downloaded Gary Craig’s free manual and after an initial perusal of it I concluded that although it was all very interesting, it sounded a bit far-fetched, away with the fairies even, and not worthy of serious consideration.
I gave it a bit of a go however, but didn’t really notice anything of great note happening. I tried it on my wife when she had a migraine and it seemed to help stave off the migraine, but we both assumed the tablets she had taken were really responsible.
I forgot about EFT for a few months, though continued to receive Gary Craig’s weekly newsletters, some of which I read.
Now I enjoy pretty good health most of the time, but the other day I developed a shoulder pain which I didn’t seem able to shake off. My first thought was to use self-hypnosis, which I knew would work, but I rejected the idea as I was about to go to work and didn’t really have time to do it. My second thought was to take an aspirin, of which we had none. So, I thought, let’s give EFT another go!
So I tap, tap, tapped for a couple of minutes, jumped in the car and headed off to work. I was about half-way to work when I realized that my shoulder was no longer giving me grief. I wasn’t convinced that EFT was responsible for the absence of pain but the experience did re-awaken the desire to find out more about EFT.
I didn’t rush out and order the DVDs, I didn’t start extolling the virtues of EFT to everyone I met, but I did study the web and read many accounts of the use of EFT, and, more importantly, I started using the basic EFT recipe on anything and everything I could think of!
Net result?? Well, at this stage, I would say I do feel more relaxed than usual, I do feel happier than usual and I do feel more positive than usual. My shoulder pain hasn’t returned either. Not a bad start for a week’s effort! After further deliberation and study of U-tube presentations on EFT, some of which, (but not all) are very convincing, I have decided to bite the bullet and buy the DVDs. These are pretty cheap really and even if they are half as good as I am hoping them to be, I will be a very satisfied customer!
Watch this space for further information…..

Mesmer - con-artist or visionary?

Franz Anton Mesmer is still considered by many to have been basically a con-artist, but he could also be viewed as a man ahead of his time, or maybe even a visionary, albeit somewhat flawed.
Whatever viewpoint you take, it has to be conceded that Mesmer represents the father of modern day hypnosis, because he was the first to recognize that the power to heal lies within people themselves, as opposed to the previously accepted view that gods and cosmic forces were alone responsible.
Mesmer was not a modest man by any standards but he was intelligent, articulate and forceful in his opinions. He developed his theory of ‘Animal Magnetism’ after coming across a woodcutter who had injured his leg which was bleeding badly. Mesmer observed that the flow of blood decreased as he neared the woodcutter and it resumed bleeding as he moved away. On further investigation he found that if he just passed his hand over the wound the bleeding would also stop.
‘Animal Magnetism’ was, in Mesmer’s view, an invisible, universal fluid, with magnetic properties, which pervades the universe. If a person was ill, then he saw this as meaning that the person’s distribution of the universal fluid within them was out of synch.
Mesmer also believed that some people, including himself, could store this universal fluid and then redistribute it correctly, thereby resulting in a cure.
Mesmer did lose the plot a bit with his ‘Animal Magnetism’ though, resorting to theatrical type behaviour where he cavorted around dressed in flowing purple robes with a long glass wand, whilst exhorting his patients to grasp iron rods protruding from a magnetic bath filled with iron filings - all in order to effect a cure. Not surprisingly, cures did occur, thanks to the power of suggestion, and such became Mesmer’s popularity, that he soon found he had a logistics problem concerning the size of his magnetic bath and the number of would-be patients. His solution to this was to start magnetizing trees as well (of which there were plenty), in order to accommodate everyone.
Eventually though, as with most good things, it all ended in tears. A government committee was set up to investigate Mesmer and they managed to observe him mesmerizing trees. Mesmer’s patients were hugging the mesmerized trees and many seemed to be cured as a result. However, one astute committee member noted that several of the ‘cured’ patients had just hugged ordinary non-mesmerized trees. Mesmer was publicly discredited as a result of this, labeled a fake, and he henceforth faded into obscurity.
Now although the antics of Mesmer may seem a bit on the wacky side, it is interesting to compare his theory of ‘Animal Magnetism’ to current-day thinking. As an example, take the recent hugely popular book ‘The Secret.” In this remarkable book, much is made of the all-embracing energy pervading the universe, how everything, including us, is composed of this energy and how everything we do or say therefore has an immediate impact on everything else in the universe. Further, the basic premise behind “The Secret” is the ‘Law of Attraction,’ which states that we tend to attract what we think about, much as a magnet attracts. If you think thoughts of ill-health, you will attract ill-health.
The terminology is maybe a little different, but change Mesmer’s ‘universal fluid’ to ‘universal energy’, change his ‘animal magnetism’ to ‘law of attraction’ and his ideas sound distinctly similar to present-day theories.
Maybe Mesmer was a visionary and he too, knew 'The Secret'!

BABY ON BOARD

Have you seen them? Of course you have. You know, those signs you see stuck on the rear window or bumper of cars. Not the slightly witty or smart signs, like “Be careful, I drive the same way as you do”, or , “If you can read this you’re too darn close”, or “My other car is a Lamborghini’, but the ones that baldly state: “BABY ON BOARD.”
Now, exactly what information is the person driving this car trying to impart?
Is it meant to be a literal message ‘Don’t rear-end me or you’ll injure the baby I have left lying on the back seat’? Or is it just meant to be ‘Slow down, you moron!’
Maybe it is a sort of cryptic way of saying ‘Please be more careful than usual anywhere near this vehicle because the driver is pregnant and could act a little irrational if you get too close.’ Who knows?
Now I may be in the minority here, but I find BABY ON BOARD signs to be rather meaningless, boring and they seem to have a somewhat hypnotic effect on me, causing me to actually speed up and drive a little more reckless than usual.
I think the time is ripe for some more interesting versions of BABY ON BOARD don’t you?
How about some of the following?
BABE ON BOARD
LARGE CHILD ON BOARD
CHEESE ON BOARD
ALL ON BOARD
BITCH ON BOARD
SNAKES ON BOARD
FORENSIC SCIENTIST ON BOARD
BORE ON BOARD
BRAT ON BOARD
MICRO-ORGANISMS ON BOARD
DAVID BECKHAM NOT ON BOARD
Anyone add to this list? There must be thousands more, some even more interesting!

Hypnotic Christmas

Well, its that time of the year again. "Snoopy's Xmas","Felise-narvy-duh?" and other perennial, mindboggling ditties ad nauseum on the radio. Frenzied, red-eyed shoppers filling malls to the gunwhales, grabbing wildly at anything and everything that's for sale and being served by majorly stressed shop assistants close to breaking point. Credit cards stretched to the utter limits of their credibility. Christmas decorations festooning everything - shops, houses, public buildings, public outhouses, all groaning under the weight of lights, tinsel, nodding reindeer, jolly Santas and the like. Mountains of high cholesterol food and alcohol being stockpiled in each and every home, as if in preparation for an imminent world disaster. And, worst of all, radio and TV announcers throwing in their contribution by giving us an unsolicited countdown of shopping days left to THE BIG DAY.
Hypnosis, self hypnosis, hysteria, trance states - it's all happening out there folks! Anyone still reckon they can't be hypnotized?
CHRISTMAS! I LOVE IT!

Ridiculously Simple Hypnosis

Have you ever tried self hypnosis? No? A surprising number (estimated at 35%) of people have, but very few of these people continue to use it more than several times. Why is this? The main reasons seem to be that:
(a) It takes too long to do it -they simply don't have enough time in their day.
(b) They don't get the results they expect, or don't know what to expect.
(c) They just lose interest and have a couple of glasses of wine instead.
How do you get around all that? Easy.
All that people are looking for is a simple, quick and enjoyable method THAT WORKS!
Well, I've got some good news and some bad news..
First the good news. A simple, quick and enjoyable method DOES exist.
Now for the bad news. You need to have a reasonably sound imagination for the method to work properly. So, if you are a civil servant or government employee then the method probably won't work for you. (just kidding)
The Method. Here it is...
First, put away the bottle of wine.
Now, close your eyes and take a deep breath. As you breathe out, imagine you are falling, falling into a wondrously soft, fluffy, white cloud. Continue breathing deeply and see yourself floating, utterly relaxed on that cloud. Doesn't it feel good to just totally relax?
That's it! Try it, practise it, use it. Anywhere, anytime. Just do it! It works!

Is this just a female thing?

Over many years experience I have noted a rather strange phenomenon which seems to pertain only to the female gender.
I think it's something to do with the cleanliness ethic, an ethic which us mere males don't seem to be particularly imbued with.
It goes further than just an obsession with cleanliness though, it also involves TEMPERATURE.
Let me explain. On the absolute coldest days of the year, my wife (whom I love dearly, I might add), has this bewildering habit of opening every window of our house as widely as possible, for as long as possible. I have also observed this strange ritual being carried out by my mother, mother-in-law and others of our female species.(in their own homes, of course.)
In reply to my apparently naive question of "Why?" my partner tells me in a sort of half-exasperated tone, "It's to freshen up the house!"
Now, in my opinion, I'm a very tolerant person. I can produce evidence of this. I allow our dog to sleep on our bed. I tolerate my wife watching shopping programs on TV in the bedroom while I am trying to go to sleep. I allow my wife to produce vast amounts of garden waste for me to dispose of. The list goes on...
But, how, (in my obvious ignorance of such matters), I ask, does freezing to our very core for several hours at a time, in the depths of winter, restore cleanliness, freshness, or whatever else you want to call it, to our humble abode? Is there a strong correlation between coldness and cleanliness?
There doesn't appear to be any rational answer to this. My wife, in the same half-exasperated tone as before, says, "It just does!"
Now, being an avid amateur hypnotist, I think I'll try and secretly hypnotize my wife into a more humane way of looking at how to achieve freshness in the home. I don't really like my chances of success,and I'm not 100% sure on the best way to approach it, but I figure it's worth a go, even if the end result is that our windows are only partially opened on wintry days!
Stay posted.

Feeling a bit inferior lately?

So you think you've got an inferiority complex do you?
Well,have I got news for you!
An inferiority complex is actually a problem that only superior people have!
People who really are inferior, either mentally or otherwise, never have a complex about it!
After that little revelation, if you are still feeling a smidgen on the inferior side you will be pleased to know that your problem can easily be solved by hypnosis.
The self-concept of anyone can easily be modified, changed or improved by a combination of intense hypnotic suggestion using graphic detail, and self hypnosis.
The speed of the solution does depend pretty much upon the motivation of the subject though. This can be aided by subconscious indoctrination and provision of some form of self help technique.
Self concept motivates every form of our behaviour, whether it be normal, deviant, delinquent or anything else! Since hypnosis can directly influence the self concept, it's pretty clear that its use is a logical choice for solving many of our problems!