More than ever before scientific investigations are proving the fundamental role of stress in causing and aggravating a lot of physical and emotional disorders. A cover story from a 1983 Time Magazine described stress as “The Epidemic of the Eighties.” The article also declared that stress is a critical health issue. And there is very little doubt that the world has become a lot more complex and stressful in the last two decades since that article was published.
Several surveys indicate that almost everybody is under the impression of being under a great deal of stress. Researchers in this domain estimate that 75 to 90 percent of the visits to primary care physicians somehow have to do with stress.
Most adults say that their job is the major cause of their stress. And stress levels have also increased in children as well as the elderly population for reasons including: Peer pressures that often lead to everything from cigarette smoking to drug and alcohol abuse; the wearing away of family and religious values and ties; growing crime rates; fear for personal security; but also social isolation and loneliness.
Stress can cause and aggravate conditions such as diabetes, ulcers, low back and neck pain, hypertension, strokes and heart attacks. This is because of the increased sympathetic nervous system activity as well as the release of cortisol, adrenaline, and other hormones. Chronic stress is corollary of weakened immune system resistance. Stress can cause anxiety, depression, and its different effects on the body’s organs.
“Stress” is defined as follows by the American Heritage Dictionary: “To subject to physical or mental pressure, tension, or strain”
The following definition is given for “tension”: “Mental, emotional, or nervous strain”
The following definition is given for “anxiety”: “A state of uneasiness and apprehension, as about future uncertainties”
And the following is the definition of “depression”: “The condition of feeling sad or despondent”
The following definition is given for “clinical depression”: “A psychiatric disorder characterized by an inability to concentrate, insomnia, loss of appetite, anhedonia, feelings of extreme sadness, guilt, helplessness and hopelessness, and thoughts of death.”
What we can be sure of is that our thoughts are the major reason for our feelings of stress, anxiety and depression. We could also say that, what we think about, and our attitudes and points of view about our experiences strongly influence what we feel. So if we can find a way to change our thoughts, attitudes, and points of view, then we can get rid of our stress, anxiety, and depression and change them for a better state of being.
Since the beginning of time, people have tried methods for eliminating stress. With the pharmaceutical industry there seems to be a pill for everything. And to that end the industry has produced a large line of tranquilizers from Valium to Xanax. If you choose to utilize these pills for relief, please make sure that you pay attention to the fine print and learn about the side effects, which commonly are, among others, addiction and dependency. Unfortunately, these types of drugs aim at treating the symptoms, instead of the cause. So when one stops taking them, the symptoms can come back.
A better way of eliminating tension, stress, anxiety, and depression is to work on the root cause, which as I said previously, is usually our thought processes. Now, here is the good news. The very essence of hypnosis is relaxing. The AMA recognized hypnosis in 1958 as an effective way to cure stress and stress related symptoms. And unlike anxiolytics, there are no bad side effects.
When you are in hypnosis, you are in the Alpha level of consciousness. It is the daydream like temporary psychological state that we experience as we are just about to fall asleep in the evening. And we experience it another time as we wake up again. There are several different ways that we can guide ourselves into this relaxed mood, from progressive relaxation to visual imagery to listening to hypnosis CD’s.
When we enter a hypnotic state, we can interact with our unconscious mind, which is the seat of our emotions. And one can more easily acknowledge new ideas and points of view that can help us to dissipate anxiety, or even avoid it in the first place.
NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming), which is a recent form of hypnosis, offers a lot of great techniques for eliminating stress. Maybe the technique that works best is called the “swish” pattern – or the “flash” pattern. When you use the “flash” pattern, your unconscious will automatically use bad, stress producing mental pictures, to generate relaxing mental pictures. Put differently, what commonly makes you feel stress will now trigger relaxation!
TO SUMMARIZE Tension, stress, anxiety, and depression can be prompted by our thoughts. So by changing our attitude and the way we resent our situation and what we’ve lived, we can dissipate these feelings at the source. Hypnosis and NLP are natural tools that make it possible to change our attitude and point of view to quickly dissipate the source of these negative feelings.
(c) Copyright 2007 By Alan B. Densky, CH. All rights reserved.
Alan B. Densky is an NGH certified hypnotherapist. He offers a complete line of anxiety management hypnosis CDs, and advanced anxiety management CDs through his Neuro-VISION hypnotism website. You can visit his self hypnosis blog, and download a free MP3.