Tag: believe

Interesting, You Can Fix That

Top Hypnosis Expert Reveals How to Remove the Fear of Clowns (and avoid Embarrassment!)

,Just in time for Halloween Stephen King’s film IT (#IT) is set to open on September 8th.  We can be sure that Throughout the U.S. there be a resurgence of  Scary Clowns invading communities and terrorizing people.  In the past, these reports included attempts by some to lure children into the woods.  The Scary clowns have people afraid, police and sheriff’s departments scrambling, and reports of physical attacks on innocent pedestrians.

Every year, about this time, I receive a few phone calls from people with a special fear.  The technical term is Coulrophobia – The Fear of Clowns!  This fear seems to haunt more people in Gen-Y and Gen-X than prior groups and there appears to be some strong indicators as to why this is.

The boomer generation grew up with clowns such as Bozo and Clarabel during the 1950’s and 60’s.  These clowns were associated with fun, laughter and cartoons, the pacifier of the generation.   That, however changed dramatically in the early 70’s with the infamous – Killer Clown – John Wayne Gacy (Pogo the Clown).

Originally, clowns were more an adult entertainment going back to the “court-jesters” or “fools”.    Beginning in the late 18th and 19th centuries, the appearance of clowns began to shift and the first appearances of the painted white face and exaggerated expression (makeup) entered the scene.   These exaggerated expressions, which hide true, and recognizable facial features are in large part the reason for the fear.

Olivia Goldhill, former features writer for The Telegraph (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/halloween/11194653/Why-are-we-so-scared-of-clowns.html) sums up the reaction of many in regards to clowns:

“The more you stare at a clown’s perpetually smiling face, the more it warps into something more sinister.

Clowns are supposedly figures of innocent fun – brightly colored jesters to entertain our children and slip on banana skins in exaggerated displays of slapstick comedy.

But the manic joy, the mask of make-up and the excessive familiarity are just a hair’s breadth away from terror.”

It is the grotesque, unnatural appearance of the human face and body, which triggers the fight/flight/freeze mechanism deep within our brains.  We get a sense of unease which is often amplified by the clown character acting in ways that would otherwise be socially unacceptable.  It is this very sense of discomfort and unease that authors such as Stephen King and director Stephen Spielberg tap into in the film IT  with the character PennyWise, or the character Twisty the clown in American Horror Freak Show, or the Joker in Batman.  In each of these, the clown embodies evil. The fear that often develops in young children who are sensitive to this odd, unfamiliar face (exaggerated features and hair) in a familiar body.  Historically, the actual people who have played clowns are themselves, sad, tragic, and often times sadistic people.

Children are taught, from the earliest ages, to avoid strangers.  It’s common for children to think that “bad strangers” look scary, like the villains in cartoons.  This is a natural growth that results from both the experience of seeing scary scenes, and creating them within their own minds.  This taught response, along with the stories reported in the news and social media have heightened the concerns and level of angst parents and communities are having.  Schools are reinforcing the warnings, especially among younger children.

While a small percentage of the U.S. population would actually be classified as coulrophoic (having the fear of clowns), they nonetheless do exist.  It is particularly difficult for these people during the Halloween season, when there is a greater number of people dressing up as clowns, and is further amplified by constant and increasing number of reports.

Fears or phobias are generally the result of unresolved processing of a traumatic experience.  Through hypnosis, the person suffering from the fear often plays a self-reinforcing, though unhealthy, mental loop that confirms the feeling.  I have helped a significant number of clients remove a host of fears and phobias that have previously paralyzed them.  Hypnosis is a powerful and useful tool in helping people overcome fears and phobias by helping them address and resolve the originating event that is the basis of their behavior.  Clients are then able to enjoy life.

Whether you fear clowns, heights, bridges, snakes or spiders, isn’t it time you made a positive change in your life with hypnosis?  STOP being controlled by your fear!  START living life free of anxiety.  I can help you with hypnosis.  SEE how!  Contact me at – info@hypnomarc.com or visit my websited – www.hypnomarc.com to request more information and to schedule your appointment – RIGHT NOW!

 

Marc Marshall, CH CHMI, is a certified consulting and stage hypnotist, author and motivational speaker with offices in Summit, NJ and Shaftsbury, VT.  He has helped people make dramatic improvements in their lives through his pain management, smoking cessation, weight loss, reducing stress and anxiety, and resolving fears and phobias programs.  Learn more today.

Interesting, You Can Fix That

What’s holding you back?

Imagine, create a picture in your mind’s eye of, how much better your life would be if you weren’t focused on things that were out of your control.  Now, I probably am shooting myself in the foot by sharing this, but the majority of people who seek my services to improve their lives are either focused on the past or the future.

Too often, we tend to trap ourselves with our own, self-destructive behaviors.  These are behaviors that in some way, our subconscious minds have associated with a reward of some type, but which create challenges for us.  The simple thinking here is that change does not occur until the pain of staying the same is more than the pain of changing.   In large part this is true.  It is the pain of behaviors, fears that paralyze, overeating, smoking, fear of future events, or repetitive / obsessive behaviors that stop us from reaching our potential.

There are two powerful tools that I share – mindfulness meditation and hypnosis.  The mindfulness trains us to focus on the moment.  When this becomes an integral part of our thinking and life, we no longer obsess about the past or worry about the future.  We learn that it is in this moment that we have the ability to make dramatic and lasting changes in our lives.  Changes that propel us into enjoying life, perhaps for the first time.

When mindfulness is combined with the power of hypnosis, the power of subconscious suggestion, we open the path way to change.  Here, I work with you to replace the negative associations that have developed and result in destructive behaviors, with positive and rational understanding.  An example of this retraining and new understanding came about from some work I did with a client who had a fear of spiders.  Through our journey together, the client revealed an experience that they had as a young child.  The child had been forced to touch a large spider during a demonstration at a pre-school.  The “young” client didn’t have the tools to express their discomfort and instead internalized and focused on the experience for more than 30 years.  During our session’s work, the client was able to revisit the initial traumatizing event and using their adult skills, able to address it and become more comfortable.  Further desensitization visualization and ultimately physical exercises allowed the client to move on past and no longer fear spiders.

So, I repeat the question – What’s holding you back?  Is it self-doubt, fear of failure, fear of losing face, the paralysis that comes with needing to be perfect?  Let’s work together and allow me to teach you the tools to improve all aspects of your life through hypnosis and mindfulness mediation.

Interesting, Proms & Graduations, You Can Fix That

Does Practice Make Perfect?

From the time I was much younger, I recalled coaches and teachers repeatedly telling me that “Practice Makes Perfect!”  Guess what, they were WRONG!  In a moment, I will tell you where the fault in their thinking and belief was.

I first became aware of the wonders of hypnosis when I was 10 or 11 years old.  I saw my first stage hypnosis show and became amazed at the antics performed by many people that I knew.  Now many of the skits that were performed at the time are not used today, but nonetheless, it demonstrated the power of the subconscious mind to control our beliefs, perceptions and yes, our behaviors.  Allow me to demonstrate what I mean.  I want you to picture me standing there in front of you.  For those who don’t know me, you can imagine that I look something like Josh Duhamel.  I just a bit shorter, a bit heavier, and a little bit older.  But for purposes of this exercise, imaging I look like him will work just fine.    So, I am standing in front of you holding this wonderful, juicy yellow lemon.  I take a silver knife from the wooden table and cut a wedge from the lemon.  The juice is running down my arm as I do this.  Very slowly, I bring this fragrant, lemon wedge that is dripping with juice and bring it to my lips.  I take a long savory bite from the lemon and feel the pucker as the juice enters my mouth.

I am sure that many of you experienced the salivation and pucker that is typical of having physically experienced that action.  Yet, I was nowhere near you.  The point being, that your powerful subconscious mind took you through that experience just as though you had actually bitten into that lemon.

Let me return back to my first experience with hypnosis.  I watched in amazement as people I knew, some really good friends, bit into a really large onion.  I remember the smell of those onions permeating the entire room, yet, every one of those people on that stage, believed that had just bitten into the sweetest, most flavorful apple they had ever eaten.  In fact, many of those same people were very disappointed when the hypnotist would not give them more to eat.

What does any of that have to do with the idea that “practice makes perfect”?  In 2005, a Doctoral student (B. Vasquez) at Washington State University conducted a research project involving the basketball team and free throws.  He divided the team into three groups.  One group practiced foul shooting as is the common practice among basketball players.  The second group, practiced free throws and also received hypnosis for sports improvement (free throw shooting).  The third group only received hypnosis for their free throws.  Now if practice does indeed make perfect, one might reasonably conclude that either group one or group two would have the best outcomes.  The results, which have since been replicated in other and similar studies, showed that in fact, group three, the group that never practiced free throws, but only received hypnosis, had the best results.  The conclusion is that our minds cannot differentiate between the hypnotic and actual physical experience.

Regardless of what we are doing in our lives, we learn at the subconscious level.  And, it is at the subconscious level that we must make changes.  This is why hypnosis is such a powerful tool in bringing about rapid and lasting change.  Our powerful subconscious minds attach emotion to behaviors.  The mind comes to establish pathways to accomplish tasks either through actual physical actions or in hypnosis.  And just like the volunteer on stage who is sweating profusely because they believe the suggestion that it is 120 degrees on stage, or is laughing hysterically at a movie that is playing only in their mind, those who are hypnotized as an aid to performance in sports or life, are training their subconscious minds to respond.  The difference, however between hypnosis and physical practice is immense.    The reason for that is that while in hypnosis, the person who is seeking to improve their skills is only visualizing and practicing the “perfect” technique.  There is no muscle memory formed from making errant shots.  The new pathways through the brain only know the “right” way.

So, my coaches and teachers were indeed wrong.  Practice does not make perfect.  Only PERFECT practice makes perfect.  And perfect practice, be it in stress management, sports improvement, mindfulness meditation, or weight management, can best be attained through hypnosis.

 

You Can Fix That

I Believe that We Will Win!

I Believe. . .

The US Men’s Soccer Team (#USMNT) are through the infamous “Group of Death” and on to the round of 16.  So what could this possibly have to do with hypnosis and hyno-counseling?  I believe everything.  Hypnosis is a state of hyper-focus that gives those who experience it the ability to make positive changes in their lives.  These changes allow you to not only believe you will win, but provide you with the skills to succeed by removing self-doubt and failure loops in our thinking.

The chant … “I Believe that We Will Win…” is much more than a catchy slogan.  It is, in every sense of the word, a mantra that focuses the subconscious mind and raises the spiritual level of the players allowing them to rise to a level not envisioned by the pundits.  In the same sense, it is our own self-doubts that frequently sabotage our own abilities to make important and lasting changes in our lives.  We get into failure loops in our attempts to lose weight, stop smoking, deal with phobias and fears, or to heal from the traumas of life.  Our minds are incredibly powerful.  The challenge, however, is that we must learn the techniques of by-passing that self-doubt and replacing our “stinkin thinkin” with a confidence that can be quickly gained through hypnosis.

Are you ready to get through the doubters and “Group of Death”?  Are you ready to get that promotion; to stop smoking; or lose and keep off that excess weight?  Are you ready to find the power within you to believe that you can win? Right now you can make that decision a reality!

Right now you can take the action to become the person you want to be!  Right now, I BELIEVE THAT YOU WILL WIN!  I BELIEVE THAT WE WILL WIN! Be that winner and set an appointment with me to set those changes in motion.

Marc Marshall, CH