The principle behind it is called reconsolidation theory, and it has been taught on our Diploma course and guided the work of Cognitive Hypnotherapists since it was discovered by neuroscientist Joesph LeDoux. He found that recalling a memory rendered it unstable and capable of being changed. Drugs appear to be one method, interventions used by our approach are another. I have written a blog on this theory for those who would like to know more – and there is an excellent article in the Times

The next stage was a clever twist. Another group of volunteers were given tasks designed to soften their views, such as playing devils advocate and defending the death penalty when they were actually in favour of it. The result was that the views attributed to other people remained the same, but those of God shifted in accordance with their own.

Finally the team used a brain scanner which showed that the same brain areas became active when contemplating their own views as those of God, but an area used for inferring other people’s mental states lit up when thinking about other American’s views.

Interesting isn’t it? As an atheist my conclusion is going to be different from people of faith, and I’d be genuinely interested to hear their thoughts – and anyone elses, obviously.

For anybody trained as a Cognitive Hypnotherapist the idea that eating dulls pain is instantly interesting because I wonder whether emotional pain also responds in the same way? If it does, it provides an insight into those clients who respond to negative emotions by overeating. Studies have linked eating disorders to traumatic memories in as many as 40% of sufferers, and this could provide an insight into why so many people view food as ‘comfort’.

What the study also shows is that drinking water also has the same effect, so it is the act of ingesting that seems important, not what is ingested. With Wordweaving, our approach to hypnotic suggestion, it would be possible to adjust a client’s choice of food or drink at the same times as working with them to clear the emorional root of the pain. In that way their issue is being worked on in several different ways at once. Food for thought.

Read about the study here.

Saturday was simply one of the most perfect days of my life. The setting was amazing; the OBE Chapel in the crypt of St Pauls, surrounded by the tombs of William Blake, Wren, Nelson and Wellington gave the ceremony a feeling that was indescribable. And the great thing was, the setting wasn’t the most memorable part of it.

To see my son Mark’s face when he saw his wife walk down the aisle (where moments before he looked like he was about to be sick), was a heart-stopping moment, because he looked how I feel when I’m about to do something difficult and Bex walks in. I guess because she makes me feel that together we can do anything, when I saw Mark and Tara look at each other the same way, I felt safe for them too. And I know that’s my projection, and I don’t care.

And so many other things: The bond between Mark and his brother Stuart (who was best man) and his half-brother Glen, was a beautiful thing to behold. The moment with my ex-wife Karen, her partner Mark, Bex and myself when we toasted the good job we’ve done raising fine boys, was precious, and watching Stu give the best Best Man’s speech I’ve ever heard was truly spooky, because we always look for bits of us in what our children do, but sometimes you see emerge from them something that isn’t simply an inherited trait, or a mix of stuff from their parents, it’s something uniquely their own, and his delivery had a charisma that came from nowhere else and no one else.

And watching Mr and Mrs Mark Silvester set off for their honeymoon the next morning glowing with happiness, with all of the hopes and dreams that attend that moment in young lives, left me so profoundly grateful for everything I have in my life, and everything that has got me to this point of it, that I had to sit alone for a while to compose myself. So much of the good in life springs from the love of the people you share it with; and I’m truly blessed.

But Bex was a bit mean laughing for a full half of a hymn, just because of my singing. Inside I’m Bobby Brown.

His experiment seemed to say no, so it will be with some relief that a recent study by researchers in New Zealand have come up with evidence that the original conclusions were wrong. You can read about it here.

Clearly the issue is far from resolved. I suspect that in the end it will be shown that we can have free will, but that most of the things we do are determined by unconscious processes. After all, we’re not conscious of teh here and now for 90% of the day, so how can we claim to be in charge of all our choices.

When people come to see a Cognitive Hypnotherapist it is usually to find help with something they don’t feel able to change themelves, ie they don’t have free will over a particular set of behaviours in particular situations.

I think it’s because we’re not alone in our heads. We have the ‘I’; that sense of ourselves that makes us feel so special as a species, but I think we also have a number of other aspects of our self which emerge in certain contexts and take over what we do. There’s nothing spooky about it, they’re just other aspects of the mental processing from which our ‘I’ emerges.

The process of successful therapy that we teach in our Cognitive Hypnotherapy Diploma course is often about re-educating these ‘parts’ so that they generate the behaviour that your will prefers.

We can probably never have free will in all situations; our unconscious does a lot of the driving, but with proper training you can at least choose the direction it heads in most of the time.

Why we respond to certain actors, or certain types of character, has been something that has interested me for a long time. On our Diploma course I teach an exercise called Trackdown. Clients identify their favourite childhood book or film, and their favourite book or film now, and look for links between the two. Then they think about how those similarities are present in their life story. There’s a bit more to it than that, but it’s amazing how often clients will have a moment of insight about how the narrative of their life has echoes of themes in their favourite stories. In my case my favourite story as a boy was King Arthur, and my favourite film as an adult is The Matrix. If you think about it, they’re the same story. Neo is Arthur, Morpheus is Merlin, etc.

As a child I didn’t feel that I fitted into my family; I have a brother and sister who are adopted, and I was sure I must be too, and I spent a long time waiting to be ‘recognised’ by someone who would elevate me to my ‘rightful place’. So I spent a long time going precisely nowhere. Releasing myself from that story has changed my life, and made ‘Take Action’ my mantra.

The basis of this projection of ourselves into a story is called isomorphism, and it’s why metaphors can be so effective in communicating information – our brains look for an equivalence between the story and our own situation.

So when I watch Swayze my mind is projecting something of myself onto him, either something I see as similar, or something I wish for myself. So when we watch actors who epitomise the virtues we desire, in some way, at some level, we become them, so their passing is a small personal death as well.

So I want to thank Patrick for the effect he had on me, and the chance he gave me to imagine myself as I’d like to be; I’d like to think that perhaps in that way he lives on in many of us.

In life there are always reasons to be cautious, and sometimes it’s obviously right to be so, but I see a lot of clients who seem to have forgotten that they are mortal. They worry about what’s ahead to the point where they keep themselves stuck in their present unhappiness.

If we’re lucky there will be a moment on our death-bed when we have a chance to look back on our life and assess the choices we made. And I bet few will applaud the times we didn’t take a chance, or commit to something that could fail, and remember with pride the times they stepped into the unknown.

For me, leaving a police career 18 years into it in order to pursue as a risky living something I had fallen in love with, was one of my big ‘throw my hat’ moments and has led to a life that feels blessed – and I know I’ll smile at the memory when I breathe my last. So I really encourage you to find some walls that seem too tall to climb, and throw your hat. You’ll enjoy the climb as much as the view from the top.

I see Cognitive Hypnotherapy as sitting comfortably beneath the CBT umbrella (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy), but where most in this discipline think that emotions arise as a result of our thoughts, our practitioners hold the view that emotion comes first and the thoughts we have are an interpretation of an existing state, so both have to be given attention. This makes more sense from an evolutionary point of view, and this research appears to support the primacy (in terms of age) of the emotional system .

Here’s the article

This was posted in one of the Quest forum, and I thought it fitted beautifully with this general theme. Have a good journey today, and appreciate the people in your life, and the nature that surrounds you. Whatever your troubles, the birds are still singing.