Hypnosis for Stress and Deeper Sleep
Stress is a normal physical response to an event or problem that makes you feel threatened or overwhelmed. Our nervous system is sensitive to danger to keep us safe. But the same system that helps us avoid physical risk can be the system that creates long-term chronic stress and damages our minds and body.
When the fight or flight response kicks in, we become focused, energetic and alert. This state can help you to meet challenges, make you sharp when doing presentations, and allow you to react quickly in an accident or other dangerous situation. However, problems arise when we stay in this state too much or when every little thing that goes wrong sends us into hyperdrive. When adrenaline and cortisol are released constantly, the damage to the body is extreme. Over time, it will damage and inflame every body system, including the brain. Memory problems, the inability to concentrate, seeing only the negative, and constant poor judgment are directly related to chronic or high-stress levels.
Hypnosis and hypnotherapy have a long history of helping people change habits and behaviors, along with improving medical issues. Its initial recorded use was in medicine for surgical anesthesia. It has now become a respected treatment for medical conditions like IBS (irritable bowel syndrome), pain reduction, autoimmune disorders, and headaches. The list of conditions that hypnosis helps to treat is too long to even attempt in this article.
One of the fundamental ways that hypnosis improves health is by creating an environment of reduced emotional and physical stress. Stress increases when quality sleep is lacking and creates other problems. Insomnia is often a side effect of stress. Lack of quality sleep increases depression and anxiety and makes people more likely to gain weight.
So how does hypnosis help with this negative cycle?
We now know that during deep stages of sleep, the body and brain are repaired and rejuvenated. Research has shown a positive result from using hypnotic recordings before bedtime. Hypnosis increases the amount of slow-wave deep sleep, increases growth hormone levels, and reduces cortisol, a powerful stress hormone, by a significant amount.
Not only does using hypnosis improve the deepest phase of sleep, but it also indirectly influences the level of health throughout the body. Hypnosis also alleviates other kinds of dysfunction through its impact on the autonomic nervous system or ANS. Through this connection, hypnosis can lower blood pressure and reduce the effects of tension on the digestive and mental functions often affected due to stress.
Positive feelings are increased dramatically by taking control of stress reactions through hypnotherapy. The simple realization that you are in control of your life is the foundation of stress management, and hypnosis helps you gain control!
