Archers to Ashes

Buffy Davis who plays Jolene

Regular listeners to the Archers will know that Jolene, the landlady of The Bull, is trying to give up smoking but is not doing very well.  Part of the problem is her motivation – or lack of it.  Her new boyfriend, Kenton, is the person who wants her to give up and is bribing her with a trip to Monte Carlo.

It’s not enough for someone else to want you to give up smoking.  To be successful at becoming a non-smoker, you need to be self-motivated.  Motivation comes from your values, the things that get you up in the morning.  Good motivators can be connected to your health, your family, your finances or your future plans.

Once you’ve got your motivation sorted out, you need to think about your beliefs.  Some beliefs are enabling and help you to achieve your goals eg “I can do this because I’m a strong person” or “I’ve done difficult things before and I can do this now”.  Other beliefs are limiting and don’t support what you want to do eg “Nothing has worked in the past so it won’t work now” or “I’m weak-willed so it won’t last”.  You can change your limiting beliefs for positive ones or you can choose not to believe them.  The first step is becoming aware of them.

So come on Jolene, you're a strong woman, what will motivate you to stop smoking?

Happy Easter!

The weather’s lovely, there’s a long weekend to enjoy and I can start eating chocolate again!  Every year I give up chocolate for Lent and, as I love chocolate in all its forms, it is a real trial.  I did have a piece of chocolate cake on my birthday but I think that’s allowable.  The first mouthful of Easter egg will be fantastic.

As an NLP practitioner and a hypnotherapist I do have some techniques that help to control the craving.  I could use an aversion technique, which is very effective, but I want to eat chocolate in the future so I won’t do that.

A really useful technique for controlling any sort of craving is ‘spinning’.  Feelings often start in the tummy area and move upwards in a circular motion.  If you reverse that motion you can reduce feline.  Follow these steps the next time you have an unwanted craving.

1.       As you start to experience the feeling of craving, notice where it starts and how it moves in a particular direction.  Connect the end to the beginning so that you have a spinning circle. 

2.       If that feeling had a colour, what colour would it be?

3.       Move that spinning circle outside your body and notice the speed it spins at.

4.       Now, slow down the spinning and reverse the direction of the spin

5.       Change the colour to the colour of calmness.

6.       Bring that calm circle back down into your body.

7.       Notice how the feeling of craving has reduced or gone.

Have a Happy and Peaceful Easter

Mind over Matter

Exercising arthritic joints can be very painful -
something this tecnology may help combat.

Last week the BBC reported a remarkable new piece of research being carried out by Nottingham Trent University into the treatment of arthritis (Mind tricks may help arthritic pain).  The technology, called ‘Mirage’ started off as a research project into the way our brains put together what we see and feel happening in our bodies but, after a woman with arthritis reported relief from the symptoms, the scope of the research has been extended..

“For the illusion to work patients place their hand inside a box containing a camera, which then projects the image in realtime onto a screen in front of them.  The subject then sees their arthritic fingers being apparently stretched and shrunk by someone gently pushing and pulling from the other side of the box.”

Twenty volunteers diagnosed with arthritic pain in their hands and fingers were recruited by the University to test out the process.

 “Before starting the test they were asked to rate their pain from 0-20, with 0 indicating no pain and 20 representing the most unbearable pain they could imagine....The study showed a marked reduction in pain - on average halving the discomfort for 85 per cent of volunteers.  Some reported greater reduction in pain for stretching, some for shrinking and some for both. 

The pain reduction worked only when painful parts of the hand were "manipulated" and for a third of the volunteers it temporarily eliminated the pain altogether.  Anecdotally, many volunteers also reported an increased range of movement. The results will be reported in the next edition of the medical journal, Rheumatology.” (Anthony Bartram, BBC 2011)

Our minds find it hard to differentiate between what we physically experience and what we see or visualise.  There are a number of NLP and hypnosis techniques that work on this principle.  Using visualisation as part of a therapy, I can help clients to change their experience of pain and improve their physical performance.

All of this is exciting news for the 10 million people who suffer from some form of arthritis, particularly those who don’t like taking drugs or don’t experience any pain relief from them.

Visiting Japan

Last October I was very lucky to have a holiday in Japan.  It was somewhere I had wanted to go for many years and I decided not to put it off any longer.  I had always thought I would go there for cherry blossom time in the Spring but, after I read an article about how beautiful the Autumn colours are in Japan, I changed my mind.  In the light of recent events it was a very fortunate decision.

The trip far exceeded my expectations.  The gardens and temples in Kyoto were awe inspiring.  I had never heard of the island of Miyajima, just off of the coast of Hiroshima.  It was so beautiful, the mountains, the forests, the wild deer in the streets and the floating Torii gate.  I also went to Iga Ueno and did some ninja training, really, I have the certificate!

I was surprised how easy it was to use public transport and navigate around the cities and the countryside.  Japanese people in restaurants, shops and on the streets were generally helpful, polite and charming.

It has been shocking to watch the news reports of the earthquake and tsunami.  Although the areas I visited were not affected, the scenery and houses look very familiar.  I can’t even imagine how you start to clear up and recover from that sort of devastation but I think everyone has been impressed by the calmness and dignity of the Japanese people.

 I hope to go back Japan sometime and visit some new places but in the meantime my thoughts and prayers go out to all those affected.

Growing Pains

As soon as the sun starts to warm up in the Spring, the urge to get outside is overwhelming.  Yesterday I rushed out into the garden to mow the lawn, pull out the weeds and prune the bushes.  All that pushing, pulling and bending without doing any warm-up exercises inevitably leads to aches and pains the next day.  Sounds familiar?

If you have severe back pain after you have been gardening you may need to consult your doctor.  If you have an annoying ache, there’s a simple NLP technique developed by Richard Bandler that you might like to try.  You may prefer to have someone else ask you the questions so that you can concentrate on the answers.

1.       If your pain had a shape, what shape would it be?

2.       If your pain had a colour, what colour would it be?

3.       If the background had a colour, what colour would it be?

4.       If you were to make the shape the same colour as the background, would it need to get lighter of darker?

5.       Now make the shape lighter/darker until it’s the same colour as the background, so that you can only just make out the faint outline of the shape.

6.       Now make it smaller and smaller until it’s as small as it can possibly be before it disappears.

7.       Now make it smaller still so that you can look at the background and find that the shape has gone.

8.       If healing had a colour what would it be?  Allow that colour to flow all over the background.  Flowing all over from top to bottom and side to side, everywhere that it needs to flow for your back to feel completely comfortable and free from that feeling that you had.  And when it’s done you can relax completely.

Happy gardening.