Archive for August, 2010

Downloads Unwrapped August 2010

I used to write this section in our monthly Inspired Minds newsletter, but we figured it would be easier to read online, and all our blog subscribers would enjoy reading it too. At least I hope you do Read August’s Inspired Minds newsletter here.

Downloads Unwrapped - August 2010

What is a f’etish? In my years as a hypnotherapist I’ve treated countless people for phobias and post traumatic stress disorder. Two of the easiest things to treat using hypnosis. But I can only recall a handful of cases of s’exual f’etishism (excuse the strange punctuation, we have to do it to avoid tripping up word filters in email programs!). It may well be that many f’etishists enjoy and want to keep their particular s’exual kinkiness. But some people would really rather be rid of s’exual compulsions that they feel do not fit with who they are. People are surprised when I say that a s’exual f’etish works in just the same way as a phobia. The phobic is responding to a trigger by producing the ‘wrong’ or an excessive response. We call this ‘faulty pattern matching’. They might respond with extreme terror to something that is intrinsically non-threatening, such as a plastic button. The match between their response and the trigger is ‘faulty’. The s’exual f’etishist does the same. A trigger which has nothing to do with s’exual activity produces a s’exual response. So some people may have phobias of inflatable balloons while others might be turned on by them. The session Overcome a s’exual f’etish deals with changing these ‘crossed wires’. F’etishes may have originated like phobias in that both may have been ‘accidental pairings’ of a s’exual or fear response to a trigger. For example, if someone happened to be feeling s’exually aroused at a time when they were watching TV, and saw on screen a woman who was smoking, s’exual arousal may be accidentally linked to ‘women smoking’  (this is what actually happened to a client of mine). Fear of travel - fear of the unknown known or the unknown unknown? The very first client I ever treated (while I was still training in 1993) had a Fear of travel. He would get weepy and anxious whenever he packed his suitcase. I asked him to think about this feeling and to notice if a memory came to mind. He said that suddenly he was thinking about a time when he’d been very young and setting off to boarding school. He hadn’t wanted to go. For fifty years he’d been plagued by anxiety about travelling, but never made the connection between leaving home as an adult and this childhood memory. Of course, people fear travelling for many different reasons because there’s a lot of ‘what-if-ing’ you can do: What if I forget my passport? What if I get mugged? What if the car breaks down? Part of the art of enjoyable travel is making good plans and maintaining a good attitude. The good attitude part encompasses relaxing with the unknown, having faith that ‘whatever happens I’ll handle it!’ and enjoying good old fashioned adventure. Adopting a control freak approach to travel rather than accepting that there are some things that you simply can’t plan for takes all the joy out of venturing forth. The session Fear of travel deals with all these aspects and more. Facing up to it and finding it’s not as bad as you think So-called ‘denial’ about what’s really going on can prevent us from doing what needs to be done, but also creates a nagging psychological discomfort -a ‘cognitive dissonance’ - which can be quite painful to maintain. Knowing a relationship isn’t working but pretending everything is fine; knowing you’re getting deeper in debt but not opening those brown envelopes; sensing that your drinking is getting of control but happily going along with the pretence that it’s all okay and your liver is thriving… But ah, the relief when reality is faced! People are often surprised at the intensity of the relief they feel when they finally face up honestly to what there is to be faced. The session It’s not as bad as you think encourages the removal of head from sand so that necessary changes can be made. Knowing the beast is the first step to vanquishing it.