New Year, New You - Bristol Hypnotherapist Catherine Embleton
A new year comes with a new opportunity, a new possibility of how things can be different, a new pathway of how you can be different. This can be both an exciting and scary thing to think about. The possibility of what we can become brings the fears around what if l fail? What if they don’t like me? What if l am making the wrong decision? These fears can overshadow the excitement of seeing growth from a place of positivity and trust, seeing failure as an opportunity to learn, seeing your mistakes as a chance to evolve, seeing your self doubt and using it as a catalyst for more self love. These fears can show up at anxiety, depression, low confidence, self down, over thinking, addictive behaviour or something else.
The interesting thing is that both of these viewpoints can be true, both realities exist, and you get to decide which one you will listen to, which reality you would like to live in. Hypnotherapy allows us to access and work directly with the parts of us which are fearful, work directly with our past experiences which are playing out over and over again, and gives us the opportunity to change.
How the unconscious mind protects us.
Growth can be hard and scary, our unconscious minds will always resist growth as it’s aim is to keep us safe and we are safest in the things we already know, the things we can already predict and control. So when we think about change or growth, whether that’s in your relationships, your job, your friendships, your habits, your relationship to food, the amount you drink or something else, our initial response is fear. This fear can easily snowball into self doubt, anger, confusion, depression and anxiety as we battle with the part of us that wants to grow and the part that is resistant to change. Hypnotherapy allows us to work directly with the unconscious mind and as we know, this is the part that dictates 90% of our thoughts, feelings, responses, reactions and behaviours. So when you change your unconscious beliefs, when you change our past experiences, you change yourself and change your life. We can transform our anxiety, self doubt, depression, low self esteem and unhealthy habits for more peace, more enjoyment, more calm and more clarity.
2022 Reflections
First things first, before we discuss growth and moving forward, please take the time to congratulate yourself for everything you have done, have achieved, all the things you have learnt. You have lived another year of life with all its challenges, gifts, ups and downs, well done you! We are far too quick to push forward to the next things before we have really appreciated the last, to really celebrate all that has happened. I have broken this blog into different questions to give you time to stop, pause and reflect.
What have l learnt this past year? What am l proud of? What are the moments l forgot, that l would like to remember?
Write these answers somewhere that you can reflect on them. I sometimes recommend my clients start a growth journal where they log all the ways they have grown and changed as it can be easy to forget. In moments of fear and pain, it can be helpful to remind yourself of what you already know.
Now l would like you to take a moment to tune in with yourself. Do you feel ready to think about the future? Do you feel like you need some more rest? What is your internal compass trying to tell you right? If the answer to this question is any of the following; slow down, rest, chill out, have fun, relax and the very clear, don’t ask me the grow yet! Then l suggest you pause your reading here and come back another time. If on the other hand you feel you are ready for more growth, you have the energy for these big questions, then read on.
Creating a future that you want.
As you ask yourself these questions, tune into your response.
How would you like this year to be different?
What will be important to you this year?
How would you life/ work/ relationships/ habits/ home be different if you had no limits?
Who do you have to become for these things to happen?
Take time to really reflect on these questions, grab a tea, take your time, give yourself permission to dream. Getting clear on your future and how you would like it to be different isn’t something that should be rushed. There is no race in life, l know we often feel like we are competing with our friends, our siblings, our coworkers, but in reality, the race is with yourself. You are the one that holds the key to your greatest power, your greatest change, your greatest life.
These reflections are important so we avoid living the same old patterns, creating the same old problems, repeating the same old habits and living our lives again and again in fear, doubt, depression and isolation.
If there is just one thing you take away from today, l hope it is this.
You are much more powerful than you think you are.
That idea, that dream of how you want life to be, is possible.
What will be your first step towards becoming more of who you are supposed to be? Who you will, now, from today, decide to be?
I thank you dearest friend for taking the time to read these words. I hope they have brought you some peace, clarity or just a new way of looking at yourself or at life.
Sending love x