General Anxiety

"State Of Constant Insecurity"

We all get anxious from time to time and being anxious is a very normal state when we have a reason for it e.g. your husband is not home yet when he should have been there four hour earlier or your girlfriend is showing no interest in you!

But when the state of anxiety starts to strike frequently and often appears out of the blue then you know that you may be suffering from an anxiety problem; anxiety is a common symptom in phobias, panic attacks and depression but it can exist on its own.

Anxiety problems are very common and affect as many as 13% of the adult population. They may start at any stage of life and range from slight to very severe:

• palpitations.
• feeling short of breath.
• tingling sensations.
• feeling light-headed.
• sweating profusely.
• feeling cold or hot all over.
• feeling nauseous.
• fear of losing control.
• fears of fainting/passing out.

This anxiety state then permeates our daily functions; for e.g. a housewife finds it very difficult to manage the household budget; an adult trembles at the thought of standing in front of a meeting and making a presentation; an adolescent feels he is going to faint in the exams room.

A generalised state of anxiety is one of the least understood conditions as the person undergoing it cannot explain it as easily as maybe a phobic person can point to the phobic object for example. Here most of reactions seem to come out of the blue and seem to be provoked by some internal thoughts that the person is not aware of; asked what is the problem the person says "I don't know; I just feel like crying; I feel afraid."

Hypnotherapy has worked very well with anxious people when the mind is very relaxed in trance the person feels more in control of these same symptoms that he/she had started to feel controlled and gripped him. Dissociation is one of the techniques that helps the person to look on his/her problem in a more detached and controlled way and he/she feels more equipped to deal with the anxiety through visualisation techniques and inner resources recovered in hypnotherapy.

The body learns to become relaxed again after months of tension and sends the positive message to the brain that everything is going to be all right and under control. The changes that occur are in the perceptions and reactions of the client towards the issues in his/her life- he/she learns how he/she can master those issues instead of feeling helpless. The goals are defined with the client as the sessions progress towards a more empowered style of living.