"You don’t have to control your thoughts. You just have to stop letting them control you."
- Dan Millman
Stress is a natural superpower we have to help us focus in the short term, particularly when we sense a threat. But stress run amok is a nasty killer that makes you suffer. And expat life - with its constant changes and loss of social support systems - can supercharge our stress, making us prone to stress-related illness, more reliant on poor coping mechanisms, and less mentally resourced. In short, we're not operating at our best.
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Hypnosis and ACT can effectively alleviate stress while helping us understand and neutralize the numerous "anxiety triggers" we've developed over time through conditioning.
Work with me in 1.5-hour sessions via Zoom to:
Investigate the circumstances that trigger stress and anxiety in your life. Whether performance anxiety, social anxiety, stress, or even simple phobias, together we'll come to understand the issue and how it affects your life.
Calm your mind. Use Hypnosis to harness the power of your mind and autonomic nervous system to teach your body to relax in circumstances previously perceived to be threatening. In the process, we'll help your body remember what it feels like to relax, something that can become unfamiliar territory if you've been stressed out for some time.
Engage in practical exercises that keep stress from controlling you. Cultivate psychological flexibility to embrace habits that let you live the life you want to live and push stress and anxiety out of the driver's seat. As expats, we experience a lot of change. Sometimes, we can lose track of what is important to us at our core. My approach to psychological flexibility uses proven, evidence-based techniques that train you to focus your attention and energy on what you value, even when life is stressful, or anxiety has its grips on you. We'll work together to make you more and more skilled at using this flexibility to bring you greater and greater satisfaction in your life -- and to put stress and anxiety in its place.
Let's face it, expat life can be stressful.
The hallmark of expat life is change, and change can be stressful.
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Our human body is still in the stone age, constantly vigilant for danger. This danger could take many forms—from a sabertooth tiger attack to being cast out of the tribe and left to fend for ourselves. Our ancestors' awareness of these threats ensured their survival, and this mechanism for threat detection remains very strong today.
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In the modern world, many daily stressors are perceived by our bodies as existential threats, affecting our physical and emotional health. The constant change in expat life is often seen by our bodies as a threat rather than the excitement we crave.
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Hypnosis is an excellent way to teach your body to relax in the presence of these stressors and use relaxed attention to manage situations.
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Often, the body and mind have been working together to keep you safe for so long that there is a lot to unpack to untangle unhelpful stress responses, resulting in persistent anxiety or even phobias. Luckily, hypnosis is very effective in this regard as well.
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We'll also engage in exercises designed to enhance your psychological flexibility, making you more deliberate with your attention and effective in creating a life you value, whether at home or abroad.
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I love discussing what I do and hearing other expat stories, so set up a chat today and see if this approach is right for you.​