Congratulations: you’ve downloaded the hypnosis you will listen to every day for the next two weeks. You’ll listen to this lying comfortably in bed ready for sleep.
The next step is to power up that hypnosis by making your personal visualisation.
You are going to create a Mind Movie to play in your imagination when you listen to your download.
A Mind Movie is a visualisation in the form of imagined moving images – like a movie – which you create to watch inside your mind when you listen to your download.
Follow the steps below to create your Restful Fix Mind Movie.
This Mind Movie will show moving images of you enjoying a restful experience in bed.
We are going to use the brain’s “conditioning” function to create a trigger to bring on restful feelings.
Our lives contain experiences which, if repeated, trigger an automatic response in our behaviour. In the most famous example, Pavlov, the Russian scientist, rang a bell every time he fed his dogs. After a while, just hearing the bell would trigger his dogs to salivate. An otherwise neutral stimulus like a bell ringing took on a positive meaning for the dogs.
Other examples of classic conditioning might be: standing up when the school bell is rung; or feeling tearful at the sight of a needle because of past painful injections; or a song from the happy moments in the past putting you in a good mood. Put simply, two stimuli are linked together to produce a learned response.
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What is the trigger for restful feelings? On your exhale, you say to yourself “relax”.
Think about a time when you felt really relaxed, comfortable and happy in bed, slept well and woke up the next morning feeling refreshed.
Find somewhere comfortable to relax.
Close your eyes.
Take five deep breaths (inhale through your nose for four or five counts, exhale through your mouth at a slower pace).
Then breathe deeply in a way that is comfortable for you, taking breaths from low down in your abdomen. Place your hand on your stomach to check that it is moving up and down as you breathe.
Create a Mind Movie in which you imagine moving images (just like in a movie) showing you resting comfortably in that bed all through the night (think about the feeling of the bed covers against your body, the pressure of the mattress, the temperature of the room, the sounds etc).
Don’t forget to include the emotions you were feeling at the time (for example: tired and content).
Your Mind Movie should be in full colour and last about 20 seconds.
Imagine you have a control board in front of you which allows you to play with your Mind Movie.
Practice watching yourself on the screen, as well as experiencing it through your own eyes (imagine being able to jump into your body in the movie).
Trigger: both before and after you watch your Mind Movie, take a deep breath and on the out breath say to yourself “relax”.
Your brain will make the association between breathing out and saying to yourself “relax” and the comfortable relaxed way you felt in your Mind Movie.
Play your Mind Movie repeatedly to remind your brain of those restful experiences.
Work it into your every day activities: e.g. when you brush your teeth, your hair, when you have a hot drink, or take a loo break and so on.
Remember to take a deep breath and on the out breath say to yourself “relax”.
Richard found it difficult to get back to sleep if he woke up at 3am as he would start worrying about work and providing for his family.
He remembered sleeping well when his son was first born as he was so tired he would sleep deeply all through the night (when his son allowed).
He created a Mind Movie movie which showed him getting into his bed exhausted, pulling the covers over himself, remembering the comfort of the heavy duvet on his body and ending with him waking at 7am realising that his son had also slept through the night.