Center for Creative Counseling

Whatever your ideal is ~ be willing to grow towards it.

The Seven Rules of Hypnosis

Rule #1: Every thought or idea causes a physical reaction

Your thoughts can affect all of the functions of your body. WORRY thoughts trigger changes in the stomach that in time can lead to ulcers. ANGER thoughts stimulate your adrenal glands and increased adrenaline in the blood stream causes many body changes. ANXIETY and FEAR thoughts affect your pulse rate.

Ideas that have a strong emotional content almost always reach the subconscious mind, because it is the feeling mind. Once accepted, these ideas continue to produce the same body reaction over and over again.

In order to eliminate or change chronic negative bodily reactions, we must reach the subconscious mind and change the idea responsible for the reaction. This is easily done with self-hypnosis and auto-suggestion.

Rule #2: What is expected tends to be realized

The brain and the nervous system respond only to mental images. It does not matter if the image is self-induced or from the external world. The mental image formed becomes the blueprint, and the subconscious mind uses every means at its disposal to carry out the plan. Worrying is a form of programming a picture of what we don't want, but the subconscious mind acts to fulfill the pictured situation. "THE THINGS THAT I HAVE FEARED HAVE COME UPON ME."

Many people suffer from chronic anxiety, which is simply a subconscious mental expectancy that something terrible will happen to them. On the other hand, we all know people who seem to have the "Magic" touch. Life seems to shower them with blessings for no apparent reason, and so we call them "lucky." What seems to be luck is in reality POSITIVE MENTAL EXPECTANCY, a strong belief that they deserve to be successful. "WE BECOME WHAT WE THINK ABOUT."

Our physical health is largely dependent upon mental expectancy. Physicians recognize that if a patient expects to remain sick, lame, paralyzed, helpless, even to die, the expected condition tends to be realized. Here is where self-hypnosis can become the tool to remove despondence and negative attitudes and bring about a hopeful positive expectancy—the expectancy of health, strength, and well being, which then tends to be realized.

Rule #3: Imagination is more powerful than intelligence when dealing with your own mind or the minds of others

This is an important rule to remember when using self hypnosis. REASON IS EASILY OVERRULED BY IMAGINATION. This is why some persons blindly rush into some unreasonable act or situation. Violent crimes based upon jealousy are most always caused by an overactive imagination. This is why some persons blindly rush into some unreasonable act or situation. Most of us feel superior to those who lose their savings to confidence men, or blindly follow a demagogue such as Hitler, or are sold worthless stocks. We can easily see that such people have allowed their imagination to overcome their reason. But we are often blind to our own superstitions, prejudices and unreasonable beliefs. Any idea accompanied by a strong emotion such as anger, hatred, love or our political and religious beliefs usually cannot be modified through the use of reason. In using self-hypnosis we can form images in the subconscious mind, which is the feeling mind and can remove, alter or mend the old ideas.

Rule #4: Once an idea has been accepted by the subconscious mind, it remains until it is replaced by another idea

The companion rule to this is: The longer the idea remains, the stronger the opposition is to replacing it with a new idea.

Rule #5: Each action acted upon creates less opposition to successive suggestion

A mental habit is easier to follow the longer it lasts unbroken. Once a habit is formed it becomes easier to follow and more difficult to break.

In other words, once a self-suggestion has been accepted by your subconscious mind it becomes easier for additional suggestions to be accepted and acted upon. This is why, when you are just beginning with self-hypnosis and auto-suggestion, we suggest you start with simple suggestions. You can suggest that you feel a tingling sensation or a warm pleasant feeling. When these have been followed, you can move on to more complicated suggestions. You should begin now with the suggestion that you will automatically emerge from self-hypnosis in ten minutes

Rule #6: An emotionally induced symptom tends to cause organic change if persisted in long enough

It has been acknowledged by many reputable medical professionals that more than seventy percent of human ailments are functional rather than organic. This means that the function of an organ or other part of the body has been disturbed by the reaction of the nervous system to negative ideas held in the subconscious mind. We do not mean to imply that every person who complains of an ailment is emotionally ill or neurotic. There are diseases caused by germs, parasites, virus and other things attacking the human body. However, we are a mind in a body and the two cannot be separated. Therefore, if you continue to fear ill health, constantly talk about your "nervous stomach" or "tension headaches", in time organic changes must occur.

Rule #7: When dealing with the subconscious mind and its functions, the greater the conscious effort, the less the subconscious response

This proves why "will power" doesn't really exist. If you have insomnia you've learned "the harder you try to go to sleep, the more wide awake you become." The rule is, "When dealing with the subconscious mind, TAKE IT EASY". This means you must work to develop a positive mental expectancy that your problem can be and will be solved. As your faith in your subconscious mind increases, you learn to "let it happen" rather than trying to "force it to happen".

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© 2005 Alice A. Amos, LMHC, CH
7000 W. Camino Real, Suite 210
Boca Raton, Florida 33433
561-347-7211

Last Edited: Monday, September 15, 2008