With all our medical advances, why is it that the incidence of depression and anxiety is skyrocketing. The World Health Organisation says that depression is the most disabling disease in the Western World today, yet all mental healthcare specialists seem to talk about is “evidence based” treatments such as counselling and anti depressants. Whilst these strategies have been shown to be helpful for some people, if this was really cutting edge advice, why aren’t we seeing the incidence of depression declining or at the very least plateauing. This in no way seeks to imply that medication and psychological counselling don’t have their place in treating depression, just that we are not exploring all the variables

Having interviewed thousands of people who have battled with depression, I am convinced that there are some serious issues with the “evidence based” approach to treating depression. These can be summarised as follows:

1. The “evidence” is where the money is

Unfortunately clinical trials are very expensive to run so private funding will only be directed towards those areas where “investors” can see a return on investment. In the world of depression treatments, this means that the vast majority of funds are directed towards medication and psychological counselling interventions. This means that important lifestyle strategies such as exercise, emotional support,nutrition, relaxation, and fulfilling work are relatively ignored. Ironically these less discussed strategies can be much less costly to implement.

1. When you’re holding a hammer everything looks like a nail

The vast majority of depression treatment studies are undertaken by doctors or psychologists. Whilst there is nothing wrong with this per se, most of these studies are evaluating areas where they have expertise (which makes sense). This means that the comparisons are often looking in isolation at one drug verses another (or a placebo) or one psychological intervention verses another. Quite often meaningful advancements in areas can come from someone outside the established “paradigms”. I love the story of the little boy who came across rescue workers who had been struggling for 3 hours with sophisticated hydraulic equipment trying to dislodge a truck which had been tightly wedged under an overhead bridge.  After being encouraged to leave the site he quietly said “Why don’t you let down the tyres “.

1. We are not just DNA

As human beings our bodies and minds are intricately linked. Depression treatments that focus purely on a “biological illness” are seriously limited. Much of the despair that exists in the western world today can be linked to loneliness, family breakdowns, excessive and unfulfilling work, and financial crises. Saying that depression is caused by low levels of serotonin is like saying teen pregnancies are caused by a sperm fertilising an egg ” yes, but…. Depression treatments that fail to reconnect us with our passions and purpose are ultimately going to be short lived solutions.

What are the right depression treatments

To find out what works best in managing or overcoming depression, we must ask the people who are living with depression what works best for them. In 2007 I asked just that, and their answers were (in order) exercise, support of family and friends, psychological counselling, fulfilling work, relaxation/meditation, nutrition and medication.

Coincidentally, the Black Dog Institute (BDI) “one of the pre-eminent mood disorder units in the world - also undertook a study directly asking those with depression what helped them most. Although there were some differences in the studies, lifestyle strategies were also shown to be extremely important. One of the authors of the published study, Professor Gordon Parker, who has been practicing psychiatry for over 30 years, has now started advising General Practitioners and their patients to exercise regularly to aid recovery.

If Professor Parker, who has published over 600 clinical papers and book chapters regarding mood disorders, can learn something from these results, perhaps we all can.

With all our medical advances, why is it that the incidence of depression and anxiety is skyrocketing. The World Health Organisation says that depression is the most disabling disease in the Western World today, yet all mental healthcare specialists seem to talk about is “evidence based” treatments such as counselling and anti depressants. Whilst these strategies have been shown to be helpful for some people, if this was really cutting edge advice, why aren’t we seeing the incidence of depression declining or at the very least plateauing. This in no way seeks to imply that medication and psychological counselling don’t have their place in treating depression, just that we are not exploring all the variables

Having interviewed thousands of people who have battled with depression, I am convinced that there are some serious issues with the “evidence based” approach to treating depression. These can be summarised as follows:

1. The “evidence” is where the money is

Unfortunately clinical trials are very expensive to run so private funding will only be directed towards those areas where “investors” can see a return on investment. In the world of depression treatments, this means that the vast majority of funds are directed towards medication and psychological counselling interventions. This means that important lifestyle strategies such as exercise, emotional support,nutrition, relaxation, and fulfilling work are relatively ignored. Ironically these less discussed strategies can be much less costly to implement.

1. When you’re holding a hammer everything looks like a nail

The vast majority of depression treatment studies are undertaken by doctors or psychologists. Whilst there is nothing wrong with this per se, most of these studies are evaluating areas where they have expertise (which makes sense). This means that the comparisons are often looking in isolation at one drug verses another (or a placebo) or one psychological intervention verses another. Quite often meaningful advancements in areas can come from someone outside the established “paradigms”. I love the story of the little boy who came across rescue workers who had been struggling for 3 hours with sophisticated hydraulic equipment trying to dislodge a truck which had been tightly wedged under an overhead bridge.  After being encouraged to leave the site he quietly said “Why don’t you let down the tyres “.

1. We are not just DNA

As human beings our bodies and minds are intricately linked. Depression treatments that focus purely on a “biological illness” are seriously limited. Much of the despair that exists in the western world today can be linked to loneliness, family breakdowns, excessive and unfulfilling work, and financial crises. Saying that depression is caused by low levels of serotonin is like saying teen pregnancies are caused by a sperm fertilising an egg ” yes, but…. Depression treatments that fail to reconnect us with our passions and purpose are ultimately going to be short lived solutions.

What are the right depression treatments

To find out what works best in managing or overcoming depression, we must ask the people who are living with depression what works best for them. In 2007 I asked just that, and their answers were (in order) exercise, support of family and friends, psychological counselling, fulfilling work, relaxation/meditation, nutrition and medication.

Coincidentally, the Black Dog Institute (BDI) “one of the pre-eminent mood disorder units in the world - also undertook a study directly asking those with depression what helped them most. Although there were some differences in the studies, lifestyle strategies were also shown to be extremely important. One of the authors of the published study, Professor Gordon Parker, who has been practicing psychiatry for over 30 years, has now started advising General Practitioners and their patients to exercise regularly to aid recovery.

If Professor Parker, who has published over 600 clinical papers and book chapters regarding mood disorders, can learn something from these results, perhaps we all can.

Anxiety problems can overwhelm us and leave us feeling out of control. They feel as though we are driven to act like this, strengthen with every ‘attack’ and lead to constant searching for reasons and answers. Involving self-doubt, insecurity and fear, anxiety problems can appear too powerful to deal with.
However, there is a way to understand these problems that takes away much of this power - to know what they really are, how they work and why we get them. And with this insight it is possible to cure anxiety problems naturally ourselves, without deep therapy or medication; to stop them completely and permanently at their very core.

We cannot fight the unknown …

The key to curing anxiety problems lies in understanding how they work. Like everything in life, when we know how and why something works we know how to master it. To try and overcome these problems without this understanding is exceptionally difficult for whatever we may try, as soon as any symptoms occur, we think that it’s not working, that it cannot be the answer and continue the never-ending search for the ‘real answer’.

For Example:
Nervousness and anxiety are profoundly helped by relaxation, and learning to be calm. There is no doubt about this - a relaxed body (and mind) cannot be tense and nervous for they are physiological opposites. Relaxation really is calming - it is impossible to be relaxed and anxious at the same time. But many of us just cannot do this, for at the back of our mind lies the self-doubt; the ‘what is wrong with me’ fears that defeat all the efforts we make.

A specific type of self-doubt lies at the heart of all anxiety problems, ranging from nervousness and worrying to anxiety disorders and depression. When we truly understand this self-doubt and how we get it, we can remove excessive anxiety (and all the problems it causes) from our lives.

The answer to every single anxiety-related problem there is, lies in moving through this self-doubt into self-confidence. And to be able to do this, we have to know what is happening and why.

Let’s look more closely at anxiety problems:

Anxiety is characterized by physical symptoms such as faster heartbeat, fast breathing, being jittery, on edge, trembling etc.and symptoms of thinking including excessive worrying, planning and apprehension.
It is a protection mechanism that has evolved over millions of years; serving to warn us that we are about to be hurt and to prepare us for action. And it does this in 2 main ways:-

1. Our thoughts: We think about potential situations before we get to them - the greatest form of protection is not to get into the situation in the first place. This is something seen in many anxiety-related problems, where we will often avoid bsituations that make us feel afraid.

2. Our Body: Prepares us for action: the fight-or-flight response. We are charged with energy ready to fight or flee. This response is responsible for all the physical symptoms of anxiety that we experience.

All anxiety problems stem from these two actions:
The first one relates to problems involving excessive and obsessive thinking, planning and worrying - it forms the basis of anxiety disorders such as: OCD, GAD and depression.
The second one relates to the physical nervousness (being jittery/jumpy/on-edge) we feel, the preparation for action, and is the basis for social phobias (indeed all phobias) and panic disorder.

Everybody has anxiety… but for some of us, it can come to be with us more intensely, occur more easily and more often; it can become more powerful and give rise to problems involving such things as persistent worrying and apprehension, obsessive thoughts and compulsive behaviour, phobias, panic and depression.

Given a certain series of events, conditions and circumstances every single person on the planet can become permanently apprehensive, constantly anxious to some degree, for these problems reflect the way we all work as human beings.
These situations usually involve stress, danger and self-doubt … self-doubt about our ability to cope and our safety.

Self-doubt … the more we have, the greater our anxiety (problem).

When we look closely at anxiety-related problems, we see that they are not:-

* Diseases
* Mental illness
* Due to chemical imbalance
* Caused by our genes

Indeed, these problems are not even ‘disorders’ (our mind and body are totally ordered in what they are trying to do) and they most certainly aren’t irrational - they exist for the most rational reason there will ever be.

Anxiety and panic are there to protect us. If this protection doesn’t work - extreme anxiety and nervousness, chronic worrying, fears and phobias, obsessions and compulsions or severe depression and more can develop.
All these problems reflect our inner-self’s attempts to protect us - to protect us because of how we feel about ourselves … once we understand this, there is a real cure.

 

How Anxiety Hypnotherapy works and how YOU can use it to improve your life:

Why do people get stressed? By asking questions! Yes, as simple as this may sound, this is one of the key reasons that we get stressed. We ask ourselves what we are doing with our life, whether our current partner is the best for us and ultimately, what is the meaning of life. So is it as easy as stopping asking questions? This will not work either, if you stop asking questions then you risk becoming one of those people that simply cruises through life without considering why they are here, what they are doing and why they exist. While these sorts of people will not often get stressed, they will also miss out on enjoying the conversations that come about as a result of posing these questions to others. One of the great motivational speakers of our time, Anthony Robbins said this several years ago: “Think of your mind, your emotions, and your spirit as the ultimate garden. The way to ensure a bountiful, nourishing harvest is to plant seeds like love, courage, and appreciation instead of seeds like disappointment, anger, and fear.” This quote illustrates how important it is to try and control the mind to achieve personal happiness.

Stress is the most dangerous drug in a human’s life. Your feelings determine your behavior. However, behavior does not equal the person. Behaviour is only a symptom of your environment and the way you live your life. However if you do not seek help, other symptoms like panic attacks, physical illness and even depression can be created. Anxiety hypnotherapy in combination with NLP and the Alpha technique is a very effective “medicine” to control the stress in such a way that you never have to go through the additional symptoms mentioned above. Stop the negativity in your life! Many people are skeptical of anxiety hypnotherapy but this is usually the case because they are scared about trying something different. But it makes sense to try something different because you have nothing to lose and everything to gain. Using anxiety hypnotherapy on a regular basis has the potential to improve your life more than you ever dreamed. You will find it easier to make friends, you will look forward to waking up in the morning and you may never get stressed again. If you would like to address an anxiety disorder you should consult a hypnotherapist who is qualified in anxiety hypnosis. Once you begin treatment you will never look back!

Choosing a hypnotherapist to deal with your anxiety disorder:

As soon as you decide that anxiety hypnotherapy is an option for you, you can be sure that you have made a good choice. It does take a bit of courage to begin treatment but after a few sessions with a hypnotherapist, the benefits will be plain to see. The most important decision you will make once you decide to undergo anxiety hypnosis is choosing a hypnotherapist. There are many ways you can choose a hypnotherapist but perhaps the easiest and most reliable is by talking to a friend who has previously seen a hypnotherapist. This way you can be sure that you are dealing with a quality organization that has the skills to transform your life from one of stress and negativity to a life where positive thinking is second nature and you relish every day. The other method of choosing a hypnotherapist is by using an online search such as Google or Yahoo. These search engines will produce a large number of results making it easy to see which practitioners you prefer. Some lists will also include prices and availability. However the most useful feature of an online search is to find reviews of individual hypnotherapists. By reading the opinion of someone else you can gain a valuable insight into what is being offered to you and how other people have rated the services provided.

Why you should not view general anxiety as an anxiety disorder:

Everyone gets anxious about things. Some people worry about money, some people worry about the future and some people worry about where they are going to get their next meal! But are any of these concerns disorders or simply part of daily life. There is a big difference from an anxiety disorder and simply general anxiety. In most cases, an anxiety disorder will arise as a result of prolonged worries which don’t go away. Every day you will wake up without knowing how to cope and you might turn to external substances such as alcohol and drugs in order to cope. So you should not worry about worrying. Worrying is normal and should in some cases be encouraged. It promotes a questioning mind which is crucial to survive in this world. Stop worrying about the little things and start asking yourself the following questions. Why am I here? What should I be doing? How does it all end? Anxiety hypnosis is a valuable tool designed to help you view life in perspective and ensure you remain in control of your emotions on a daily basis. Anxiety hypnotherapy is recommended for anyone who worries without reason and it has the potential to improve your life more than you ever dreamed.