Changes in behaviour can add up to self-help or personal development, for example mixing with people who have a positive disposition can be good for your health. It can be soul destroying associating with people who always have a reason why they should not change their own destructive behaviour. Taking up a physical sport or hobby, walking, cycling, etc as well as improving your health, gives you a natural high as endorphins (the bodies feel-good chemicals) enter your bloodstream when you are under physical duress (check with your doctor before taking up an exercise programme). The above methods, and a thousand others, can be considered as effective self-care. Improvements in communication and social interaction cannot fail to improve the lot of a neurotic, or anyone else. Logic dictates that if you are trying to dispose of a troublesome thought (which leads to troublesome behaviour) it is easier to achieve if you are busy doing something else. A certain ‘pushing out of boundries’ is helpful for clients with irrational fears. If you fear leaving your home (agoraphobia), then you may practice walking to the front door. Once walking to the front door does not trouble you, maybe you could walk to the end of the path, then the end of the street etc. Eventually, leaving your home will no longer hold any fear for you. This is known as cognitive behaviour therapy, and the miniscule success of each achievement makes the client feel good, and spurs them on to improve on their previous success. This can be perceived as an upward spiral of recovery where ‘bite-sized chunks’ of exceeding usual comfort zones can lead to full recovery. Excessive giving to a partner, family member or friend eventually leads to the provider feeling resentful. Assertiveness (without anger) often results in relationships recovering their former strengths or the flight of the unreasonable. Self-Hypnosis Clients learn self-hypnosis to benefit from developing a new conditioned response (or habit) to a triggered stress situation. The cause of anxiety or any other neurotic behaviour is a thinking distortion that produces an effect that is detrimental to the emotional, mental or physical wellbeing of an individual. A conditioned response results when someone visualises something repeatedly in his or her mind, until the thought is there without consciously having to think about it. (Steve Norton, 'The Principles of Life' see links) This problem is analogous to a whirlpool of negativity - the more anxious a person is the more negatively they think ad infinitum. Self-hypnosis can effectively break this cycle of negativity by firstly distracting the client from the faulty thought process. This distraction brings the client to a realisation that they have some control over their anxiety. If a client can successfully control their anxiety some of the time repeatedly, then it becomes a conditioned response, and the anxiety vanishes as the control becomes a habit. (Steve Norton, 'The Principles of Life' see links) Clients learn a self-hypnosis process on their first session, and I encourage them to affirm suggestions relating to their presenting issue. If a client were having hypnotherapy for weight control, I would encourage them to affirm suggestions like:- I enjoy drinking a glass of water before each meal. I enjoy eating healthier foods with less calories, fat, and sugar than before. I feel invigorated and it puts me in a good mood when I take more exercise - even if it is going for a walk or a jog etc. If attention drifts away during self-hypnosis, just bring it gently back concentrating on the chosen visualization using imagination, and physically feel the body relax. There is no resistance to the suggestions communicated in the hypnotic state providing the client is receptive and delivery is competent. This is true for a therapist delivering hypnotherapy, or the client practicing self-hypnosis.

Albert Schweitzer ‘Each person carries his own doctor inside them. They come to us not knowing that. We are at our best when we give the doctor who resides within each patient a chance to go to work.’ John Wooden ‘Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are.’ Alexander Pope ‘A man should never be ashamed to own that he has been in the wrong, which is but saying…that he is wiser today than he was yesterday.’ Voltaire ‘Man is free at the moment he wishes to be.’ Benjamin Mays ‘Failure is not reaching your goal, but having no goal to reach.’ Marcus Aurelius ‘Waste no more time talking about great souls and how they should be. Become one yourself.’ Virgil ‘Fortune favours the brave.’ Norman Vincent Peal ‘Become a possibilitarian. No matter how dark things seem to be or actually are, raise your sights and see possibilities…...always see them, for they’re always there.’ Bernard Meltzer ‘The real measure of your wealth is how much you’d be worth if you lost all your money.’ Socrates ‘The only good is knowledge and the only evil is ignorance.’