What is an irrational fear or phobia?
A phobia is an irrational fear, literally a fear without good reason, or a fear of something that may not happen. People with phobias often experience unwanted responses to animals, objects, insects, actions or places.
This physical response is known as a stress response; people often describe their reaction to something as being “paralysed with fear” or “having butterflies in my stomac”, “just wanting to run away” from whatever is triggering the response.
People with phobias often know their response is irrational, which makes it harder to accept.
Phobias are far more common than many people realise. It is estimated that more than 11% of the population have some kind of irrational fear.
Generally people manage their phobia on a day-to-day basis and only seek help from a hypnotherapist when it prevents them doing something they want to do, or when they know a situation will force them to face it. People are also aware of the possibility of unconsciously passing on their phobias to their children, who learn from their behaviour.
People often say “you’re my last resort” or “my final hope”. The most common phobias are:
- Fear of flying
- Public speaking
- Claustrophobia
- Fear of sickness (often linked to social phobias)
- Fear of insects
- Fear of heights
- Fear of needles
- Fear dentists
- Fear of water
How do people get phobias?
An irrational fear of something is a learned behaviour, sometimes from a parent or a respected friend or relative. It is part of the body’s natural defence system: often phobias are exaggerated fears of evolutionary memories; imprints on our brains that help protect us through caution, making us innately awareness of something that could harm us.
For example, we know there are poisonous spiders in the world that can hurt us and even kill us, so we have an awareness of that on a primal level. However, a house spider in the UK is completely harmless. A person with a phobia is unable to make this differentiation.
As a small child we learn about fears from our parents, as they teach us (consciously and unconsciously) how to live and relate to the world around us. If you see your parent being frightened of a spider, your instinctive response and the message hardwired to your brain is that this is a threat and can harm you too.
Over time, when you see a spider that message is reinforced, so it is exposure to that fear which compounds it and makes it worse.
How do you treat phobias?
Using hypnosis and Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) this can be done rapidly as the unconscious is able to process information more effectively without the interference of the critical mind. Often phobias can be treated in just one session. There is, however, no guarantee as change depends on the individual’s willingness to embrace it. Generally though, everyone will make positive changes from the first session, any other sessions will strengthen this new way of thinking.
What will a session be like?
I will evaluate the level of your phobia and then use a combination of techniques to help you resolve it, gradually building up your confidence and your ability to stay calm when you are confronted with your phobia. I want to get to the point where, you no longer think about the issue and just go about your daily life as normal.