It is a known fact that public speaking or performing in front of an audience is the top thing that most people fear. Last month there was a newspaper article about Adele who is said to have been suffering sleepless nights and anxiety with the pressure of her upcoming engagement singing the Bond theme Skyfall at the Academy Awards. Apparently on the advice of a friend she has been using the services of a hypnotherapist to help calm her nerves before and during the big night with great success.
Although it is more and more in the news when celebrities turn to hypnosis for things like losing weight or quitting smoking, it is not often that we hear of them using hypnotherapy to help with performance. However there are a few examples.
- Tiger Woods uses hypnosis to help his golf game
- Former Spice Girl Melanie Brown used hypnosis when she was preparing for a big show in Las Vegas
- Several athletes during the last Olympic Games turned to hypnosis to help with performance anxiety and nerves
Most of us will not be in a situation where we have to perform at this level but things like making a presentation at work, giving a speech at a wedding or 21st or competing at a sporting event are sometimes enough to have your pulse racing and in some cases extreme anxiety. Hypnotherapy is a great tool to help you to cope with the increased pressure associated with these high stress roles.
One of the advantages of using hypnosis to help lower performance stress is that in a relaxed state we can run you through your own personal performance scenarios as many times as you like in a comfortable and relaxed state, so you begin to experience regaining control in what was a previously stressful situation. From there you can also start to build up (consciously and subconsciously) the performance that you really would like to give – whether it is in a Monday morning business meeting, a lead role in a local play, or sitting that final exam.
Of course we may consciously know that there is no reason to feel nervous but your conscious thoughts are often not enough to turn around out of control thoughts and feelings. There may also be past experiences and conditioning that may need to be resolved before we start to help you rebuild your confidence. In fact there are so many benefits to using hypnosis for performance stress that many business people use it for presentations, students for exam nerves, athletes to improve their times or game and musicians to help achieve the highest standards of performance.
It is also interesting that being in hypnosis is not just something that happens when we are relaxed and in a reclining chair. The tools and techniques that you learn in the clinic are easily applied whenever and wherever you need them in the real world, you just need to know how.
