#73 Relaxation Hypnosis for Stress, Anxiety & Panic Attacks - SOUNDS - (Jason Newland) (14th January 2020)

Hello, welcome to jasonnewland.com. My name's Jason Newland and this is Relaxation Hypnosis for Stress, Anxiety and Panic Attacks. Please only listen when you can safely close your eyes. If you like what I do, leave a review.

Now, I don't know if you can hear it, but there's background sounds. It's very, very windy outside. So you might be able to hear that and the fridge has just come on in the kitchen.

So you may think, why am I mentioning this? Well, there's something about some people find background sounds, or maybe they use the word noise, to be stress-inducing. Let's say, traveling on a bus or standing in the supermarket queue, waiting to pay, or being at a wedding, or, you know, being in a public space, where maybe it's not just the people, the amount of people, but the amount of sound.

Possibly a bit of, it's too much, you know, it can become too much for some people.

And I class myself in that group of people that sometimes can be affected by that. It's a bit of a, or whatever the word is, you know, it's just overstimulation, possibly, of my eardrums. Now, I've mentioned in the past, you know, there's different things we can do.

One of the things I do is I wear headphones, the sound cancelling headphones. Which I think is really good, really helps. Helps me to yawn when I think about them.

But we're not always able to use headphones in all situations. For example, when I was working in a call centre, I just realised technically I was wearing headphones because I was talking to customers on the phone. But they weren't noise cancelling headphones.

When I was sitting in a canteen at work, I didn't have headphones on there. Waiting for a job interview or for some kind of interview situation, can't sort of wear headphones in that situation necessarily. At a wedding, can't wear headphones.

At a wedding or in a church. So there's lots of places and times where wearing headphones is not really possible or perhaps socially acceptable. So what else can we do? What other things can be done to reduce the stress levels or the anxiety levels in those situations? I mean there's ways we can prepare for it.

As far as rehearsing in our mind the events that are going to unfold and rehearse feeling relaxed during that process. So I used to do this when I was working in a club. And the first part of the club was very, quite intense, quite an intense couple of hours.

The rest of the night was a lot easier, but the first couple of hours was intense. Some, not always, but quite often. So on the train, I had about 20 minutes, maybe 15 minutes on the train.

I'd sit down, close my eyes and I'd rehearse the process of getting off the train, feeling relaxed, walking to work, feeling relaxed, walking, doing the job, the first couple of hours, feeling relaxed, doing the rest of the evening, feeling relaxed, and then going home in a taxi. Getting home safely, going to bed, feeling relaxed.

And then I'd reverse it all the way back through the whole process, but backwards, feeling relaxed all the way there, feeling relaxed all the way back to the club from my house, feeling relaxed from the end of the evening all the way to the beginning of the evening, feeling relaxed through those two hours at the beginning, feeling relaxed as I walk, you know, going back to the train station.

Basically, as the doors open, feeling relaxed as I move back into my seat that I'm actually sitting in, in that moment. Sometimes I'd do it a couple of times. Sometimes I'd just sit there with that feeling of comfort and confidence that's gained from that.

And then the train would get to where I was going, the doors would open, I'd get off. And the journey felt familiar anyway, because I was already making that journey regularly. But it took on a different feeling.

It took on a feeling of confidence in my ability to feel relaxed and to process correctly, you know, because there was times before I was learning to relax that I'd find I'd get overwhelmed by the onslaught of customers. I say onslaught, there's just a lot of people coming in kind of at the same time. And there was a lot to do, a lot to focus on.

And I used to find that my stress levels would get a bit high. So this is something that I did in order to relax those stress levels, to feel confident that I could do all that stuff without really too much effort, reminding myself that I'd done it many times before and everything was going to be okay. So it's almost like watching back, when I was sitting there, watching back a little movie of what's already happened.

So I've already got the script in front of me, I already know what to do. So when I do get off the train, I just get off. Almost like rehearsing a play in your mind.

And I felt confident. And it made the evening a lot easier. And I did indeed feel relaxed, felt calm.

So if you can find a way to rehearse before going into a situation that may be a little bit overwhelming, or maybe a lot overwhelming, and that might not just be because of the excessive sound. You know, it might be because of the people, it might be because of the situation. For example, a job interview is not a normal situation.

It's very different to sort of most other things, or going to a funeral, or going to a wedding. They're very specific types of things, which perhaps may require a bit of attention from you towards yourself, a bit of kindness, a bit of gentleness, a little bit of preparation beforehand, preparing to feel confident within yourself to feel relaxed, feel confident within yourself to get through that particular situation.

And I guess it's a different kind of confidence, as opposed to, I think sometimes, when I think of confidence, I almost think of cockiness or arrogance, in a sense of, I now feel I can do this, jumping up and down, and a bit kind of false, perhaps, or excitable.

But of course, confidence can be far from that. It can be a beautiful thing and really help you to accomplish your goals and to improve your life in so many different ways. And this type of confidence is quite specific, because it's about having confidence in your ability to feel relaxed, to keep those stress levels at a minimum, because you've done it before.

We've all managed to deal with difficult situations in a relaxed manner. Probably not all the time. I know I haven't.

But there have been times when we have maybe even surprised ourselves by how calm we were. So by rehearsing the event that's about to happen, it can be useful. This is going to be known as the windy recording.

It's probably got gale force winds outside. And that was another thing I was going to mention, is you can actually use the sounds around you to increase your comfort, to increase your relaxation. Especially with the wind, because it's nature.

Nature is beautiful. I wouldn't particularly want to be out in the wind right now. Luckily, I'm heavy enough that no amount of wind is going to make much difference to me.

I'll still be on the ground. But I'd rather listen to it than be in it. A bit like rain.

I like the sound of rain. I don't want to be in the rain, really. Although one day, in the future, I'd like to have a private garden.

No neighbours or anything like that. And in the summer, when it really, really rains hard, I just want to run around, lay down, naked in the garden, have all the rain just hit me. It's just very beautiful.

Almost like a waterfall, you know. Or like a natural shower, instead of being in a bathroom. And that's got nothing to do with the recording.

I just want to share that with you. Just remembered, just had this little fantasy of, because that would be so relaxing. Because you know, sometimes you're only getting under a shower.

Especially if it's a high pressure shower. And when it hits your scalp, you know, the top of your head and the scalp, it just is, to me, it's a feeling like no other. It just stimulates, relaxes at the same time, all the different parts of your body.

It's just, even just thinking about it, I get a little bit tingly on my scalp. Or it might be nits, no. No, no, it's definitely the thinking about it, getting tingly.

So you've got sounds around you. Unless you, even if you're at the top of a mountain, you're still going to hear birds farting. So you know, you're still going to have some kind of sound.

You still have the wind, the rain, the weather. So if you're on a bus, you're going to have people talking. If you're in the church, you're going to have people perhaps singing.

Or you can sometimes just hear someone breathe, there's a lot of people breathing, and it's good that they are breathing. You know, it's better to be on a bus, sitting next to someone who's breathing heavily than someone who's not breathing at all. You know, you definitely get to where you're going a lot quicker.

Because you know, if I have to stop that bus and get an ambulance, you're never going to get to where you're going. So sometimes sounds that are annoying, perhaps don't need to be annoying. That shrill that maybe you hear if you're on a bus and school kids are getting on a bus and they're high pitched, almost, you kind of have to check your ears to see they're bleeding.

That sound, it can be uncomfortable, but it is reality, isn't it? That's just what's happening. I have to expect the window to blow in in a minute. But I can sit here, I can listen to the wind and almost breathe it in.

And let it relax my body and my mind. Because when you focus on just one thing, the less things you focus on, the more relaxed you'll get. So if you're in a public place, and there's lots of sounds, or if you're on a bus, and there's lots of people talking, maybe just focus on one person.

Just focus on their voice. Perhaps don't take any notice of what they're saying. Just focus in on the sound of the voice, like you are with me.

Maybe they've got a light voice, maybe it's gravelly, maybe it's, they've got an accent that you recognize or don't recognize. You can close your eyes and just notice the sound. But when you've got your eyes closed in that situation, the sounds can take on a different meaning.

I mean, first of all, I would change the word noise to sound, because that eliminates the emotion. When someone says, no one's ever said, it's so noisy. I don't say it's so soundy.

It's so noisy, which is never a compliment. Can you hear that sound? Or can you hear that noise? Can you hear that noise? It doesn't sound positive. Can you hear that sound? It doesn't sound negative.

So when you're actually focusing on that one person, maybe you can spread it out and notice that the sounds on the bus, or the sounds on the train, or the plane, or in the church, or, you know, maybe at the wedding, maybe you're sitting there, you can close your eyes for a couple of minutes, maybe. Maybe you don't have to close your eyes. You can just defocus your eyes a bit.

Focusing on the sounds and noticing, it's very much like the weather. Very much like the wind. There's little peaks, little changes.

So if you're on a bus, you hear someone maybe close to you talking, and then you hear a laugh at the back of the bus. Maybe you hear someone coughing at the top of the bus on the upper deck. Maybe you hear a small child crying near the front of the bus.

There's different sounds coming from different spatial parts of the bus. And when you do that, when you focus like that, it changes the way you're feeling, so that it is no longer an emotional thing. Because once the emotion is taken out, the stress levels reduce.

Once the emotion is excluded, anxiety is also excluded. In the same way as someone might have been given a pink money box, shaped like a pig, they were given it by someone that they cared about in their family. Maybe their grandmother.

The grandmother was giving it to them, to her, by her grandmother. And it's passed through the years. It's cracked.

It's old. It doesn't hold any money anymore, but it's just, it's got so much emotion connected to it. But that person gives me that pig.

That pig, cracked, dirty, old money box that doesn't hold money anymore. It's just, that's all it is. Has no emotion connected.

It means nothing to me. Because perhaps I've just bought it. Well, why would I buy it? But I've seen it in a jumble sale or a flea store or something, or I've just found it.

It has no meaning to me at all. That's the difference between when the emotion goes out. That's what it's meant by that.

When you're just being there, hearing what's going on, but not adding that internal dialogue of, this is annoying. This is upsetting me. This is too much.

This is overwhelming. There, there, no, no. And all the other things that maybe we say to ourselves that may not be useful.

Think of all those people like that pink, that old pink pig-shaped money box that's old and cracked as far as the sound that they're making. It's irrelevant to you. Unimportant.

They're just living their lives. What they're saying may be important to them. But not to you.

Because you're just traveling to your destination. And when you don't, you don't have to worry about stuff like that. You feel more relaxed.

Just naturally feel calmer. Not just in your mind, but in your body and just in your demeanor, just generally relaxed. And when I say relaxed, I don't mean just all floppy on the floor, like butter kind of just blissed out and kind of just not wanting to move because it feels so pleasurable.

That is one way to be relaxed. But this is a different kind of relaxation, just a chilled-out calmness where you can function and do things. You still feel calm, still feel healthy physically and emotionally.

So those are just a few ideas or a couple of ideas that I had today. So if you've got something coming up, maybe rehearse feeling relaxed at that event, that situation. And then when you are there, instead of getting frustrated by the sounds, instead of calling it noise, call it sounds.

Instead of expecting a negative physical reaction, maybe just accept that the sounds are there. And just start to notice the overall sense of those sounds, the little peaks, the little changes in volume and how the sound moves maybe from the left side of the room. Then maybe you can hear the right side of the room.

If you're in a big hall, a big hall, maybe you can hear things outside the window. Perhaps if you're in a bus, you can hear the weather, the rain hitting the sides of the windows outside. Perhaps you can hear the engine of the bus.

Or if you're at work, sitting in an office, at a computer, maybe you can notice the sound of the keyboard. Maybe you can notice the sound of the water machine, you know, as people are getting some water or the coffee machine as people are getting coffee. Perhaps you can hear the sound of the printer.

Perhaps you can hear the sound of the weather outside. The sound of the air conditioning. Just a few sounds that are just there that you can maybe become aware of.

And it's something about that breadth of awareness that relaxes you as well, as well as focus as well. When you focus on just one thing, that also can be relaxing. You see, when I was younger, the wind would have kept me awake.

Now, I find the wind to just be beautiful. Such a wonderful sound. It's almost like I've... In some ways, you could serve added emotion or change the emotion towards the sounds of the weather to actually enjoy them, to appreciate them.

After all, it's just a feeling. It's just a sound that just sounds. So I'm going to leave you with those couple of ideas, and I'll speak to you next time.

Remember to be kind to yourself because you deserve to be happy. You deserve to feel relaxed and calm and confident. Lots of love.

Bye.