I used to write this section in our monthly Inspired Minds newsletter, but we figured it would be easier to read online, and all our blog subscribers would enjoy reading it too. At least I hope you do  Read January’s Inspired Minds newsletter here.

Downloads Unwrapped – January 2010

So many people I have met or worked with (and I have to include myself in this, because there was a time when it was me, too) fear speaking up in groups. And our new download speaking in groups focuses in on this very fear and sets out to replace it with confidence and ease.

Speaking in groups can be fun. Really.

Fearful speakers may be fine one to one, but as soon as there’s a ‘meeting’ or a ‘social event’, they feel as if they just can’t give their opinion, or speak up or out. They may actively dread the ‘spotlight’ being turned on them with the terrifying question: “So what do you think?”

Now the reasons for this can be various, and the reasons are not as important as finding the solution (unless understanding the reasons forms part of the solution). Some people have just never learned to speak to more than a couple of people at once, but others have had bad experiences, perhaps when they tried to speak up in the past. This could be a vestige from school days or early family life – if someone, for example, was always shouted down, or ignored, they may have come to ‘feel invisible’ in groups.

Whatever the root of the fear, this session neutralizes negative past experiences and makes good any missing learning so that anyone can feel at ease in a group situation and speak out whenever they need or want.

Being clear about your boundaries is good for you and others

Becoming confident speaking out in groups involves dealing with others, which links to another new session setting boundaries.

Clearly letting other people know what you will do and what you won’t do protects you from:

• feeling unnecessarily resentful
• over-stretching and exhausting yourself
• making promises you can’t keep

Rather than just automatically saying yes (or even no) to people, this session encourages you to stop and really consider your options. It also encourages you to set boundaries with yourself. For example, I might (and I do) set a boundary around my leisure time with an: “Okay, I’ll watch TV for an hour, then I’m going to do some work.” We all need boundaries and demarcations in our lives, interpersonally and when relating to ourselves, and this session will help set up and manage those boundaries.

Hypnosis induction teaches you how to induce hypnosis

Talking of boundaries, sometimes it’s effective to blur them – especially when we are being creative and flexible. When using hypnosis (and being hypnotized) we don’t always need to make a great song and dance about the fact that ‘now I am doing an induction’. We can be hypnotizing someone while just describing the process of hypnosis. This is a more subtle and flexible approach to trance work and forms the basis of the brand new All about hypnosis induction, which very economically explains hypnotic induction to you while actually being a hypnotic induction for you – and at the same time teaching you how to use this later to hypnotize others. We love it when a single tool has multi-functions…

Podcast: Download (2.0MB)

Full hypnosis download Be a better friend

Friendship is so important. One long term study found that people with a strong network of good friends enjoy much greater physical and mental health and were even 22% less likely to die! (1)

But aside from the health benefits, just having friends increases our opportunities in all kinds of ways. Friends can give us feedback on our ideas, humor and careers. Good friends are a buffer when times are tough and a real garnish to life’s pleasures.

But the best way to have a good friend is to be a good friend. It’s so easy to let friendships slide, to forget or neglect to take active steps to regularly see or speak to your friends.

Looking after your friendships may be as important to your health (and of course those of your friends) as regular exercise and eating healthily, so the new hypnosisdownloads.com ‘be a better friend’ session encourages an increased appreciation of friendship and looks at how we can all be better friends.

Mark

Note

(1) The study, published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, followed 1500 people over the age of seventy for a decade, and found that people who had a strong network of friends were twenty-two percent less likely to die. The study separated out any influence of lifestyle habits, family support, wealth and social status from this conclusion. So aside from the pleasure and satisfaction that having good, solid friendships can bring, if you take seeps keep your social life healthy, you are likely to live longer and be physically healthier yourself.

Podcast: Download (2.1MB)

Full hypnosis download Setting boundaries

Being able to comfortably say no to people, being able to set limits in your own mind as to how much you’ll work, how much TV you’ll watch and feeling empowered to respect your own needs for rest, privacy and even dignity is what the new ‘setting boundaries’ hypnosisdownloads.com session is all about.

It’s great to be generous with your time and efforts, and it’s also great to be able to tolerate other people’s bad behavior sometimes but its also vital to be ‘master of the option’ because, of course, sometimes it doesn’t actually help others to always assume it’s okay to take advantage of you, or be disrespectful. And it certainly doesn’t help you.

It’s a bit like overeating – where you get caught up in the pleasure of the moment, and forget all about the later consequences. Except in this case you get caught up in making the moment ‘pleasant’ by ‘being pleasant’, and forget about the long term cost in strain and stress and resentment.

The new ‘setting boundaries’ session should help people less resentful and boost their self-respect – as well as gaining increased respect from others. It could save lots of time too.

All the best

Mark