The Importance of Coping Skills – Hypnotherapy in Ely and Newmarket

When someone comes to see me for help with something like anxiety, stress, panic attacks, overthinking or something else, one of the things I want to know is how they currently attempt to handle, deal and cope with their unwanted thoughts and feelings. I want to know what strategies they have put in place, deliberately or without realising, that may be helping or hindering them feeling better.

Often clients have been to see other therapists along the way, whether for similar issues or something different.  I will always ask about what strategies, skills and techniques they were given to do outside of their sessions by that therapist. I want to explore what they may have tried before and what has, or hasn’t, worked well for them. There’s little benefit in me suggesting they do more of the same if they haven’t found that it helped at all. Yet along with building upon what works, sometimes adjustments and slight changes in other strategies can make them more effective and easier to apply to interrupt things like anxious thoughts.

However, more often than not their former therapist didn’t give them any techniques for outside the sessions to help them in managing their own thoughts and feelings. To be honest, this astounds me because the importance of having effective, workable coping skills in your life cannot be underestimated.

Building Effective Strategies

If you are struggling with anxiety, panic, worry or stress then you may try just about anything to try and alleviate some of those uncomfortable feelings and intrusive thoughts. Some of the things you might do to feel a bit better for a brief time can be healthy, such as going for a walk or a jog, eating healthily and using hypnosis or meditation.

Sometimes your coping strategies may be less helpful but they give you that brief respite that you are so desperately craving. You may drink caffeine to try and help you cope through the day, consistently snack to get that short moment of comfort before you feel bad again, or you may have got into the habit of drinking alcohol in the evening to try and slow your brain down enough so that you can get at least some sleep. All of these things have a knock on impact that can cause more challenges over time.

I see it as a key part of my job as a hypnotherapist to help you to develop healthy and effective ways to manage your own thoughts and feelings. Not only does this mean you get more benefit from your sessions, you can also start to feel a lot better more quickly. Especially at the outset of your sessions, when those habitual thoughts and feelings will be there until we sort them, you want to have methods that work for you to calm your emotions and your mind. As far as I’m concerned, it’s a therapeutic necessity that you have the capability to alleviate unwanted and uncomfortable thoughts and feelings, both during your hypnotherapy and afterwards.

Even after you achieve positive results from your sessions, life will continue for you. As for all of us, there will be challenges and events that you will need to navigate. Having effective coping strategies means you don’t have to suffer the next time something comes along because you will be able to handle, deal and cope with it better using the things you have learnt and applied (either proactively or reactively). You won’t need to go back to struggling with that old anxiety and worry that you used to have, or once again adopt unhealthy strategies. In addition, being in control over your own thoughts, feelings, actions and reactions means you are less likely to need to visit a therapist to help you to sort things.

Having coping skills that work for you, and that you can easily apply, is a vital element of successful therapy. Whether it’s calming feelings, interrupting thoughts, thinking differently and more clearly, being healthier or any other number of other strategies that I share with clients, these things put you more and more in control of you own thoughts, feelings and actions. They lead to greater success from your therapy and they can aid and assist you long into the future as you make use of them in your life.

Applying these methods and strategies becomes an investment in how you feel now and how you manage into the future. I can give you more coping strategies than you could ever use so it’s always about finding what works for you when you need it. Some things you may use all the time and others will be there for when you need them. You learn to direct your own thoughts and feelings rather than being thrown from one challenge in life to the next. And being in control by using your coping skills means you get to feel better and better, not only through your hypnotherapy, but also way beyond it.

To your health and happiness, 

Dan Regan

Award Winning Hypnotherapist in Ely & Newmarket

Struggling with anxiety, stress, worry and fear and need some help? Find out how I can help with a Complimentary Hypnotherapy Strategy Session. Learn more here: Appointments

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