In this solo diary video, hypnotherapist Caroline Cavanagh reflects on her week as she prepares to speak at a menopause‑focused event in London. She explains how she uses personal reflection to turn mistakes into learning, and shares concrete tools for handling performance anxiety. First, she reframes the physiological symptoms of anxiety (racing heart, sweaty palms) as adrenaline that sharpens perception. She then outlines a two‑step ice‑breaker: a genuine compliment followed by a brief admission of vulnerability, which she says reliably turns awkward pauses into empathetic connections. Shifting to the upcoming panel on menopause, Caroline introduces the concept of being “selfish” – an upside‑down energy pyramid where the self sits at the top, ensuring sufficient energy before attending to children, partner, work, and extended family. She describes her morning routine (dog walk, exercise, meditation) as a way to fully charge her “battery,” and explains how she allocates her limited energy across the pyramid’s tiers, warning that neglecting self‑care can lead to burnout and health crises. The video ends with a reminder that prioritising self‑care is not selfish but essential for managing anxiety, especially during menopause.
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Hi there, and welcome to the next edition of Diary of a Hypnotherapist, something that I've been doing now for a good couple of months actually, because I practice what I preach. And I ask a lot of my clients to reflect on their week so that you can build on the things that went well, and then change the things that didn't work as well. Because one of the big triggers of anxiety is failure, making mistakes, but we can learn from mistakes and then it turns a failure into a real positive and hopefully you won't make that failure again, won't make that mistake again. So, I am doing exactly the same and by recording these videos that may just help some other people as well, which is just a bonus. And as I reflect on my week, and this does look a little bit different, the reason being I'm about to head up to London because I'm speaking at an event tomorrow and had a little bit of time to kill because I got here early. So hence not perhaps being the normal presented self, shall we say. But yeah, my week this week, I actually haven't done that much hypnotherapy, to be honest. I have been focusing more on the speaking side of my business. And one of the things that I do is, as a self-employed person, the only person that's going to develop me is me. So I do go to events to learn, also to model other speakers, because that's a great way of learning, is watching someone and going, they did that really well, how can I build that into my talk? But pre the event, I faced a situation that some of you may relate to. And that is networking, walking into a room where you know nobody and going up to complete strangers and trying to engage in conversation. And even with my mature years, shall we say, I still find this quite challenging. I'm a natural introvert, so going into that environment is outside of my comfort zone, and therefore I will get a little bit anxious. So I use one of my tools and recognise that this anxiety is going to help me perform better. The racing heart, the sweaty palms are all putting adrenaline into my system that is allowing me to be more perspec— more perceptive, more aware, more in the moment, which are all really important criteria, especially if you're talking to strangers because they pick up on that. And I also deployed 2 tips that I've learned over the years. Firstly, when you open that conversation, and you might be— there was one scenario where there were 2 women talking together and I kind of had a bit of an in. I just complimented them both on something. One of them, I think it was her earrings, the other one her dress. They were women, which makes that a little bit easier, but everyone likes a compliment, and naturally what happens is people then compliment you back, so it's broken the ice, but then you need to have something to follow up with, otherwise you get that really awkward pregnant pause. And the tip that works for me is I allow myself to then be vulnerable. I will say, do you know, I find these scenarios really quite challenging, walking into a room where I don't know anyone and trying to make a conversation. And when I've deployed this, 9 times out of 10, probably even more, people go, oh, I know what you mean, and straight away another connection, empathy, and then the conversation tends to flow that much easier. So, if you find yourself in those situations, please do nick those techniques because I've nicked them in the first place because they really do work. And tomorrow I'm at an event where I am the speaker, so that is a different scenario and people will often choose to come and talk to me As the speaker, so that makes things a lot easier. I'm part of a panel, so there's 3 of us talking again to an audience of women, mature women, because the event is all about menopause. And often anxiety can increase during this phase of life for a number of reasons. And the tip that I'm going to be sharing is to be selfish. And I know whenever I say that to clients in the therapy situation, I get the, that's a bad thing! Do you know, it's not. Being selfish is really important. It's the proverbial put your own oxygen mask on first. And for a lot of women, we spend so much of our time helping others, looking after the kids, the parents, the husband, and working, and cooking, and Friends and, and, and, and. And I liken it a lot like an upside-down pyramid with you at the bottom balancing it, trying to keep everything stable, but that is a very, very unstable situation that often will then just crash. So what being selfish is, is turning that pyramid the right way up and placing yourself on the top because one, That stable, and 2, you get to be on the top in control because anxiety and control are very strongly related. When you're in control, you're less anxious. When you're out of control, you're very anxious. And building on from that, it's then about looking at energy as a resource that you can spend and spend it wisely. So of the pyramid, imagining that there's tiers, You look after yourself at the top and you do all you can to get yourself as fully resourced with energy as possible. So for me, the first 2 hours of my day, I walk the dogs, I do some exercise, I do some meditation because they're all things that top my battery up to make sure that I am fully resourced for whatever is going to hit me during the day. Then my next tier down were my children. They're at uni now, But they would've been the next tier down. Once they're okay, then comes my husband. Doesn't like the fact that he's under the kids, but that's my choice. Then comes my work. Then comes my disabled brother. And I just allocate my energy. Sometimes I don't get down to spending any energy on my brother because there is none left. And that can be sad sometimes because I would love to do more with him, for him, but if the energy isn't there, If I get into negative energy and debt, ultimately my pyramid isn't going to work. I'm going to fall off the top. And I've ended up in hospital twice because I didn't look after myself. I'm not doing it 3 times. So the tip is to get your pyramid the right way up and then to think about who is your priorities in terms of allocating your energy. And when you start with your energy fully topped up, the chances are you're You are going to be able to serve everyone really well, but if you don't get to those bottom tiers every day, that is okay. Look after yourself first. Being selfish is not a bad thing. It's actually a really good thing. And I will leave you with that thought today because I've got now a lot less time to go and get my train, and I will look forward to speaking to you again next week. Have a wonderful weekend. Bye.
