Best Tips for Reprogramming Your Subconscious

Hey there, everybody, and welcome to this presentation on tips for reprogramming your subconscious using guided imagery. I'm your host, Dr. Donnellice Snipes. In this presentation, we're going to talk briefly about what guided imagery and self hypnosis are and the benefits of them, when you might want to try using guided imagery or self hypnosis, and some stripes strategies that you might use if you want to experiment a little with these things before going fully into using them. The benefits of guided imagery and self hypnosis have been shown to stem from various factors, including alteration of expectations, as well as attentional, cognitive and emotional regulation mechanisms. What does this mean? And I have here in parentheses, virtual schema. We've talked in the past about schema being shortcuts that our brain uses to predict what is going to happen in the future based on what has happened in the past. So it takes our memories and it kind of files them all and writes a summary of what's going to happen. We have schema about stoplights, for example. We expect, using our schema, that a stoplight that's green will go yellow and then it will go red. If it doesn't follow that order, it can be very confusing to us. These schema help us predict things without having to use all the mental energy to think about them all the time. When we use guided imagery or self hypnosis, what we're doing is we're creating a virtual schema. We're not actually doing it, but we're envisioning it and we're putting ourselves there as much as possible. A lot of athletes use guided imagery to create virtual schema. They see themselves doing the perfect dive or hitting the perfect stroke or catching the perfect catch. And that helps prime their brain and prime their body. Because our brain controls our body for what to do. When we use guided imagery, we don't envision ourselves failing. We don't envision ourself in a disaster. We envision ourself successfully handling whatever situation it is by doing this. The virtual schema that we're forming includes an expectation for a positive resolution. So that's one part of it. Our attentional, cognitive and emotional regulation is also different. In this virtual experience we're having. We're focusing on what we're doing, we're focusing on that situation. We're not focused on extraneous stimuli. We are thinking through the process actively in guided imagery. We're not letting our default mode take over. We're not letting that inner critic interject its thoughts about what's going on. We are actively cognitively talking through or walking through this experience, which can also be helpful because in real life, when we're experiencing things, especially if it's distracted, distressful, we may be flooded with a lot of automatic thoughts and we may kind of go on autopilot as our HPA axis or our threat response system gets triggered doing guided imagery. We are not triggering that HPA axis because we're envisioning a safe, successful event. They found guided imagery and self hypnosis can both be very, very effective with people who have chronic non migraine headaches. So that's a good thing. And that's true for both adults as well as adolescents. That is a huge tool for people to have in their toolbox because it's really hard to focus at work or at school if you've got chronic headaches. It's been shown to be effective with chronic pain and anxiety, both adults and adolescents, as well as weight and feeding management. Guided imagery and self hypnosis can help people adjust their relationship, change their schema, change their expectation of their relationship with food. During REM sleep is when our brains process recent memories. Many times when we examine our dreams, they incorporate aspects of the things that we encounter during the day. A lot of times I'll find this is true. I'll wake up in the morning and I'm like, where in the world did that come from? And I think back and it's my brain processing something that I saw on television the other night. I was watching an old Simpsons episode and Homer drove into a desert that had thousands of snakes, rattlesnakes, going through it. And I was watching that right before bed and guess what appeared in my dream? Rattlesnakes. And it was just my brain saying, okay, I've got this little artifact here. I've got this thing from the day and I'm not sure what to do with it. So I'm going to incorporate it, however I can figure out how. So REM is an interesting time for our brain to figure out what's useful, what to hold on to, and what to let go. Therefore, nighttime is a really great time right before you go to bed to program or to put information in the path of your memory so it can be integrated. The brain is getting ready to process all the stuff and the memories from the day. So let's just put all this stuff right on top of the pile so it gets processed first. Ideally, if you're trying to reprogram your subconscious, it should be the last thing you do before you Go to sleep after you've brushed your teeth and everything, you're getting ready to wind down. This is the last thing you do. Think of yourself as the CEO of your body. Hopefully that's how you think of yourself. And your subconscious is your manager, and the subconscious is, is going to help you anticipate what's going on and make sure everything runs smoothly. As the CEO, you need to tell it what to do. So before bed, you're going to review your goals for your rich and meaningful life. In business, we call this the dashboard. And if you've worked in organizations, in management at all, you know that at the beginning of every fiscal year, you create a dashboard. You create goals for, for what you expect to accomplish. And that is your definition of a rich and meaningful year in business. But what we're talking about here is what is your dashboard for your rich and meaningful life? And I've talked about that in a lot of different videos. Who are the people, things, experiences that are important to you in your rich and meaningful life? How are you succeeding and fulfilled in each one of those areas? What do you want to change in one of those areas? Maybe you want to adjust the amount of energy and how you're nurturing your relationships. Maybe you feel like you haven't been giving it enough attention, or maybe you feel you want to be more patient or with the people that are important in your rich and meaningful life. So that may be one area that you want to adjust. Or maybe you have a habit that you want to change. Maybe you want to stop mindlessly grazing on food every time you walk into the kitchen. There may be a lot of things that you want to change. Big things, little things, whatever. It's important to pick one. In business, we call this rapid cycle change. Pick one thing, focus on it, accomplish it, and then move on to the next thing. If you tell your subconscious too many things, it can't focus on it. Just like if you told an employee to do too many things all at once, they probably wouldn't be able to be successful. If you're already working on something, maybe you decided you were going to start addressing your relationship with food or you are going to stop smoking. That may not happen in one session. So if it's something that you already started working on, assess your progress. How did you do today in response to your guided image in comparison to how you want to be doing? How did you do today? Did you have progress? So choose that one specific goal and stick with it. You're going to be looking for fractional Improvements, again, you're not going to likely change from not doing something to doing it a hundred percent of the time in one night. You want to see, did you even think about changing your behavior the next day? Did you attempt it? Did you do it successfully? So some of the time. And build on those, build on that progress. So, for example, you may tell yourself, I want to improve my relationships by being more patient, telling yourself, I will be patient with mistakes. Maybe you tend to be impatient with people who make mistakes. So I will be patient with mistakes. And that's the one thing that you're going to tell yourself if you decide you know a different goal, not the same time, a different goal. I will reduce my anxiety by focusing on the facts in the current context. Well, that's a lot to say. Feelings are not facts, just reminders to examine the facts. That's what you will tell yourself. Or another goal might be. I will reduce my whatever the habit is by recognizing that thoughts do not have to lead to actions. You may repeat to yourself, my thoughts don't control me. I can choose my behaviors. Once you've reviewed your rich and meaningful life, you've reviewed your dashboard, you've identified the goal you want to work on. The one thing that you want to work on, you've identified a positive proactive step or thing that you can tell yourself, I will do this. Then you say, okay, now get into a relaxed state and turn off your default mode network. Turn off your autopilot by first focusing on your breathing. And we've talked before about breathing in for four, holding for four, exhaling for four and holding for four. And sometimes that's called square breathing. Breathe in, hold, exhale, hold, breathe in, hold, exhale, hold. You do that a couple of times and you will feel your tension starting to go away. You'll feel that relaxation response starting to kick in. Your heart rate probably will slow down a little bit. That's all good. If we want to take it back to the business metaphor. This is kind of like an executive retreat. If you are trying to get a bunch of stuff accomplished and you're doing it at the office, you've got people who are knocking on the door, phone calls coming in, and constantly being distracted and pulled away from it. When you go on an executive retreat, you're more relaxed and you're able to focus on that one thing. You're not worried about somebody knocking on the door or, or needing you to leave the meeting. Move on after you've started breathing and started that relaxation response. Now it's Time to release tension from your body with what I call global muscular relaxation. And this is sort of the quick and dirty version of progressive muscular relaxation. With global muscular relaxation, as you breathe in, you inhale the good air hold. And then as you exhale, you actually feel the tension leaving your body. And you feel your arms and legs becoming heavier and sinking into the bed or the sofa or whatever you're sitting on. Do that three or four times. You want to feel yourself getting progressively more relaxed. The next step. Now that you're relaxed and your brain is receptive, you're not thinking about other things. Visualize yourself doing whatever it is that you're doing or want to do, feeling safe, empowered, and capable. So envision yourself interacting with people and having more patience. Envision yourself interacting with a colleague at work. That typically irritates you. Envision yourself interacting with them tomorrow. Patiently envision yourself interacting with your kids or your dogs patiently. Tomorrow you can envision yourself engaging in purposeful action. Envision yourself making the next positive choice. Once you envision yourself doing that, then take it the step further. I see myself being more patient with my kids tomorrow. How does doing this make me more abundant in my energy, happiness, attitude, productivity, and relationships? So I see myself being more patient. And then I think to myself, what are the positive effects? What are the benefits? If I'm more patient with my kids tomorrow, how will it feel? How will I feel better? How will my relationships better be better? And that can help reinforce what's going on. And you can repeat this a couple of times. If we're talking about relationships, you can repeat it a couple of times. Envisioning yourself being patient, for example, with different people. And then envisioning, if you do that, how does it benefit you? You know, after you're patient with them, how does the rest of your day go as a result? Restate your intentions five times. Slowly inhale as you exhale. Half smile and restate your intention. I will be patient with my people that I'm in relationships with. Obviously, you don't want to stutter on it. You want to pick out what you're going to say. I will be patient with people tomorrow. Hold after exhaling and sit with that feeling and that half smile. Now, why the half smile? You say, well, if you smile too much, it feels fake. It's like, I'm going to be patient tomorrow. But if you have a half smile, you just gently turn your mouth up. It actually triggers in your brain for some reason, it tricks your brain and your brain says, oh, if I do this tomorrow, it'll make me happy. So that half smile you inhale as you exhale. Half smile. I will be patient. Tomorrow, after exhaling, sit with that feeling and that half smile for a second. Then let your face relax and repeat it four more times. Turbocharge. You can narrate your visualization and the impact of it and continue listening to it as you go to sleep so you can narrate. Tomorrow, when I see Sally at the office, I'm going to take a deep breath and I'm going to remind myself to be patient with her. And when she says this, I'll say this. This is how, how it will go. And I won't be as drained after dealing with her. I will have more energy, I'll feel happier and more relaxed and whatever else is going to be a benefit of being more patient with that person. So you record that and you can put it on a loop and listen to it for 15, 20 minutes as you're going to sleep. That'll get you, for most people, that'll get you pretty solidly into that first REM cycle in which the brain is going to latch onto stuff that is most readily available. Your subconscious is your manager and retrieves memories and and tells you what to expect based on past experiences. To alter those memories, you need to be relaxed so your manager can focus on what you are saying instead of focusing on lots of other things. We used to do it this way, but that's not how we're doing it anymore. We want to do it this way now. Self hypnosis or guided imagery can help you retain, reprogram or rescription your subconscious expectations for future events. Doing this right before bed introduces new information at the opportune time to be integrated.