People with claustrophobia experience fears associated with small spaces or areas where it can be impossible to escape quickly, such as trains, airplanes or elevators. Some people even feel claustrophobic in MRI scanners. Because of their feelings, people with claustrophobia often attempt to stay away from small spaces. Sufferers also tend to sit near entrances or along the sides of a room, versus being in the center. Claustrophobic people frequently have panic attacks when they begin to feel “stuck” or enclosed. For some people, being in a tight area is as alarming as the thought of being buried alive.
Experiencing an anxiety attack in a crowded area can be a scary experience for claustrophobic people and people around them. When a person’s claustrophobia is triggered, they may suffer panic attacks, difficulty breathing, physical illness, fainting, and other, often intense, responses. One may become claustrophobic at any time or due to a traumatic incident, but it often starts during childhood.
The phobia may be triggered by various situations, which can be different from person to person. For instance, some claustrophobic people might only feel scared while on a lift, while other people find large crowds aggravate their condition. Regardless of the specific situation, claustrophobia and other phobias tend to have a negative impact on people’s daily lives and personal satisfaction. People with phobias often develop avoidant behaviors and suffer a lower quality of life as they focus their lives around their fears.
For several people, the fear of embarrassment or humiliation over their fears is as difficult as the the fear itself. Some phobia sufferers recognize that their feelings are overblown and illogical, but cannot seem to stay in control. The reason why is that phobias come from deep within the unconscious mind, which no amount of conscious effort can be fully effective in controlling. This poses a special challenge to the treatment of phobias.
Claustrophobia is cured with anti-anxiety drugs or therapy. Hypnotic therapy is an ideal, safe and non-invasive form of therapy with no negative side effects. It works by targeting the underlying causes of fear in the unconscious mind to quickly cure a phobia. A system that has Ericksonian hypnosis therapy techniques and Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) can be used to eliminate a phobia. This innovative program uses multiple hypnotic techniques to help people fight their fears.
The initial step in the therapy process is helping the sufferer become rested and anxiety-free. Hypnosis has long been used as a form of stress-relief therapy, to help people clear their minds and focus deeply.
Conventional hypnosis has made use of direct, post-hypnotic suggestions to help cure phobias. The disadvantage of the direct approach is that the mind tends to resist being simply “told” how to respond. Many people throw up mental blocks and disregard suggestions. In our modern society, men and women are particularly likely to resist direct suggestions since we are largely independent thinkers who question authority.
The basis of the hypnotic state is calm relaxation. Once set the relaxed state, instead of using post-hypnotic suggestions, a better approach named systematic desensitization can often help extinguish a phobia through visual cues.
Ericksonian hypnosis therapy techniques use a more refined approach than traditional hypnotherapy. It utilizies indirect suggestions embedded in captivating metaphors and stories to engage the unconscious mind and convince it to follow a desirable, phobia-free line of thought. Due to the fact that indirect suggestions aren’t required to be tailored for a single phobia like direct post-hypnotic suggestions do, a single good Ericksonian hypnotic therapy program can work to beat any phobia or even several phobias.
NLP, Neuro-Linguistic Programming, is a modern form of therapy that many well trained hypnotherapists have adopted. The best NLP technique for fighting a phobia is called the Visual – Kinesthetic Disassociation, also called V/K. The V/K is called the one session phobia cure, and for good reason. Irrational or anxiety reactions (attacks) occur because traumatic emotions are associated with and aggravated by mental imagery. With the V/K, the traumatic emotions are disconnected from the mental imagery – often in just one session, and the phobia is essentially cured.
Those suffering from claustrophobia can attain rapid relief by using hypnosis therapy. The combination of Ericksonian hypnotherapy and NLP techniques can help anyone beat their fears. Hypnotic therapy has helped many people feel confident and secure doing activities where before, they would have completely broken down. Hypnotherapy techniques have provided phenomenal benefits for people with phobias and continue to improve lives every day.
Alan B. Densky, CH has invented several hypnotic methods for the healing of symptoms of anxiety attacks based on NLP and Ericksonian hypnotherapy. Learn more on his Neuro-VISION hypnotherapy website using his Free research library and video research library.
