Is Hypnosis a Real Solution for Stress and Anxiety?
Stress and anxiety are among the most commonly-reported challenges facing people today. These obstacles have only become more widespread in the recent years since the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s common to turn to medications for these challenges, but these drugs bring additional risks and side effects. Thus we enter a seemingly unending cycle of stress and/or anxiety.
Is hypnosis a realistic solution for anxiety and stress?
In fact, it is. Let’s explore why hypnosis can be safer, faster, and highly effective at combating these hurdles.
First, it’s important to understand that stress and anxiety are not the same thing, while they are often used interchangeably. Stress is typically caused by an external trigger, and it can impact us in the short term, or persist long term. Anxiety is excessive worrying, even when there is no real danger. It’s been described as “regret about the future,” and it’s the most common mental health symptom in the U.S.
Understanding the distinction between the two, we now acknowledge that anxiety and stress share many similarities. Both can bring emotional, cognitive, and physical symptoms. On the flip side, experiencing some stress and anxiety throughout life is normal and can even be helpful on the short term. However, these symptoms become problematic and are even considered disorders when they persist to the point of interference with daily life.
Let’s imagine an example. Perhaps you go to the doctor for persistent irritability, fatigue, or difficulty concentrating or sleeping. These are some common side effects of ongoing anxiety and/or stress. You could be among the 25% of adults in the U.S. that meet the criteria for an anxiety disorder diagnosis. Your physician then offers you a prescription, putting you among one in 12 adults in the U.S. taking anti-anxiety medication. These drugs commonly include anxiolytics, sedatives, and soporifics, which have varying risks and side effects.
For instance, they may cause falls leading to injuries, which is a higher risk for aging adults. These drugs can also be associated with risk of negative outcomes after surgery. Anti-anxiety medication use is associated with an increased mortality rate. Long-term use of certain drugs can lead to drug habituation and increased tolerance. Benzodiazepines are a class of drugs commonly prescribed for anxiety, and the treatment need for abuse of such drugs tripled between 1998 and 2008! So usage and abuse of addictive anxiety prescriptions has been rising starkly. Beyond the damage to health, this leads to downstream consequences in families and society.
Even without a prescription, people might try to reduce stress in less favorable ways. More than 18% of those with a clinical generalized anxiety disorder report self-medicating with alcohol. There could be many more people taking drugs and alcohol in attempts to soothe their symptoms than we can accurately track. In addition to all the side effects these substances can bring, relying on drugs to manage stress and anxiety for prolonged periods means that we aren’t learning to cope or building resilience naturally.
How can hypnosis help?
Hypnosis is safer than most medications, easy to try, and significantly reduces anxiety, even if you are already receiving relevant treatment. Various meta analyses have found hypnosis to be a highly effective method for reducing anxiety — either as effective or potentially more effective than other treatments. Among the other treatments in the included studies were meditation and cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT). So this means that hypnosis involves fewer risks and side effects when compared to medications, and it is at least as effective as the other drug-free anxiety treatments (or more effective when combined with those drug-free treatments).
Further, hypnosis is fast, simple, and on-demand. Talk therapy and CBT can be expensive and they require the availability of your practitioner. Meditation works best when done regularly — it’s recommended as a daily practice. Anecdotally, it can be a frustrating endeavor, as most of us don’t have a mindfulness teacher and we aren’t sure if we’re doing it right. So hypnosis is much less of a time investment when compared with the other alternatives to medication for anxiety.
Several studies have found that practicing self-hypnosis as a medical patient reduces stress even regulate immune functions. This is particularly interesting, considering prolonged stress can negatively impact those very immune functions.
OK so, hypnosis is cheaper, faster, safer, and just as (if not more) effective as the alternatives.
How do you do it?
Reveri is a self-hypnosis app with a focus on a few common challenges, including stress and anxiety. The Relieve Stress Exercise can be done anytime, anywhere, and it takes about 10 minutes. Those that use it report noticeable, immediate improvements on their stress and anxiety levels. With the help of Dr. David Spiegel’s soothing voice and knowledge stemming from decades of clinical research, you can tap into the powers of your own mind and overcome significant sensations of anxiety and stress. Other exercises such as Improve Sleep, Eat Well, Manage Pain Perception, and Enhance Focus may help with the varying side effects brought on by stress and anxiety too.
The bottom line
The benefits of hypnosis stack up nicely when compared to the competition. You can hire a clinical hypnotherapist, or download Reveri to explore the growing library of content developed by the authority in clinical hypnosis. If you decide to join the Reveri community, you can also suggest new hypnosis exercises that focus on a particular challenge related to your stress or anxiety, which Dr. Spiegel will develop for the app. So give it a try today!
Contact us: support@reveri.com
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Many Reveri members experience the benefits of self-hypnosis after a single 10-minute session.