You wake up and the alarm is ringing. The clock reads 7:45 am: you leave the bed, take a shower, grab an energy bar or prepare a quick breakfast, and you get into the rush hour while listening to the radio. Finally, you make it to the office, look at the computer, look at your cell phone and talk to your co-workers occasionally. After repeating the last 3 steps, it is finally 5:00pm. Of Course it is rush hour again. You make it home, take a shower, go to bed, and repeat the cycle the next day.
It is easy to get trapped in a routine, without space to work on yourself and relax for a few hours during the day. It starts to feel alienating, so you decide to give meditation a try. Everyone is talking about it! Why not? But when you start doing some research you find out there's something called self-hypnosis, what is the difference? What if I try self-hypnosis and I don't wake up?
I got to try both of them to see the difference and this is what happened:
When you look up the definition of meditation, you'll find something like this: "the act of giving your attention to only one thing, either as a religious activity or as a way of becoming calm and relaxed" (definition via dictionary.cambridge.org)
According to this definition every time you're focused on a single activity you're meditating and I decided to try it out.
I have always liked artsy stuff, so I bought a notebook and a few watercolors, I had never painted anything before! After using a Youtube tutorial I could make some silhouettes and before you know it, I had been painting for two hours! That felt very good! I was focused, without pressure, just enjoying what I was doing, but I thought there had to be something else. So, I looked up a few online meditations and started practicing!
Later, I decided to try short meditations (5 minutes long), I felt I was forcing myself to be relaxed. Maybe such a small time works for others, but it didn't for me, that's when I started giving a chance to those with 10-20 minutes of duration
Depending on the meditation I could be very relaxed or I would start questioning if I was doing it well. But the results were better! In fact, I was so relaxed that I was close to falling asleep a few times.
On the other hand, when I was looking for meditation, I found out something called “self-hypnosis.” I was very reluctant to try it! A few comments on the web pointed out that it was a very deep relaxation, I had never thought about that possibility. I had other things in mind, like I would get into a trance, my soul would come out of my body and that I wouldn't be able to come back to reality or any other crazy thing. After reading a few comments I decided to give it a try.
The first self-hypnosis I tried it was from Michael Sealy, and the name was Hypnosis to Release Negativity (Subconscious Questions for Deep Mind Change). I was very focused on it, plus I had a great feeling right after listening to it! I felt pretty bad during three days after that, I suddenly got sad out of nowhere for things that I thought I had gotten over. Then I had an amazing sensation that felt like relief. It was something that I couldn't describe; I felt like I had taken negative things out of me. I think that self-hypnosis cleaned me.
I did it a few times after that day. I have been using different Youtube channels like Jason Stephensons and Michael Sealys. Jason makes more meditation audios than self-hypnosis, but I still think he's helpful! He includes guided meditations to sleep, affirmations and even meditation for kids. I would strongly recommend this one from his channel Manifesting & Deserving Abundance Guided Spoken Meditation Hypnosis for sleep & law of attraction. You’ll feel refreshed and light after listening to it! Try to do it when no one can interrupt you if you are interrupted then you'll get a headache, and we don't want that.
Michael has many options for self-hypnosis, all of them have different goals: Healing mind and body, Deep Sleep Hypnosis, Lucid Dreaming. There are a few meditations there too! You can do any of them, his voice is very relaxing! I would strongly suggest you start with this one Hypnosis to Release Negativity (Subconscious Questions for Deep Mind Change). You're going to feel bad for a few days and maybe you'll cry for things without any sense. You'll remember old problems, but it feels like cleaning yourself from negative emotions. I loved that one, plus, it’s only 30 minutes length!
Maybe the difference between them is subjective, meditation has always been linked to "a relaxed state" but when it comes to self-hypnosis, people tend to relate it to "a trance" and that's why is not so popular.
After doing some research I found a website specialized in self-hypnosis that pointed out that in meditation the objective is to empty the mind ,while self-hypnosis has a specific goal like being more positive, remove negative thinking and others. I'm not an expert, but based on my experience, I think it would be nice to give them a chance! Maybe that's the only thing you need to make you take it easy and enjoy your daily life, just make sure you don't do this while driving or while operating machinery, find a quiet spot and see how it goes!
CREDITS
pexels.com (pictures)