Self-Hypnosis

Sample Session: Hypnosis Session to Overcome Porn Addiction

Welcome to your hypnosis session

Please note that the content of this audio is hypnotic so please do not listen to it whilst you are driving a car or operating any types of machinery.

Before we begin, let me ask you, what will it be like when you finally put an end to your porn addiction now?

PAUSE

Because this is a powerful and effective hypnosis program that has been specifically designed to help you to overcome negative patterns and habitual behaviors that are keeping you chained to pornography and I know you want to be free. You don’t want to be a prisoner anymore, you want to have the freedom to be the person you want to be, don’t you?

Can you imagine now, how your life will change completely for the better, when you redirect your focus and attention onto healthier goals, relationships and hobbies....?

PAUSE

Can you bring to mind now a picture of what you will be doing and all the things you will have in your life when you are free?

PAUSE

You are about to go on a journey into hypnosis, which is a very relaxing state of mind. You are in control during hypnosis and you will hear what I’m saying to you. Sometimes the words may come and go and that’s ok. On this journey you are going to be able to reprogram your mind and your thinking at the very deepest level. You are going to change your perceptions and beliefs and enhance how you feel about yourself, sex and relationships because now is the time to take back control and get your life back on track, isn’t it?

PAUSE

Change can happen immediately and you will feel an amazing positive impact by the end of this powerful hypnosis session. To continue enhancing the benefits from this session all you have to do it to continue listening to this program as much as you want. I recommend that you listen to this session several times a week over the next month.

Ok, so if you haven’t done so already, silence your cell phone and any other devices. Find a comfortable place where you won’t be disturbed for a few minutes.

For this hypnosis session I’d like you to be seated in a chair. Make sure that your body is upright and when you are ready you can go ahead and close your eyes now.

Take a deep breath in

And breathe out

Once again take a deep breath in

And breathe out

Settle into this space...

PAUSE

In your imagination can you see yourself going into hypnosis?

Can you imagine yourself feeling relaxed?

Could you pretend that you are relaxing more deeply, just for a moment?

Because I know that you’ve experienced hypnosis before right now.

Consider what it’s like, inside your mind, when you start to become more relaxed now

What’s it like when you do relax more and more?

Ever so easily just drifting to a relaxing state of mind, maybe now or in a moment...

That’s right

And what would it be like if your relaxation begins to deepen more and more.

Then just let yourself become more deeply relaxed and imagine yourself feeling totally relaxed and completely calm as you listen to my voice.

I have to tell you that going into hypnosis is a wonderful experience and you can experience your thoughts changing easily and effortlessly because this is a powerful session of hypnosis that is creating big changes for you already.

As you go into hypnosis I want you to pay attention to the sounds around you and realize that they will allow you to go even deeper while you continue to focus on my voice that follows you wherever you go knowing that the meaning behind my words will always be clear to you and that means every time you feel the support beneath you, you know that you are safe.

Feel yourself sinking a little deeper into that support now because as your mind relaxes our body can relax too.

And you really should relax, fully and completely, fully and completely, totally relaxed....

Notice how it feels to relax comfortably and to experience hypnosis comfortably

That’s right

Have you ever felt so relaxed that you’ve just fallen asleep?

It’s such a natural process and did you ever notice that you drift into a sleep like state easily and naturally?

You can remember a time you were deeply relaxed, do you remember that feeling spreading throughout your entire body now...

Find yourself drifting into a deeper, wonderful, comfortable, calming and relaxing state as you realize that you mind is relaxing and your body is relaxing now.

And as you relax you’re unconscious mind can take onboard and integrate all kinds of useful suggestions and actualize them immediately or in one minute, or maybe 5 minutes or  sometimes unconscious minds like to take a long, long time as long as 15 minutes to actualize these suggestions now.

So let go and just enjoy the process as you become more and more relaxed because hypnosis is an easy natural state to be in.

The more you listen to my voice the more you go into hypnosis and become deeper more relaxed

And it’s a good thing because you are calm and comfortable every way as you can easily bring to mind a staircase and it’s the most amazing staircase you have ever seen and you can see there are 10 steps down and in a moment we are going to walk safely down these stairs together and every step down you take you are going to feel more and more relaxed as you safely hold onto the rail and safely walk down each step.

Are you ready?

Starting with the top and taking a safe and carefully step down

(READ THIS SECTION SLOWLY)

10 – deeper more relaxed[ME5]

9 – feeling comfortable and calm

8 - more relaxed

7 – feeling deeper more relaxed

6 – going to deeper levels of relaxation

5  - feeling  more and more relaxed

4 - deeply relaxed and calm

3 - so relaxed

2 - almost at the bottom now, just one more step to go ...and 

1 – feeling deeply and completely relaxed here

That’s right

Feel that your mind is quieter now as your body softens and sinks a little deeper into the support beneath you.

PAUSE

And as you consider the quality of the relaxation that you have achieved that means that you know that you are now in control. Because you are in control, you can control your sexual urges now, can’t you? And in doing so, you can channel that energy and that focus onto more positive activities in your life.

In realizing that you are in control because you have created this state of relaxation that you are experiencing now, you can adopt a healthy attitude towards yourself and towards sex because you are dedicated to changing now. You are dedicated to finding your freedom and creating a happy, wholesome and balanced life as you redirect your focus onto other, positive activities, hobbies, relationships and goals.

You know that your willpower is strong and that you are charge of you. You are in control of your destiny. You are creating your future. And in knowing all of that, you make a clear decision to break free from thoughts and behaviors that no longer work for you.

You are in control of your life and you feel positive about yourself now that you are free from porn. Your focus is now on creating positive goals for your future. You can see in your mind’s eye the type of person that you want to be. You can envision all the things that you want to have in your life and visualize all the positive things that you are doing in light of the changes you are making. And as you create that image in your mind now, realize that you are changing into a strong, healthy and positive human being.

This image of who you want to be now becomes your focus. It remains at the front of your mind, no matter what. So when you feel triggered to watch porn, you redirect your focus and your energy by coming back to this image of the person that you want to be.

And remember, you are in control. You are in charge of you. And the more you can focus on who you want to be, the more freedom you enjoy. And it feels good to feel free, doesn’t it?

You are transforming into someone who has an amazing and fulfilling life because you are in charge. You are in control. You can control your urges, your behaviors and your mind. Which means that creating change is easy for you because you focus on what you want and your self control is strong enough to change any habit.

PAUSE

Because you have been listening to my voice, that means you have the power to go into hypnosis deeply and easily any time you choose. When you do, you drop into this relaxing and resourceful state of mind where you can accept positive suggestions for change and transform your life for the better. Because all of these suggestions become part of who you are and part of your thinking and your behaviors AND your being. Which means all of the positive suggestions that you receive can be actualised by your unconscious mind immediately and become part of your reality now.

In a moment I’ll count from one to five. On the count of five you’ll open your eyes feeling alert, refreshed and wide awake. Coming out of hypnosis with all the positive suggestions that are aligned to your life.

1 - Feel the energy flowing into your arms and legs.

2 – Coming back from hypnosis now.

3 - Feeling more energised with every number that I count.

4- Coming back to full awareness now, feeling alert and refreshed.

5 - Eyes open and feeling refreshed, wide awake and back in the room

PAUSE

Welcome back! You can re listen to this hypnosis session whenever you like to reconnect to the suggestions within the program and then you will supercharge your results.

Thank you for listening

• For a recorded version click here (Female Voice)

Research

by Florin Onighi for GuardYourEyes

Self-hypnosis for addictive behaviors. A rapid review of available evidence

Summary

Does self-hypnosis help people who are trying to stop addictive behaviors?

Background

Self-hypnosis refers to intentional hypnotic induction that is self-directed, without therapist presence, with or without the use of audio recordings (Elkins et al., 2018). Potential rationale for self-hypnosis as a useful aid for addictive behavior treatment is that, by acting on underlying impulses, it may weaken the desire to smoke, strengthen the wil lto stop, or improve the ability to focus on a treatment programme by increasing concentration (Spiegel et al., 1993).

Study characteristics

MEDLINE, PsycINFO and PubMed databases were searched using the terms ‘self-hypnosis’, ‘self-hypnotic’, ‘autosuggestion’, and ‘autohypnosis’ and ‘guided imagery’. Only publications in English were considered. Studies published up to September 2020 in peer-reviewed journals comparing self-hypnosis to no treatment or other clinical applications were included.  

The search for studies examining the efficacy of self-hypnosis as a clinical treatment returned 23 studies, of which 4 were conducted in the context of addictive behaviors and are included in this review.  Studies lasted at least two months.

Key Results

Study	Audio?	No. of practice sessions	Active control group?	Participant number	Is there an effect? (control type)	Limitations
Pekala et al., 2004 (chronic drug/alcohol us)	Yes.	4 x 50 min. sessions Daily self-practice (suggestedt) for the next 3 months. 4 hypnosis protocols: self-esteem enhancement, relapse prevention, serenity enhancement, and anxiety and anger management/reduction.	Yes. Relaxation/stress management or transtheoretical cognitive-behavioral program.	41 (self-hypnosis) 35 (control group) 178 (relaxation and transtheoretical interventions)	Yes. 15% of the variance in abstinence was due to self-hypnosis. Self hypnosis increased self-esteem and serenity and decreased anger/impulsivity in severely addicted individuals practicing at least 4 times a week (no such effects were found for relaxation/stress management or the transtheoretical interventions).	46% of the study participants could not be contacted at follow-up. No significant differences at 2 months follow-up between the self-hypnosis practice and control groups (probably due to hypnotic susceptibility or other variables).
Tindle et al., 2006 (smoking)	Yes.	6 x in-person weekly group sessions + daily home study  (1 workbook and 4 audio CDs)	No.	17 (self-hypnosis) 17 (control group)	Yes. Intervention participants had greater readiness to quit (Readiness to Quit Ladder, 8.3 vs. 7.2) and lower state anxiety (Spielberger Index, 32 vs. 38) at end of treatment than the control group. Abstinence rates in the intervention versus control groups were 36% versus 18% at 6 weeks and 30% versus 12% at 12 weeks, respectively.  94% found the technique helpful for smoking cessation. At a 1 year follow-up, 24% of intervention participants remained abstinent.	Small sample size (pilot study). No active (treatment) control group.
Lloret et al., 2014 (gambling addiction)	No.	2  x  1h practice sessions  and  7 x  1h intervention sessions	Yes.  (CBT)	21 (CBT) 28 (Self-Hypnosis)	Yes. Self-Hypnosis = CBT Abstinence at 6 months follow up was 61.9% for the CBT group and 60.72% for the self-hypnosis group.	The dropout rate was slightly higher for the self-hypnosis group. Small sample size. The study excluded a control group (authors’ decision based on ethical reasons.)
Spiegel et al., 1993 (smoking)	No.	Single, 50 min. session	No.	226	Yes. Abstinence rates at six-months and 1 year were 30% and 25%.	No control group.

Conclusions and discussion

Combined, the results of four studies (with a total of 305 people) show a success rate (abstinence) for self-hypnosis in the range of 24% to 61.9%. However, there were no differences at follow-up between the interventions in the audio self-hypnosis with active controls (Pekala et al., 2004). Therefore, we can conclude that there is no evidence that self-hypnosis helps people who are trying to stop problematic behaviors more than behavioral interventions, when delivered over the same amount of time.

As self-hypnosis can be used at will by the person trying to quit, this intervention can have some advantages over behavioral programs in terms of higher compliance and lower costs, as even a small number of sessions can prove effective (Spiegel et al., 1993; Pekala, 2017). In terms of effectiveness conditions, it is recommended that participants complete a minimum of 3 to 5 self-hypnosis sessions per week to expect improvements (Pekala et al., 2004). Practice sessions facilitated by a self-hypnosis expert before participation in an intervention might also be helpful.

In terms of self-hypnosis program content, an audio self-hypnosis program with different protocols (e.g. self-esteem enhancement, relapse prevention) might prove more effective than a generic protocol as it can target multiple mechanism of behavior change and counteract habituation (i.e. from listening to the same program many times). Self-hypnosis protocols targeting negative affect (e.g. stress reduction, serenity enhancement) might prove highly effective in the case of problematic sexual behaviors as negative affect leads to craving which in turn predicts engagement in addictive behaviors (Enkema et al., 2020).

References to studies included in this review

Lloret, D., Montesinos, R. and Capafons, A., 2014. Waking self-hypnosis efficacy in cognitive-behavioral treatment for pathological gambling: An effectiveness clinical assay. International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, 62(1), pp.50-69.

Pekala, R.J., Maurer, R., Kumar, V.K., Elliott, N.C., Masten, E., Moon, E. and Salinger, M., 2004. Self-hypnosis relapse prevention training with chronic drug/alcohol users: Effects on self-esteem, affect, and relapse. American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis, 46(4), pp.281-297.

Tindle, H.A., Barbeau, E.M., Davis, R.B., Eisenberg, D.M., Park, E.R., Phillips, R.S. and Rigotti, N.A., 2006. Guided imagery for smoking cessation in adults: a randomized pilot trial. Complementary health practice review, 11(3), pp.166-175.

Spiegel, D., Frischholz, E.J., Fleiss, J.L. and Spiegel, H., 1993. Predictors of smoking abstinence following a single-session restructuring intervention with self-hypnosis. American Journal of Psychiatry, 150, pp.1090-1090.

Additional references

Elkins, G.R., Roberts, R.L. and Simicich, L., 2018. Mindful self-hypnosis for self-care: An integrative model and illustrative case example. American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis, 61(1), pp.45-56.

Enkema, M.C., Hallgren, K.A., Neilson, E.C., Bowen, S., Bird, E.R. and Larimer, M.E., 2020. Disrupting the path to craving: Acting without awareness mediates the link between negative affect and craving. Psychology of Addictive Behaviors.

Pekala, R.J., 2017. Addictions and relapse prevention. Chapter in Handbook of medical and psychological hypnosis: Foundations, applications, and professional issues, pp. 443-451.