Unleash The Power of Your Mind

Your brain is wired to every part of your body. When you cry from sadness or joy, or blush from embarrassment, your thoughts trigger physical reactions. Even nightmares can make you wake up sweating.

Harvard psychologist Ellen Langer has spent decades studying this mind-body connection. “We all know our thoughts affect us physically, but few realise how deep the impact really is,” she says.

In 1979, Langer conducted a ground-breaking study called Counterclockwise. She recruited elderly men in their 70s and 80s to spend a week living as if it were 1959. The house was filled with 1950s decor, music, and news, and the men fully immersed themselves in this era.

By the end of the week, their physical and mental health improved dramatically. One man ditched his cane, and they even played a spontaneous game of touch American football. Measurements before and after the experiment revealed better mobility, cognitive abilities, lower blood pressure, and even sharper vision and hearing!

Visualisation

Research shows that the brain struggles to distinguish between reality and imagination. In a 2003 study by the Lerner Institute, volunteers who visualised exercising their little finger for 12 weeks saw a 35% increase in muscle strength—without lifting a finger!

The best part? You can tap into this power. Through visualisation, you can guide your unconscious mind to create positive changes in your body.

Some people may visualise these things in a biological way; others use metaphorical images, and it really doesn’t matter which method we choose. There is no magic formula. The beauty of this is that it uses your imagination, which is unique to you.

Be aware of the emotions as you relax into the visualisation. Feel how you would feel knowing this was taking place inside you as you imagine it. This deepens the connection between your mind and body.

Quest Cognitive Hypnotherapists create powerful hypnosis recordings, specific to each individual client. We use the client’s unique life experience and language to weave a tailor-made visualization that gives the mind a road map towards their personal solution state.

The Impact of Stress

Studies have demonstrated that stress can impact the successful implantation of a fertilised egg.

This led to Professor Levitas from Soroka Hospital in Beersheva studying the impact of hypnosis on IVF outcomes. Having used medications such as tranquillisers in previous studies, none of these worked as well as hypnosis. The study found that 28% of the women who were hypnotised for the IVF embryo transfer became pregnant, compared to 14% of the women in the control group.

A Harvard Medical School study alongside Boston IVF demonstrated the IVF success rates of women who undertook a mind-body programme alongside their IVF treatment were 52% compared to 20% those that didn’t.

Stressed About Being Stressed

Despite the large body of research indicating stress impacts fertility outcomes, some researchers say this is not the case. I would say it’s not the stress—it’s the stress about being stressed!

Stanford University Psychologist Kelly McGonigal’s research indicates stress in itself doesn’t impact our physiology; it is our relationship with stress that is important. When we are stressed about being stressed, it can have a physiological impact.

When we struggle with any experience (including stress), whether by trying to stop it, wishing it wasn’t there or denying it, we give it more power. When we allow it, without taking any meaning from it, it moves on, and our mind settles all on it’s own.

This is why a toddler’s mind settles all on its own after a tantrum without any intervention. As adults, though, when we are stressed, we think we need to do something about it. We try, either to fix what we think is the cause or to calm our minds.

The problem is, it’s not caused by our circumstances, but our thinking, or perception of those circumstances. In trying to calm our mind we are interfering with its natural settling process. We get scared of stress because we think we need to be calm and positive to get pregnant. This locks the stress in with more stress. Plenty of people who are stressed get pregnant.

It’s not what we do it’s why we do it

One way we try and get rid of the stress is to appease the fear behind it, the fear of not getting pregnant. That fear can result in ‘Project Baby’ taking over our lives. We end up doing everything we can to improve our chances of getting pregnant.

For four months I did everything I could to improve my fertility. I brought things into my life that I knew could make a positive impact – such as acupuncture, supplements, etc. I threw myself at it. My test results got slightly worse! Looking back, I can see now that I was acting from fear. Those things were feeding the fear because the decision to do them came from fear. The fear outweighed the positive benefit of those actions.

It’s not what we do, it’s why we do it. If you are doing something from fear it’s probably not serving you. Perhaps it’s time to let it go for now. You can always start it again at some point in the future.

Project You v Project Baby

From my personal experience and working with couples for 16 years I firmly believe that the more you focus on ‘Project You’, the more ‘Project Baby’ takes care of itself, with or without treatment.

We had a 10-year fertility journey. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone, but I am so thankful for all that I learned about myself during this process. The pain of this journey prompted me to pursue much deeper work on myself. This resulted in us having our son against all odds and in me being both a happier man and, I believe, a better father. I believe that I am a better person than I would have been, had I not processed some of my own limiting thoughts and beliefs that locked fear and tension in my body.

This is why I recommend you find a Quest Cognitive Hypnotherapist to help you with your own ‘Project You’ journey. Together, you can unlock any limiting beliefs that might be holding you back. Through this process you can unleash your fertile mind and body.

https://www.qchpa.com/therapist-finder/#!directory/map/ord=rnd

Russell Davis