Laughter improves the mind and spirit. If we can laugh at our troubles, we can create positive biochemical changes in our body which will help reduce feelings of depression or helplessness. When we laugh, we breathe more deeply, which fills our body with oxygen and improves our immune system. Our blood pressure decreases and endorphins and other natural pain-relieving hormones are released. We create a better state of mind and when we are in a better state of mind, we are able to think more calmly and clearly. Our entire body relaxes.

In stressful situations, our body suffers. Constant stress robs us of our sense of humor. It takes the fun out of life! When we are children, we laugh on average about 400 times in a 24 hour period. As adults, we only laugh about 17 times a day! What a tragedy!

A good laugh bursts forth from the soul.

You can bring more laughter into your life. Collect books and movies that are funny and the next time you’re feeling down, bring them out and laugh. Choose to surround yourself with happy and positive people. Be more playful in your daily activities. Give yourself some “laughter therapy” whenever you’re feeling down.

As Oscar Wilde said, “Life is too important to be taken seriously!”

In my practice as a Clinical Hypnotherapist, I encourage my clients to lighten up. We focus on the positive aspects and the solutions which brings a sense of peace. Being able to laugh at yourself is an important step on the way to enlightenment…a state of acceptance and love for your true authentic self…including that part of yourself that laughs so hard, milk comes out your nose!

Sex is not the answer. Sex is the question. “Yes” is the answer.
~Swami X

Sex is the most fun you can have without laughing.
~Woody Allen

Sex Reduces Pain

Immediately before orgasm, levels of the hormone oxytocin surge to five times their normal level. This releases an increase in endorphins, which alleviate the pain of everything from headache to arthritis to even migraines. In women, sex also prompts production of estrogen, which can reduce the pain of PMS. Just thinking about sex can help to reduce pain.

Sex Improves Intimacy

Speaking of oxytocin, this so-called “love” hormone helps us to bond, trust and build intimate relationships. Higher levels of oxytocin have also been linked to a feeling of generosity.

Sex Helps You Sleep Better

The release of oxytocin during orgasm promotes sleep. Getting enough sleep helps to maintain a healthy weight and blood pressure.

Sex Burns Calories and Keeps You Fit

Sex is a great way to exercise. A vigorous session may burn some 200 calories–about the same as running 15 minutes on a treadmill. 40 half-hour sessions could burn off more than enough calories to lose a pound. The pulse rate or an aroused person rises from about 70 beats per minute to 150, the same as that of an athlete at maximum effort. Muscular contractions during intercourse work the pelvis, thighs, buttocks, arms, neck and thorax.

Another fitness benefit of sex is that it can keep you in constant awareness of your body image. If you are continually being naked in front of another person, it’s a good incentive to stay in shape.

 Men’s Health magazine has gone so far as to call the bed the single greatest piece of exercise equipment ever invented.

Sex Boosts Immunity

Good sexual health could mean better physical health. Wilkes University in Pennsylvania says individuals who have sex once or twice a week show 30% higher levels of an antibody called immunoglobulin A or IgA, which is known to boost the immune system, protecting you from colds and other infections.

Sex Relieves Stress

Biological Psychology reports that frequent intercourse was associated with lower diastolic blood pressure and overall stress reduction. A study of 24 women and 22 men noted that those who had intercourse had better responses to stressful situations than those who abstained from sex. They performed better at such tasks as speaking in public and doing verbal arithmetic.

Sex Improves Cardiovascular Health

Researchers in England recently published a study of 914 men who were followed for 20 years. They found that compared with those who had sex less than once a month, those having sex twice or more per week reduced the risk of fatal heart attack or stroke by 50%.

Sex makes for a Happier Prostate

Some urologists believe they see a relationship between infrequency of ejaculation and cancer of the prostate.

A study recently published by the British Journal of Urology International asserts that men in their 20s can reduce by a third their chance of getting prostate cancer by ejaculating more than five times a week. Another study, reported in the Journal of the American Medical Assn., found that frequent ejaculations, 21 or more per month, (252/year) were linked to lower prostate cancer.

Sex is a Beauty Treatment & Fountain of Youth

In a study at the Royal Edinburgh Hospital in Scotland, a panel of judges guessed participant’s ages. Those who looked seven to 12 years younger than their age were also enjoying sex at least four times a week, on average.

Sex raises a woman’s estrogen level, which helps make hair shiny and skin supple.

Sex also boosts production of testosterone, which leads to stronger bones and muscles.

Having at least two orgasms a week can increase your life span. Every time you orgasm, the hormone DHEA (Dehydroepiandrosterone) increases in response to sexual excitement. DHEA can boost your immune system, repair tissue, improve cognition, and even work as an antidepressant.

Sex helps your sense of smell. After sex, production of the hormone prolactin surges. This in turn causes stem cells in the brain to develop new neurons in the brain’s olfactory bulb, its smell center.

Sex gives you better bladder control. Pelvic floor muscle exercises known as Kegels offer the benefit of minimizing the risk of incontinence. Strong muscles increase the intensity of orgasms.

Sex Improves Your Teeth (special delivery system for women). Seminal plasma contains zinc, calcium and other minerals shown to retard tooth decay. It could be a far more satisfying experience than squeezing a tube of Tartar Control Crest. Researchers have noted that etiquette usually demands the brushing of one’s teeth before and/or after intimacy, which helps promote better oral hygiene.”

Sex can enhance your sense of spirituality.

Many ancient traditions and cultures view sexuality as something sacred and spiritual. Sexual energy is unlike any other.  When we merge with this power during orgasm, we are connecting to our non-physical aspects. Why do you think we cry out, “Oh God!”? According to the Taoists, since we are conceived through orgasm and orgasmic energy permeates every cell of our body, we need to feel this orgasmic energy regularly – ideally every day – to stay healthy.

Thousands of studies and more than a decade later, “the science shows which approaches work,” says Josephine Briggs, MD, director of NCCAM.” One such therapy is hypnosis, which can literally change the way the brain receives signals from the body and from outside stimulus.

A recent study showed that women who were hypnotized for five weekly sessions, found improvement in symptoms and occurrence of hot flashes. After the sessions, they reported a reduction in both the frequency and the severity of their hot flashes.

“Hypnosis teaches us that we have more control over how we process both internal and external information, like temperature, than we usually give ourselves credit for,” says David Spiegel, MD, associate chair of psychiatry and behavioral sciences and medical director of the Stanford Center for Integrated Medicine. “For instance, hypnosis can suggest to the brain that it should tamp down its sensitivity to heat; when it does just that, women with hot flashes have an altered perception of their body temperature.”

The body doesn’t know the difference between what the brain perceives as reality and what is imagined. Your body responds to your thoughts. You can change your perceptions.

Hidden benefit: Hypnosis can decrease anxiety and depression and improve your quality of sleep.

Dr. Karen Olness, author of Hypnosis and Hypnotherapy with Children, conducted an experiment involving immune systems and the subconscious mind at Rainbow Babies’ and Children’s Hospital in Cleveland. A video was shown where one puppet represented a virus; another, which looked like a policeman, represented the immune system. After viewing the video, the children were guided into a relaxed state and asked to imagine lots of policemen puppets running around inside their bodies. When saliva samples were taken, the results showed that their immunoglobulin levels had substantially increased. Their immune systems had been supercharged with their imagination and were working as though they were fighting off real infections. Dr Olness states, “It is still my view that every child with chronic illness should learn self-hypnosis, because of the sense of coping and competence it gives them.”

The mind doesn’t know the difference between what is imagined and perceived reality. The body responds to what the mind is creating. The subconscious mind is not logical or rational. It merely takes what it observes and makes it so. And so it is.

This research about the processes by which cells receive information may radically change our understanding of life. It shows that DNA is controlled by environmental signals from outside the cell, including the energetic messages emanating from our subconscious mind in the form of positive and negative thoughts. The cell’s membrane, Lipton says, is where “consciousness and matter interact”. Considered to be a major breakthrough in cell biology and quantum physics, this research shows that our bodies can be changed when we change our thoughts.

The mystic healer Edgar Cayce once said, “Remember that thoughts are things, and as their currents run, they can become crimes or miracles.”

If our genes are a blueprint, our mind is the contractor. What kind of a body have you built? Are you healthy? Are you physically fit? Is it time for a re-model? I can help you to access your most powerful tool…your subconscious mind. Are you ready to do some trance-formational work? It all begins with a thought. The Mind Matters.

He was completely consciously aware, and spent days and nights visualizing how it would feel to walk out of the hospital with his own legs. During the months spent at the hospital he kept telling himself that he would be out of it “before Christmas”. And that’s exactly what happened, just before Christmas.

The doctors dubbed him “The Miracle Man”, and never understood how what they witnessed was possible.

There are many documented cases of people who, with the power of positive thinking and positive feelings, have eliminated deadly physical conditions. Medicine is unable to explain it scientifically, but at the same time doctors and scientists accept it as a fact: “miracles” happen.

Albert Einstein said, “There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle”.

Either way you decide to live, you are right. You create your reality.

I can help you to use the power of your subconscious mind, the 88% of your mind that controls your behavior. I can help you to focus on positive thoughts and positive emotions to create a more positive reality. I can help you to tell yourself that anything you set your mind to accomplish is possible.

Be realistic; plan for a miracle.

Hypnosis Reduces Pain and Speeds up Recovery from Surgery

Since 1992, we have used hypnosis routinely in more than 1400 patients undergoing surgery. We found that hypnosis used with patients as an adjunct to conscious sedation and local anesthesia was associated with improved intraoperative patient comfort, and with reduced anxiety, pain, intraoperative requirements for anxiolytic and analgesic drugs, optimal surgical conditions and a faster recovery of the patient. We reported our clinical experience and our fundamental research.

[Hypnosis and its application in surgery] Faymonville ME, Defechereux T, Joris J, Adant JP, Hamoir E, Meurisse M, Service d’Anesthesie-Reanimation, Universite de Liege, Rev Med Liege. 1998 Jul;53(7):414-8.

Hypnosis Reduces Pain Intensity

Analysis of the simple-simple main effects, holding both group and condition constant, revealed that application of hypnotic analgesia reduced report of pain intensity significantly more than report of pain unpleasantness.

Dahlgren LA, Kurtz RM, Strube MJ, Malone MD, Differential effects of hypnotic suggestion on multiple dimensions of pain. Journal of Pain & Symptom Management. 1995; 10(6): 464-70.

Hypnosis Reduces Pain of Headaches and Anxiety

The improvement was confirmed by the subjective evaluation data gathered with the use of a questionnaire and by a significant reduction in anxiety scores.

Melis PM, Rooimans W, Spierings EL, Hoogduin CA, Treatment of chronic tension-type headache with hypnotherapy: a single-blind time controlled study. Headache 1991; 31(10): 686-9.

Hypnosis Lowered Post-treatment Pain in Burn Injuries

Patients in the hypnosis group reported less post treatment pain than did patients in the control group. The findings are used to replicate earlier studies of burn pain hypnoanalgesia, explain discrepancies in the literature, and highlight the potential importance of motivation with this population.

Patterson DR, Ptacek JT, Baseline pain as a moderator of hypnotic analgesia for burn injury treatment. Journal of Consulting & Clinical Psychology 1997; 65(1): 60-7.

Hypnosis Lowered Phantom Limb Pain

Hypnotic procedures appear to be a useful adjunct to established strategies for the treatment of phantom limb pain and would repay further, more systematic, investigation. Suggestions are provided as to the factors which should be considered for a more systematic research program.

Treatment of phantom limb pain using hypnotic imagery. Oakley DA, Whitman LG, Halligan PW, Department of Psychology, University College, London, UK.

Hypnosis Has a Reliable and Significant Impact on Acute and Chronic Pain

Hypnosis has been demonstrated to reduce analogue pain, and studies on the mechanisms of laboratory pain reduction have provided useful applications to clinical populations. Studies showing central nervous system activity during hypnotic procedures offer preliminary information concerning possible physiological mechanisms of hypnotic analgesia. Randomized controlled studies with clinical populations indicate that hypnosis has a reliable and significant impact on acute procedural pain and chronic pain conditions. Methodological issues of this body of research are discussed, as are methods to better integrate hypnosis into comprehensive pain treatment.

Hypnosis and clinical pain. Patterson DR, Jensen MP, Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, WA USA 98104 Psychol Bull. 2003 Jul;129(4):495-521.

Hypnosis Useful in Hospital Emergency Rooms

Hypnosis can be a useful adjunct in the emergency department setting. Its efficacy in various clinical applications has been replicated in controlled studies. Application to burns, pain, pediatric procedures, surgery, psychiatric presentations (e.g., coma, somatoform disorder, anxiety, and post traumatic stress), and obstetric situations (e.g., hyperemesis, labor, and delivery) are described.

Emerg Med Clin North Am. 2000 May;18(2):327-38, x. The use of hypnosis in emergency medicine. Peebles-Kleiger MJ, Menninger School of Psychiatry and Mental Health Sciences, Menninger Clinic, Topeka, KS, USA. peeblemj@menninger.edu

Self-Hypnosis Alleviates Tension Headaches

In 169 patients, self-hypnosis was largely successful in alleviating chronic tension headaches. (International Journal of Clinical Experimental Hypnosis, 2000)

Healed significantly faster from surgery

Two studies from Harvard Medical School show hypnosis significantly reduces the time it takes to heal.

Study One: Six weeks after an ankle fracture, those in the hypnosis group showed the equivalent of eight and a half weeks of healing.

Study Two: Three groups of people studied after breast reduction surgery. Hypnosis group healed “significantly faster” than supportive attention group and control group.

Harvard Medical School, Carol Ginandes and Union Institute in Cincinnati, Patricia Brooks, Harvard University Gazette Online at http://www.hno.harvard.edu/gazette/2003/05.08/01-hypnosis.html.

Surgery

Hypnosis given during surgical radiology not only diminishes patients’ pain and anxiety, but also shortens surgical time and reduces complications from the procedure. (Lancet, 2000)

Scientific American Mind (July, 2005) featured an article titled “The Truth and the Hype of Hypnosis” which stated that “hypnosis has been shown to be a real phenomenon with a variety of therapeutic uses- especially in controlling pain,” citing, among others, a 1996 National Institutes of Health panel which judged hypnosis to be an “effective intervention for alleviating pain from cancer and other chronic conditions.” The article further cites a meta-analysis published by the International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis which found that “hypnotic suggestions relieved the pain of 75% of 933 subjects. The pain relieving effect of hypnosis is often substantial, and in a few cases the degree of relief matches or exceeds that provided by morphine.” Another meta-analysis of 18 separate studies found that “patients who received cognitive behavioral therapy plus hypnosis for disorders such as obesity, insomnia, anxiety and hypertension showed greater improvement than 70% of those who received psychotherapy alone.” Additionally, the article stated there is strong evidence that hypnosis can be an effective treatment for “asthma; some dermatological disorders, including warts; irritable bowel syndrome; hemophilia; and nausea associated with chemotherapy.”

The success of hypnotherapy in pain treatment and management has a very long history. The following studies are more than 20 years old and the supporting research is mounting.

Speigel and Bloom (1983b) reported that a study of women with metastatic breast cancer showed that patients who received group therapy with training in Hypnosis over a one-year period were able to reduce their pain experience by 50% when compared to a control group. In addition, at a 10-year follow-up of these same women, the Hypnosis treatment group had a mean survival rate of 36.6 months compared to 18.9 months for the controls. This suggests that the intervention may be both important quantitative and important qualitative effects (Spiegel 1989a)

In a neurochemical study of Hypnotic control of pain conducted by Domangue (1985), patients suffering arthritic pain showed a correlation among levels of pain, anxiety and depression. Depression was correlated with dopamine levels and negatively correlated with levels of serotonin and beta endorphin. Following Hypnotherapy, there were clinically and statistically significant decreases in depression, anxiety and pain, and increases in beta endorphin-like substances.

 In a controlled trial conducted by Olness (1987), self-Hypnosis was shown to be significantly more effective than either propranolol or placebo in reducing the frequency of migraine headaches in children between the ages of six and twelve years of age.

In fact, key regions of the brain appear to react as much to the expectation of pain as much as they do to actual painful stimulation. Experiments at the University of Michigan and Princeton University showed that the same region in the brains’ prefrontal cortex that anticipates pain is less active if a person expects a stimulus to hurt less.

Hypnotherapy can help with the perception of pain, by changing the expectation. The mind can alter the feeling of pain by substituting another feeling such as heat, tingling, numbness. It can also divert the location of pain to another body part, thereby allowing relief.  In a January 5, 2004 article by Benedict Carey, The Los Angeles Times reports “the brain can virtually shut down pain signals when preoccupied.”

In 2002, Mount Sinai researchers performed studies which found that adding hypnosis to standard post-surgical care sped the recovery almost 90% of the time in terms of levels of pain, anxiety and the need for painkillers. “The hypnosis seems to change expectations and this change appears to have a strong effect on what people actually experience” says Montgomery, an author on the studies.

Dr. Karen Olness, a professor in the departments of Pediatrics, Family Medicine and International Health at Case Western Reserve University states, “With sufficient practice, many adults can learn to tolerate various painful procedures without medication” Nearly everyone can use self-hypnosis to “reduce the fear and anxiety that accompanies and that can heighten pain.”

A 1999 study reported in the European Journal of Pain states “Hypnosis is a powerful tool in pain therapy.” Researchers used a PET imaging machine to trace the blood-flow patterns of fibromyalgia patients while under hypnosis and “proved there are actual blood-flow changes and patterns in the interplay between cortical and subcortical brain dynamics,” concluding “the patients had less pain during hypnosis than at rest.”

Are you suffering from chronic pain? Are you suffering anxiety and anticipating pain from a surgical procedure? Would you like to learn ways to manage it? Hypnotherapy may be the answer.

“Twenty-three experts in fields that included behavior medicine, psychiatry, and pain medicine presented to a National Institutes of Health panel both scientific and anecdotal evidence to support the use of behavioral and relaxation approaches to treat chronic pain. In particular, the panel found strong evidence for the use of hypnosis to alleviate cancer pain.” (Journal of the American Medical Association, July 1996).

Headaches: The January 2001 issue of Psychology Today references a 2000 study from the International Journal of Clinical Experimental Hypnosis in which self-hypnosis was largely successful in alleviating chronic tension headaches in 169 patients.

Pain & Grief: The National Hospice & Palliative Care Association (NHPCO) of Alexandria, VA in its reference manual Complementary Therapies in End-of-Life Care states “Hypnosis is an effective tool that empowers a patient to take control of her/his response to the physical pain and the psychosocial/spiritual pain of the dying process”.

 Childbirth: The Journal of Family Practice (May, 2001) published Effects of Hypnosis on the Labor Processes and Birth Outcomes of Pregnant Adolescents  which states “Hypnotherapy has been found to be effective in providing pain relief, reducing the need for chemical anesthesia, and reducing anxiety, fear, and pain related to childbirth. Hypnosis has also been helpful in both managing various complications of pregnancy (such as premature labors), and reducing the likelihood of premature labor and birth in high-risk patients.”

 The Journal of Sports Science (April 1993) reported that researchers at the School of Kinesiology at The University of Western Ontario in London, Canada, investigated the effects of imagery on the soccer playing of both skilled and novice players. Performance on the post-test as measured by response time (the time to complete the soccer task) revealed a significant improvement for both the skilled and novice players in the imagery group.