Seeking Perfection Guarantees Failure

Hypnosis to relieve exam anxiety can have unusual results. For example, nineteen-year-old Louise was making herself physically sick with worry over an impending aeronautics exam.

She reasoned that if she did not do well her whole future was doomed. She had to do well, otherwise she could not get into her chosen field of aeronautics.

Along with the physical symptoms of upset stomach, leg pains and a splitting headache from lack of sleep, Louise was depressing herself with thoughts of failure, both in the exam itself, and in life.

Nothing less than a top grade would be good enough.

Clearly, Louise had set herself up for a crash. Anyone who feels she must be perfect guarantees herself disappointment because we are all imperfect.

But Louise had not sought out the therapist to change her philosophy (not consciously anyway). At her request, hypnotherapy was solely of the supportive variety. (It could have been analytic, i.e., seeking the cause of her anxiety and self-sabotage).

Positive Hypnotic Suggestions

With imagery and positive words from the therapist Louise imagined:

>>herself studying effectively,
>>recalling all the necessary material during the exam,
>>subsequently receiving a top honour in aeronautics.

The hypnotherapist reinforced what Louise knew about herself: that she was highly intelligent and capable of succeeding in a variety of fields. She enjoyed the session and left feeling calm, relaxed and optimistic.

A few days later, Louise wrote the exam – and failed.

Hypnotherapy Can Change Attitudes

But the good news is that the hypnotherapy had freed her from her doomsday thinking.

“So I didn’t make it. I did my best, I feel good about me, and that’s important. What the heck, if I don’t go into aeronautics I’ll find something else. You know, it feels so good to be able to accept that it’s O.K. I didn’t get an A.”

Some people are not as sanguine as Louise. They would only be satisfied when hypnosis helped them to pass an exam they feared. Like Bradley. He had failed his accountancy exam twice but was determined to pass it. Unlike Louise, Bradley wanted to know why he had failed.

Hypnoanalysis Can Uncover the Cause of Fear

So the therapist used hypnoanalysis. This is the process of analysing the origin(s) of a fear while the client is in hypnosis. The common method used with Bradley was to first relax him into hypnosis and then ask him to feel the fear. Once Bradley signalled that he was in touch with the fear the hypnotherapist counted rapidly to five after saying “allow that fear to grow stronger and stronger as I count to five.”

The next instruction – immediately following the word “five” - was to “go now to the first time you felt that fear.”

Right away Bradley recalled an incident when he was eleven years old and his father had berated him for not doing better at math in school. The father, an accountant, made fun of Bradley’s inept attempts to master mathematics.

Hypnotherapy Heals Mixed Emotions

Subsequently it became clear that Bradley’s fear of exams was rooted in the repeated terror during his childhood that he could never please his father. What was even more significant was Bradley’s reluctance as an adult to outdo his father. Deep down Bradley harboured such anger at his father for the cruelty inflicted upon him as a child that he pushed this anger away because it aroused more guilt than Bradley felt he could handle.

Both the childhood incidents (of which there were many) and the mixed emotions of the adult Bradley (he also adored and admired his father as well as being angry with him) were dealt with in hypnotherapy.

Then the hypnotherapist focused on the exams. When asked what grade he wanted to achieve Bradley hesitated and finally blurted “70% would be good I guess.”

Success With Imaginative Use of Hypnosis

“Right now this is all in your imagination, Bradley,” said the therapist, “so why wouldn’t you go for 90% or even 100%?”

Bradley aimed for 85%. The hypnotherapist relaxed Bradley into hypnosis and then made positive suggestions that he would:

>>understand what he was studying,
>>absorb the material, and
>>be able to recall it easily.

In addition the hypnotherapist encouraged Bradley to imagine himself receiving his (accounting!) diploma, opening a private practice office, being flooded with clients and so on.

The key to success in using hypnosis to relieve anxiety about taking exams is to be relaxed both while preparing for and actually writing the exam.

And one way to be relaxed that Bradley learned from the therapist, is to be unconcerned about the outcome. This paradox served Bradley well. He went on to score 92%.

He'd joyfully absorbed how to use hypnosis to relieve exam anxiety.