Hello everyone! For those of you who are unfamiliar, I am a remote clinical hypnotherapist; today I'd like to talk to you about some of my work, my observations in such and hopefully give a few people a little bit of relief in doing so.

As a hypnotherapist, I work with the trance, or Theta, state. Hypnosis is simply the voluntary, manual activation of that state. The reason this is important involves somewhat of a misnomer about hypnosis. You see, hypnosis isn't a sleep state, but it is the gateway to sleep. The same physiological system that controls the transition to sleep and engages what is commonly known as sleep paralysis is the same one that controls the transition to trance; in fact, must do so to fully shut down in Delta, or the sleep pattern.

This can be directly observed in the transition of brainwave frequencies going from Alpha to Theta to Delta; reversing this order in waking. To put it simply: we must go into trance to go to sleep and come out of a trance state to fully wake. It's a natural part of the human daily cycle and it is with all of this explained that I have experienced a unique tool in fighting insomnia or really any sleep related issue.

Insomnia, then, by my observation and professional experience isn't an issue going to sleep, but rather an issue going into trance. A failure to start the engine of sleep, so to speak; trance is the key. Even in my work with people unrelated to sleep it is often commented on that the sleep quality and speed of getting there is much faster.

Why is insomnia so difficult to fight, though? Well, while the core cause is varied from individual to individual, it ultimately boils down to being unable to find the keys to start that engine. The reason itself is odd... trance and anxiety states are very closely related. We can change what is supposed to be a transition into our parasympathetic nervous response (trance) into our sympathetic nervous response (fight or flight) and the last thing your brain is wired to do is sleep in that state.

The question in all of this is evident: how do we voluntarily enter the trance state? For some of us, myself included, we work with a hypnotherapist and have those states taught and demonstrated. For others, simply performing a willful, meditative cooldown before bed can suffice. As said before, this like all issues are unique to each of us.

I hope this provided some insight and understanding to what you are struggling with. I am happy to answer any questions and provide whatever help I can. This is a common issue for me to resolve, so I felt like I needed to share my observations and knowledge. Have a wonderful day and I hope you get some rest soon.