Latest / The Hypnotist / 🎯 Why New Year’s resolutions fail (and the identity shift that works 🧠- from a Hypnotist) ✨
Transcript
- 0:05Welcome to The Hypnotist, the show that gives you inside
- 0:09access to cutting edge hypnosis with real clients facing genuine
- 0:13issues. Brought to you by the
- 0:14hypnotherapist, Demanded by celebrities, CEOs and even
- 0:18royalty. Adam Cox.
- 0:20These recordings took place live from Evans Clinic in London's
- 0:24world famous Harley Street, so get yourself comfortable and
- 0:31enjoy today's episode of The Hypnotist.
- 0:39Hi there. It's Adam here.
- 0:41And today is New Year's Eve, the 31st of December, and is
- 0:47probably the day that more people than at any other time of
- 0:54the year are thinking about making a change.
- 0:58And generally, New Year's resolutions tend to represent 2
- 1:03main different types of changes. It's either a habit change or
- 1:09it's a goal. Change.
- 1:12Now if it's a habit change, that might be to lose weight, quit
- 1:16smoking, to stop doing certain things.
- 1:19That are. Unuseful perhaps things like
- 1:23drinking too much, for example, and that's why you get lots of
- 1:27initiatives. Around.
- 1:29January, like dry January, for example, because people want to
- 1:33stop doing certain things, so they're reducing habits, but you
- 1:37also get habits of doing things and that might be going to the
- 1:42gym more, getting stronger. It might be doing something that
- 1:47would be positive, like eating well or going to the gym more.
- 1:52And generally, that's why you see gyms are so busy in January,
- 1:57because a lot of people are making a very similar resolution
- 2:04at exactly the same time. So the first type of change that
- 2:08people make when they think of resolutions are doing less of
- 2:11something or more than something.
- 2:14And generally, we can either call these habits or standards.
- 2:19Now the second. Type of change and it's much
- 2:21better than a habit based change is a goal or an outcome.
- 2:27Base change and something. Like this would be to, let's
- 2:31say, get a promotion. It might be to get a pay rise,
- 2:35it might be to lift a certain amount of weights, or it might
- 2:39be to have an income of a certain amount.
- 2:41That's a better goal than just saying I'm going to lose weight.
- 2:45It would be better for someone to say I'm going to get to a
- 2:49dress size of 10. If they're currently a 14,
- 2:54that's better. But these still have a high
- 2:58probability of failing. And mainly why these kind of
- 3:03resolutions fail is either because they are too ambiguous,
- 3:09they don't have the sufficient clarity.
- 3:12So losing weight, for example, is a very unclear goal, whereas
- 3:19getting to a certain dress size or a particular weight on the
- 3:22scales or a particular body fat percentage is a much clearer
- 3:27goal. So you can improve your odds
- 3:29just by having something clear and tangible, something
- 3:33specific. Now the other main reason that
- 3:37people don't achieve these is that they focus too much on the
- 3:42behaviour. Now the behaviour for example
- 3:46might be I'm going to go to the gym everyday or I'm only going
- 3:50to eat salads. And generally this is the trap
- 3:54that I see a lot of people falling into, that they hold
- 3:58themselves to an unrealistically high standard to make achieving
- 4:05the goal binary. And by binary, it means that
- 4:08they can either win or lose. And that's why, I don't know if
- 4:13you've noticed this, but a lot of supermarkets have very
- 4:18attractive offers on things like cakes and biscuits and chocolate
- 4:24in January because they hire people like me, psychologists,
- 4:30to figure out how they can stop people doing something that
- 4:35would affect their sales. So you get these buy one free
- 4:39offers, you get these discounts of things because what they
- 4:43figured out is most people have a binary approach to goal
- 4:48setting. And what that means is that they
- 4:52say, right, no more cakes, no more biscuits.
- 4:54And then if they have one or they have some ice cream and
- 4:58their goal is to lose weight, well, effectively they've failed
- 5:03their resolution. And here's the interesting
- 5:05thing. If you fail a resolution and
- 5:07it's framed as binary so you can either keep to the resolution or
- 5:13fail the resolution, then there's a lot of relief.
- 5:17Of. Pressure and stress to some
- 5:20extent the moment you fail because it now gives you
- 5:24absolute permission to go back to the previous behaviour.
- 5:30Whereas if the goal is to say, right, I'm going to improve the
- 5:35quality of my food by a certain percentage.
- 5:40And let's say for example, it might be 4 or five nights a
- 5:43week, I'm going to have a salad with meals or I'm going to have
- 5:48more fresh vegetable juice or, you know, Whole Foods, less
- 5:52processed foods that can be winnable.
- 5:55It doesn't require perfection to make that goal achievable.
- 6:01So a lot of what goes on in the actual focus on the behaviour is
- 6:06based on what would it take to fail.
- 6:09And what I've seen is that the people that do get their goals
- 6:14and whether that's to lose weight, earn more money, get
- 6:18stronger, whatever it might be, is that they focus on the long
- 6:23term outcome. And they also focus on
- 6:26consistency rather than this burst of motivation and ultra
- 6:33high standards. And what's really interesting is
- 6:37that psychologists have looked at different types of change.
- 6:41And one of the types of change is revolutionary change.
- 6:45So this is a fad diet. This is most news resolutions
- 6:50where you have to have this ultra, ultra high standard, like
- 6:55everything you normally do is different.
- 6:58But the nature of revolutions is that they're dramatic and
- 7:01there's a lot of change, but they tend to be temporary.
- 7:06Evolutionary change is very different.
- 7:09Evolutionary change has the premise of subtle changes over a
- 7:15long period of time of incremental progress, and that
- 7:20tends to work and to stick. And it doesn't really matter
- 7:25what the change you're trying to make is, whether it's losing
- 7:29weight, earning more money, getting fitter.
- 7:32Evolutionary change is much, much more likely to get you to
- 7:35the goal than revolutionary change.
- 7:39But here's the number one reason why people fail to hit their
- 7:43resolutions or their goals for a new year, and it's because
- 7:47they're focusing too much on behaviour and not enough on
- 7:52identity. If there's one thing you get
- 7:56from this episode today, it's this distinction.
- 8:00Behaviour is what you do and identity is who you are.
- 8:06And one of the best questions that you can answer to increase
- 8:10your likelihood of making the change of hitting that standard
- 8:15or achieving that outcome is not to ask yourself, what do I need
- 8:19to do? That's behaviour.
- 8:21It's who do I need to be to make this change, this outcome,
- 8:27inevitable. And typically identity is linked
- 8:32to values and beliefs rather than actions at its core.
- 8:39When you get the identity right, the behaviour naturally.
- 8:43Flows from the beliefs. That are aligned with the
- 8:47identity. That means that it's a foregone
- 8:50conclusion that you will achieve.
- 8:52That. Outcome and this idea came
- 8:55originally from someone called Robert Dilts.
- 8:58He was very influential in the early days of NLP and he created
- 9:04Dilts logical levels. At the bottom of this you've got
- 9:09environment and behaviour. So most people, they try and
- 9:14change their environment and what they do to make a change to
- 9:18their life. So all of those people going to
- 9:21the gym in January, instead of being on their couch in their
- 9:26lounge, they're now in a gym that's changing their
- 9:28environment. And instead of watching TV,
- 9:31they're now lifting weights or going on a treadmill that rarely
- 9:36lasts. The people that are in the gym
- 9:41all year round have certain beliefs about exercise or it's
- 9:45linked to their identity and therefore it doesn't matter if
- 9:50they missed your gym session because they will consistently
- 9:53go to the gym throughout the whole year.
- 9:56There are some people that have the identity of being a smoker
- 10:02and they try and quit, they try and change the behaviour but I
- 10:06want you to think of a non-smoker.
- 10:08How much discipline or motivation does a non-smoker
- 10:12need not to smoke? 0 because at the identity level,
- 10:18it's simply something they simply don't want to.
- 10:20Do so if there's. One key outcome I would
- 10:24encourage you to look at to make the most out of making real
- 10:29progress in the next year, it's to focus on who you are at your
- 10:34identity, not on what you do. And here's the interesting
- 10:40thing, a lot of people when they focus on who they want to be,
- 10:46sometimes link it to very much behaviourable things.
- 10:51So it's kind of like I'm someone who goes to the gym, but it the
- 10:55kind of people who go to the gym a lot don't link it to their
- 10:59behaviour. It's just, you know, they have
- 11:03beliefs about what the gym is doing for their body and
- 11:07sometimes about their emotions too.
- 11:09Like the gym makes me feel good. You know, I love to exercise
- 11:13those beliefs and values are what really influences the
- 11:19identity. There's one final tip before we
- 11:22get to the hypnosis, and that really comes from spinning too
- 11:26many plates. I've done this a long time and I
- 11:29know that sometimes the tendency is on the end of one year.
- 11:34The beginning of a new is to think of every single thing you
- 11:39want to change. And you've probably heard the
- 11:42analogy of plate spinning, that if you spin too many plates,
- 11:46some are going to drop. This can happen with goals and
- 11:51habit changes. That if you decide that you're
- 11:53going to get a promotion, learn a new language, lose weight and
- 12:00make another change as well, you're now almost diluting your
- 12:07focus from one outcome to many outcomes.
- 12:12So for the hypnosis session, I'm going to encourage you to think
- 12:16of just one change. And that could be a change that
- 12:22is related to your health, to your finances, to your overall
- 12:28quality of life. But just one, and the best way
- 12:32to come up with what this one should be is to answer the
- 12:36question, what would be the single change in your life that
- 12:41would have the? Biggest.
- 12:43Positive improvement in the quality of your life.
- 12:48Now for some people that might be their income, for some people
- 12:51it might be their profession. For some people, it might be
- 12:54their overall health and well-being and generally when
- 12:58you figure out what the. One thing is it.
- 13:01Tends to enhance almost every other area of your life.
- 13:07Whereas for some people, if one thing changes positively but it
- 13:12doesn't really make their life any better, all you're doing is
- 13:15you're focusing on a low priority items.
- 13:18I would encourage you to think of what are the high priority
- 13:21items and then focus on one of those that would make the
- 13:25biggest possible change. And by doing that, it gives you
- 13:29the highest possible upside of making that change and then
- 13:33figuring out who do you need to be so that that change or that
- 13:39goal is inevitable. Not it may happen, but is
- 13:44inevitable. That kind of version of you
- 13:48exists and probably isn't fully activated now because if it was,
- 13:54you wouldn't need to make the resolution that you're trying to
- 13:57make. We need to release the old
- 14:00identity and step into the new identity where doing that thing
- 14:06is almost a foregone conclusion. It's just inevitable now.
- 14:12This is a more generic session. Most of the hypnosis that I
- 14:17share is actually based on real client sessions, real people
- 14:21facing real issues. And I share the session but
- 14:24protect the confidentiality of the client.
- 14:27It's just my voice that gets recorded.
- 14:30This is different. There is no client.
- 14:32It's just being created for a resource.
- 14:36So that if you do want to make a change going into the new year,
- 14:40this could be helpful in order for you to do it.
- 14:43But I would encourage you to also consider that if you were
- 14:48to work with me directly, then maybe the ability to make more
- 14:53progress quicker. And here's the key question I
- 14:58want you to ask yourself to think of if it would be useful
- 15:02to work with someone that has helped over 1000 people make
- 15:07profound changes in their life. And that is, whatever this
- 15:10change is that you're intending to make, how many times
- 15:14previously have you already attempted and failed to get that
- 15:19outcome? And are you doing anything
- 15:22different now than the other times?
- 15:26And if this feels a bit like a Groundhog Day, if it feels like
- 15:30you're doing something that you've already done before and
- 15:33you're just setting the same intention, the same goal, then
- 15:36you may benefit from working with someone that has helped
- 15:41over 1000 other people to make a change that's actually stuck and
- 15:44lasted and helped them to become that identity that would enable
- 15:49them to keep that change. So if that's of interest, I
- 15:53would encourage you to look in the description of this episode
- 15:57to book a free consultation call.
- 16:00That free consultation call takes place over Zoom.
- 16:02We'll have a chat and who knows, we may end up working together.
- 16:06For now though, I would encourage you to find a quiet,
- 16:10comfortable place, the kind of place where you're not going to
- 16:12be distracted or disturbed to. Relax.
- 16:16And enjoy the session. Take a deep breath in, and as
- 16:33you breathe in, breathe in that. Resourceful feeling of.
- 16:37Calm and relaxation and as you exhale, feel a wonderful feeling
- 16:47of release, as if any tension, stress and worries are starting
- 16:54to leave your body. In your outward breath,
- 17:00breathing in relaxation and exhaling tension.
- 17:08Each breath takes you, the deeper and deeper relaxed.
- 17:19The deeper you breathe, the more relaxed you feel.
- 17:25And the more relaxed you feel, the deeper you breathe.
- 17:33And as your body relaxes, your imagination awakens.
- 17:42With your eyes closed, allow yourself to drift to a place
- 17:46within. The kind of place.
- 17:49Where powerful, profound changes can naturally take place.
- 17:58Continuing to breathe in relaxation and exhale tension.
- 18:05That's it. I want you to imagine a
- 18:10staircase leading down, leading down to your own private cinema.
- 18:20This is a cinema of the past and the future, breathing in
- 18:28relaxation, exhaling tension as you imagine standing there at
- 18:35the top of this staircase. Maybe it's wooden, maybe it's
- 18:41made of marble or carpeted, You decide.
- 18:47As I countdown from 12:50, you will imagine taking a step down
- 18:54each step of the staircase. When I arrive at 0, you will
- 19:02have left the staircase and you will be at a corridor that leads
- 19:08towards your own private cinema. Breathing in relaxation,
- 19:16exhaling tension. 10 taking the first step, That's it.
- 19:23Feeling deeper and deeper, relaxed.
- 19:29That's it, Nine. Another step down the staircase,
- 19:35releasing tension from your jaw, your forehead.
- 19:40That's it 8. Focus now on your neck and your
- 19:44shoulders as you take another step down the staircase.
- 19:49That's it. Feel that tension being released
- 19:54as eight becomes 7. Just imagine your arms all the
- 20:02way down to your fingers feeling.
- 20:05Comfortable. And relaxed.
- 20:10That's it. Almost like your arms.
- 20:14The limbs of A. Puppet with no strings.
- 20:18That's it as six turns to five. Now focus on your internal
- 20:24organs. Your heart is relaxing now.
- 20:32Your lungs are relaxing now. That's it.
- 20:39Stomach all the way down your digestive system into your gut.
- 20:43Relaxing now. All of your internal organs
- 20:48relaxed as five goes to four. Another step down the staircase,
- 20:53all the way down past your diaphragm, deep into the gut if
- 20:59the neck and the shoulders where some people hold on to stress
- 21:04and tension. The lower gut.
- 21:08Is where anxiety lives. So as you breathe in that
- 21:12relaxation, exhale that tension, feel it leaving your body, all
- 21:19the anxiety dissolving into vapor and leaving your body in
- 21:27your outward breath. That's it.
- 21:31As four turns to three, another step down the staircase.
- 21:35That's it. I want you to imagine your legs
- 21:40are getting limp, loose and relaxed initially, your thighs
- 21:46going down into your knees. That's it.
- 21:49Three goes to two, your calf muscles all the way down into
- 21:53your ankles, feeling effortlessly relaxed.
- 21:59Now that's it. Deeper and deeper relaxed down
- 22:07into your toes, so your legs. Like your arms also.
- 22:09Feel limp and loose and relaxed. That's it.
- 22:17And then one from the tips of your toes to the top of your
- 22:20head, all the way down to the tips of your fingers.
- 22:23Feel that ripple of relaxation as you are now down on the final
- 22:29step of the staircase. Feel your body relaxed,
- 22:34comfortable. That's it.
- 22:37And 0 You've now left the staircase, walking down that
- 22:42short corridor and going into your own private cinema.
- 22:50And I want you to imagine. Imagine taking a comfortable
- 22:55seat in your own private cinema. That's it, and I want you to
- 23:04imagine a movie is about to play.
- 23:11This is a short film about an attempted change.
- 23:19That doesn't last. When you focus just on
- 23:23behaviour, breathing and relaxation, exhaling tension, I
- 23:29want you to see your current identity as if you're a.
- 23:34Character an. Actor in a movie focusing.
- 23:40On trying to make. A change linked to what you do.
- 23:47Maybe see yourself trying to lose weight, to change a habit,
- 23:54to do less of one thing or more of something else.
- 23:59Maybe see yourself. Trying to attempt 7.
- 24:03Or 8 different. Goals all at the same time, and
- 24:08I want you to see how this current strategy plays out.
- 24:17What you do well, but what isn't quite right, and maybe this is
- 24:25a. Change that you've.
- 24:26Tried to make before, and if so, maybe see yourself as a little
- 24:32bit wiser able to. Do different.
- 24:36Things to increase the probability.
- 24:41This is your current identity trying to make a change, and I
- 24:48want you to learn everything you can by seeing this version of
- 24:53you and what your unconscious anticipates will be what happens
- 25:01when you try to make this change.
- 25:09I want you to get a sense that some things are good and some
- 25:13things could be improved, and I want you to keep replaying the
- 25:20movie each. Time you.
- 25:22See a mistake? An error.
- 25:27An area of improvement. Just allow yourself to see
- 25:32yourself making making a change that is evolutionary and then
- 25:41starting again, each time seeing yourself more likely to succeed.
- 25:52I want you to imagine that this can keep on happening until you
- 25:57get the best version of you trying to do the right thing.
- 26:08Let's rewind that and consider a different movie.
- 26:14I want you to ask yourself a question.
- 26:18What? Would be the single most
- 26:23impactful change. That you could take.
- 26:27Into the new year. Not 5, not 3, just one.
- 26:36What is the single thing that you could do differently that
- 26:42would positively impact your life?
- 26:49And then ask yourself an even more powerful question.
- 26:59Who do you need to be in order to make that change inevitable?
- 27:08Not what you need to do, but who you need to be.
- 27:14What qualities, What do you need to value?
- 27:19What do you need to believe? And then imagine seeing that
- 27:26version of you, the version of you that is the evolved
- 27:32identity. See that version of you making
- 27:38that change? And I want you to notice the
- 27:44difference. This evolved identity of you is
- 27:52living in a different way. It's less about.
- 27:57What you do and more about who you are, a vegan doesn't
- 28:06require. Discipline or self?
- 28:12Control not to eat meat because a vegan doesn't eat meat.
- 28:23I want you to imagine what your identity needs to be in order to
- 28:31align perfectly with this change.
- 28:41I want you to ask yourself what would need to follow the words I
- 28:48am in order for this change to naturally align with that
- 28:57version of you. Consider this the building
- 29:03blocks. And now imagine observing that
- 29:08future version of you there on that screen, in that identity,
- 29:17with that focus, with all of those values, beliefs, and
- 29:24qualities that would naturally align with that change.
- 29:30And then imagine playing. These two movies.
- 29:34Side by side so you can see the difference the.
- 29:38Version of you trying to. Do the right thing compared with
- 29:43you being the right version of you.
- 29:52Notice the. Distinctions the differences
- 29:55which one has more in a conflict and struggle, which one's more
- 30:01likely to fail, and if your. Unconscious accepts.
- 30:07That when you are aligned with an identity, the change becomes
- 30:14inevitable and I want you to imagine seeing that identity
- 30:20version of you. Making progress.
- 30:26Being consistent, doing what's required.
- 30:33Not with a burst. Of motivation or willpower.
- 30:37But through alignment, by being that version of, you see that
- 30:45version of you on that screen making.
- 30:48Progress. Small wins become bigger wins.
- 30:54That version of you doesn't look at success or failure, but
- 30:58everything is a feedback loop. If something doesn't go to plan,
- 31:03that version of you makes an amendment, a tweak, A
- 31:07refinement, and see yourself progressing.
- 31:11Until you have. Irrefutable evidence that that
- 31:17version of you has made the change or achieved the goal that
- 31:24you have determined would have the single biggest impact on
- 31:31your life. Breathing in, breathing out,
- 31:37feeling deeper and deeper, relaxed.
- 31:41And when you're convinced that that future version of you is
- 31:46aligned with an identity that would make it inevitable that
- 31:53you make that change, rewind it. And then imagine stepping into
- 31:58the screen and feel what it would feel like to wake up
- 32:04tomorrow being that version of you.
- 32:10Notice how the resources are different, the thoughts are
- 32:16different and the behaviour doing the right thing.
- 32:22Is not the. Intention, but now the side
- 32:26effect of being that version of you.
- 32:33I want you to notice that when there are setbacks or
- 32:36challenges, this version of you linked to the identity doesn't
- 32:43even perceive it as failure. It's just a.
- 32:48Pause for reflection, a feedback loop.
- 32:52You reassess and then continue. Not every day needs to be
- 32:57perfect in order for that version of you to be aligned
- 33:07with this goal or change. I want you to imagine now.
- 33:13It's a year from now and I want you to imagine you're now
- 33:19thinking back to what impact that change had on the quality
- 33:24of your life. Did it give you more freedom,
- 33:29More confidence? More courage.
- 33:34More feelings of. Pride or something else?
- 33:38And then imagine how different it feels to be a year from now,
- 33:45wanting to make another big change, but building on the
- 33:51foundation of having already made that change.
- 33:58And you can do that. You could imagine yourself one
- 34:01year from now, knowing what it would feel like to have already
- 34:07lived with that change, that it becomes so natural that it
- 34:14requires no effort. It's simply how you are living
- 34:20now. I want you to imagine leaving
- 34:25that cinema, walking back up the stairs.
- 34:29And starting to float. All the way back to your
- 34:32reality, but now with clarity. Clarity as to the change.
- 34:40A willingness to step into a new identity and a willingness to be
- 34:47consistent, even if it means pausing for reflection and then
- 34:54moving forward once again. Very soon I will count from 1:00
- 35:01to 10:00 to awaken you. So take a deep breath in through
- 35:05your nose and out through your nose.
- 35:09Wiggle your fingers. Wiggle your toes, connect and
- 35:13calibrate into the here and the now as I now count from 1:00 to
- 35:1810:00 to awaken the evolved identity.
- 35:24The version of you that can make that change feel inevitable, A
- 35:32foregone conclusion. It simply will be done.
- 35:40Starting to count 123 waking up. 456.
- 35:44More alert 7-8 open your eyes Open your eyes 910 Wide awake,
- 35:51Wide awake. Wide awake.
- 35:59Thank. You so much for joining me on
- 36:01today's episode of The Hypnotist.
- 36:04If you've enjoyed this episode or got some value from it,
- 36:07please give it a five star rating and review.
- 36:11And maybe, you know someone that would also benefit from this
- 36:14particular episode, in which case.
- 36:17Share the episode. With them so they can also get
- 36:19the benefit too. And if you would like to.
- 36:23Listen to this episode where it's just the hypnosis.
- 36:27So no intro, no outro, no explanation, just the hypnosis
- 36:31and completely ad free. There will be a link in the
- 36:34description where you can subscribe at a very low cost and
- 36:38only get access to the hypnosis O.
- 36:41If that's of interest, please check that.
- 36:43Out Thank you. Again for being a regular
- 36:47listener of the hypnotist and I'll see you again soon for
- 36:50more.