Instant Stress Management

To the ancient Indian system of Yoga, breathing is considered to be so important that before any task a yogi first prepares his/her breathing. Proper breath control is considered the key to healthy living. In fact, learning to do proper diaphragmatic breathing has been proven to reduce stress and anxiety permanently.

Our breathing is something that we have become so familiar with that we are almost completely unaware of its effects. Consider this, our breath bridges our conscious and unconscious i.e. unconsciously we are always breathing and at any time we can consciously focus on our breathing.

This is important to remember because all our emotional states are reflected in our breathing. If we are stressed our breathing tends to be shallow and focused in our upper lungs. In fact jerky breathing itself will actually increase anxiety and stress. While when we are relaxed we tend to breathe fully into our belly. Knowing this you can observe yourself and know when its time to consciously take control of your breathing to control your stress.

Practicing belly breathing (diaphragmatic breathing) can be extremely beneficial and can be done anytime.

Just follow this simple method

Sit or stand with your back straight, put your hand on your belly and breath in a slow and deep pattern.

Don't try to overfill the lungs or empty them - just breath softly but fully - expanding your belly on the inhale and contracting on the exhale.

Keep your attention focused on your breathing.

You will find that your mind will tend to drift. That is normal.

Simply return your attention to your breath when you notice you got distracted.

Allow the relaxation from this breathing pattern to spread through your body and just enjoy yourself.

The following is a breathing technique called Pranayama.

Tip: Practice the method and then expand the gaps to suit your breathing capacity. i.e. you may take longer to do each repetition of the breathing technique as it may take more air to fill your lungs. Find a comfortable pattern and stick with it.

The purpose of visualization is to enable you to quickly clear mental stress, tension, and anxious thinking. The visualization can be used when feeling stressed and is particularly useful when your mind is racing with fearful, anxious thinking.

This visualization process, when practiced frequently, is very effective for eliminating deep-seated mental anxieties or intrusive thoughts. To gain maximum benefit, the exercise must be carried out for longer then 10 minutes at a time, as anything shorter will not bring noticeable results.

There is no right or wrong way to carry out the visualization. Be intuitive with it and do not feel you are unable to carry it out if you feel you are not very good at seeing mental imagery. As long as your attention is on the exercise, you will gain benefit.

It is best to do this exercise in a quiet place where you won't be disturbed, and then when you are more practiced you will be able to get the same positive results in a busier environment such as the workplace. You should notice a calming effect on your state of mind along with a sensation of mental release and relaxation.

Either sitting or standing, close your eyes and move your attention to your breath. To become aware of your breathing, place one hand on your upper chest and one on your stomach. Take a breath and let your stomach swell forward as you breathe in and fall back gently as you breathe out. Take the same depth of breath each time and try to get a steady rhythm going.

Your hand on your chest should have little or no movement. Again, try to take the same depth of breath each time you breathe in. This is called Diaphragmatic Breathing.

When you feel comfortable with this technique, try to slow your breathing rate down by instituting a short pause after you have breathed out and before you breathe in again. Initially, it may feel as though you are not getting enough air in, but with regular practice this slower rate will soon start to feel comfortable.

It is often helpful to develop a cycle where you count to three when you breathe in, pause, and then count to three when you breathe out (or 2, or 4-whatever is comfortable for you). This will also help you focus on your breathing without any other thoughts coming into your mind.

If you are aware of other thoughts entering your mind, just let them go and bring your attention back to counting and breathing. Continue doing this for a few minutes. (If you practice this, you will begin to strengthen the Diaphragmatic Muscle, and it will start to work normally-leaving you with a nice relaxed feeling all the time.)

Now move your attention to your feet. Try to really feel your feet. See if you can feel each toe. Picture the base of your feet and visualize roots growing slowly out through your soles and down into the earth. The roots are growing with quickening pace and are reaching deep into the soil of the earth. You are now rooted firmly to the earth and feel stable like a large oak or redwood tree.

Stay with this feeling of grounded safety and security for a few moments. Once you have created a strong feeling or impression of being grounded like a tree, visualize a cloud of bright light forming way above you. A bolt of lightning from the luminous cloud hits the crown of your head, and that ignites a band of bright white light descending slowly from your head all the way down your body, over your legs, and out past your toes.

As the band of light passes over you, feel it clearing your mental state. It is illuminating your mind and clearing any disturbing or stressful thoughts that you may have been thinking about. Repeat this image four or five times until you feel a sense of clearing and release from any anxious thinking.

In finishing, see yourself standing under a large, luminescent waterfall. The water is radiant and bubbling with vitality and life. As you stand under the waterfall, you can feel the water run over every inch of your body, soothing you and instilling within you a sense of deep calm.

Try to taste the water. Open your mouth and let it run into your mouth, refreshing you. Hear it as it bounces off the ground around you. The water is life itself and it is washing away stress and worry from your mind and body. After a moment, open your eyes.

Try to use all of your senses when carrying out the visualization. To make the pictures in your mind as real as possible, use your senses of touch, taste, and hearing. Feel the water trickle down your body; hear the sound it makes as it splashes over you.

The more realistic the imagined scenarios, the more benefit you will gain. Many people report very beneficial and soothing results from using these simple visualizations frequently. The mind is much like a muscle in that, in order to relax, it needs to regularly release what it is holding onto.

You can use any situation or location that will help calm you. We liken this to "finding your happy place". Maybe you feel relaxed in a swimming pool or on the beach. Imagine yourself there. Just make sure wherever you go in your mind is a place where you can be calm and rested.

By visualizing the different situations, you are allowing your mind to release. It is like sending a message to your brain that when you close your eyes and begin this process it is time for letting go of anything that it has been mentally holding onto, including anxious thinking.

In order to train your mind how to let go of the stress, it is important to practice this daily. With practice, you can learn to release all stress within minutes of starting the exercise. Your daily practice should take place before going to bed, as that will enable you to sleep more soundly.

Many people do not do these visualizations in the bedroom but some other room before going to bed. That way, when they enter the bedroom and close the door, they are leaving the mental stress and anxious thinking behind them. Just be sure you have the opportunity to totally concentrate on your mental images.

Visualization as a tool for dealing with mental stress is very effective. If such visualization is carried out properly, you can reach a deep feeling of inner calm. This technique probably will not work in helping to end an anxiety attack, but it can help that attack from beginning. It is a very powerful support tool for ridding yourself of general anxiety sensations.

With practice, you find you go days without having anxious thinking interrupt your life, and importantly, this significantly reduces the level of general anxiety you feel.

Visualization is simply a tool you can use to overcome anxious thoughts and feelings. Let's look at various ways that you can combat excessive stress - beginning with music.

Meditation is probably the most powerful & effective method we know of for stress management. It has been on the cover of Time Magazine , the film director David Lynch promotes transcendental meditation and Dr. Herbert Benson has made a name for himself with three meditative techniques that invoke "the relaxation response".

You can learn meditation just about everywhere nowadays. Everything from breathing techniques to machines for bio-feedback can help you learn to meditate.

Using the alpha meditation training recordings you can go into a meditative state that would normally take weeks, maybe months of practice. In fact, the sound technology used for the meditation training recordings on this page use the same sound technology touted by holosync.com as the key to "meditating deeper than a Zen Monk" (this site is not affiliated with holosync)

About Meditation and Brainwaves

Researchers have discovered that certain brain wave frequencies correspond to different levels of activity. You can read more about it in another article by Time Magazine called "Alpha Wave of The Future".

Beta 14-30Hz Alert - You tend to do waking activities at this frequency

Alpha 7-14 Hz - Relaxed with Alert Attention - A Basic Meditative State

Theta 4-7 Hz - Deep meditative state- most people fall asleep in theta.

Delta 0.5-4 Hz - Deep sleep

The following meditation training track has a background frequency of about 10 Hz. This is to help train you to enter an Alpha state AT WILL enabling you to manage stress easily.

Benefits of Alpha

Helps the body and mind relax very quickly.
Enhances creativity.
Enhances learning.
It helps synchronize your left and right hemispheres bringing more of your brain 'on-line', making this very good for deep thinking.
With some practice you can enter and use Alpha whenever you like.
Alpha helps create an overall healthy state of mind and body.

To learn more about this technique visit Meditation Training for Stress Management

The following video combines guided visualization for relaxation with binural beasts (a sound technology) to guide your brain to a level of alpha.

So the relaxation of the following video is very very deep. You must use headphones though.

Low self-esteem can lead to various problems in someone's career, relationships and personal life. Low self-esteem can easily be transformed into stress and even depression which can further affect one's metal, physical and social disposition.

Respected psycho-therapist, Dr. Nathaniel Branden, defines self-esteem as the "disposition to experience oneself as being competent enough to be able to keep up with the challenges in one's life." The concept of self-esteem is basically all about how one views himself and his place in life itself. It is overall view of oneself based on reality.

Having a healthy self-esteem is important. It gives someone a positive outlook in life and this is reflected in his performance in his job, in his relationships and basically in everything that he does.

Here are 10 helpful tips on how one can boost his self-esteem.

1) Accept yourself

People should remember that everyone is unique and beauty is to be found in every human being. Yes, other people can be better in doing certain things but this fact shouldn't hinder people from being the best that they can be.

Everybody is special and unique. A person's true worth cannot be seen in only one dimension of his life. For example, people usually envy the rich, thinking that they have everything and thus they are the happiest people in the world. However, the best things in life can never be bought by money. Stories of unhappiness among the rich are everywhere around us and this is a sign that wealth cannot be equated with happiness.

2) Self-Appreciation

Accepting oneself is different from appreciating oneself. Self-acceptance is a pre-requisite to self-appreciation but the latter must always be present. One might accept oneself under a pessimistic light and this is not very healthy. "I accept that I cannot do the things that I really want to do because I am weak" is a sample statement which depicts an unhealthy self-acceptance.

Appreciating oneself under a positive light is a definite self-esteem booster. One must highlight the good things about him and try to reinforce them and be better at those things.

3) Refrain from Comparing

Low self-esteem can be brought by the environment. Again, this can be traced to the lack of self-acceptance. Everybody is different and you have qualities that no other person has. A general sense of self-worth should be built without comparing oneself to other people.

4) Don't Put Yourself Down

Nobody's perfect. Making a mistake is definitely normal and people should start accepting this fact. People with low self-esteem tend to put themselves even lower by continuously and harshly putting themselves down. An inner voice which reverberates inside their heads tells them that there is no hope. This should not be the case and having control over the inner voices can be the solution for this problem. Cut yourself some slack, you've done your best and that's what's important.

5) Befriend Positive People

Having friends who are positive towards dealing with life's challenges can influence someone into seeing life in the same light and eventually build his self-esteem.

6) Remind Yourself of the Positive Things About You

Again, there is beauty in everyone. Remember all the things that you like about yourself and the good things which you have done and make a list of the most striking ones. This will help in self-appreciation and definitely give you something to smile about.

7) Use tools

Buying books, cd's and other materials about building self-esteem wouldn't hurt, would it? These materials can definitely provide some informative ways on how to deal with low self-esteem. However, buying these materials would be useless if the lessons which they give wouldn't be applied in real life.

8) Engage in Fun Activities

Having fun once in a while releases stress, takes the negative ideas out of one's head and leaves space for positive thoughts to fill in. Having fun makes one feel happy about oneself.

9) Hangout with Friends

Having fun can be done privately but nothing beats fun with friends. Friends are usually a part of the primary support group of a person and can provide much needed conversations for a down-and-out person.

10) Seek Help

When all else fail, seek professional help from a psychologist. There's nothing wrong with taking care of yourself since low self-esteem can lead to more serious problems.

Having low self-esteem can be solved with the right tools and the right attitude. Loving yourself is the ultimate way which leads to a healthy and a better "you."

Instant Stress Management Principle # 1: Every Thought Affects the Body As Well

Years of scientific study have proven conclusively that the mind and body are interrelated. In a feature in Time Magazine it is written, "Not only is the mind like the rest of the body, but the well-being of one is intimately intertwined with that of the other. This makes sense because they share the same systems? nervous, circulatory, endocrine and immune. What happens in the pancreas or liver can directly affect brain function. Disorders of the brain, conversely, can send out biochemical shock waves that disturb the rest of the body." The article is called "Your Mind, Your Body" published in the issue dated Sunday, Jan. 12, 2003.

Since your mind does affect your body, which means it influences chemicals that are released in to your body, you can reduce your stress with JUST your mind. Remember, every thought affects the body as well.

It is important to become aware of your thoughts. If you are thinking negative thoughts then your brain is releasing chemicals, which are sustaining negative emotions in your body. All negative emotions have a bad effect on your mind-body in the long run. So, regular stressful thoughts WILL make your immune system weaker and your body will experience the negative effects of stress.

Catch yourself when you are thinking negative thoughts and you have made a good positive first step. Direct your mind on to a positive outlook and you have taken the second step needed to directing your thoughts in a way that will reduce your stress.

How can you create a positive outlook? By focusing on a positive aspect of the situation you are faced with.

For example; If you have to clean a whole sink of dirty dishes it can seem like a lot of boring work. However, if you focus on how the dishes will look when they are cleaned and put away and how good YOU will feel about it at that time THEN you are focusing on a positive outcome.

If you keep in mind that you thoughts will affect your body then you can learn to keep watch on your thoughts. By keeping your thoughts positive or at least neutral, you keep yourself fresher and more energized.

In conclusion, if you focus on a positive outcome the task you are doing will become easier and therefore less stressful. Learning to manage your thoughts and focusing on the positive in any given situation is an extremely important stress management skill.

Instant Stress Management Principle #2: Imagination is Stronger than Knowledge

We all know that ghosts do not exist, at least most of us do. Yet when sitting around a campfire and listening to ghost stories most of us, even strong unbelievers in the supernatural, will get spooked. This is not because the people around the campfire suddenly became believers in ghosts but because our imagination overcame our knowledge and released the chemicals in our body that goes with fear. Our imagination trumped our knowledge.

Most of our stress occurs before the actual event that is supposed to cause stress. For example, if there is a presentation that you have to give to your office or class, it will cause most people a good deal of stress way before the actual presentation.

However, if you suddenly discover that you are moving to a different office or school and your upcoming presentation doesn't matter anymore, then suddenly the stress you were feeling will decrease tremendously. This means that your experience of stress before the actual event was dictated by your perception. i.e. by your imagination.

In dealing with any event, how you imagine it to be, will influence your levels of stress. You may know there is nothing to worry about when the boss or principal calls you to his or her office. Yet your imagination will often provide you with reasons to feel stressed.

Imagination always trumps knowledge.

You can use this knowledge about the power of your imagination to your advantage. If your imagination can create imagery in your head that creates a stress response, you can also do the opposite.

Imagine your presentation going smoothly or that the audience is indifferent to you and will forget you as soon as you leave the stage, then your stress will decrease. If you enjoy talking to a crowd then just imagine yourself having fun and being in tune with your audience without being too caught up in their reaction (takes some of the pressure off).

Imagine yourself relaxing on the beach while you are waiting to talk to your boss and this will help you stay relaxed. You will also have more of your mental resources available to you to tackle a problem if that is that you have been called for.

Imagination may be stronger than knowledge yet imagination can be brought under your control in many situations. So, knowledge of the power of your imagination can be empowering for you if you apply this knowledge to the proper circumstances. This will decrease your stress in most situations you will encounter.

Instant Stress Management Principle #3: What You Expect Tends To Be Realized

Many of us will make up in the morning not wanting to wake up. Breakfast may not be good or we find ourselves in the middle of morning traffic. This is enough to make us feel like it is going to be a bad day. So it is. Everything that can be seen in a negative light IS seen that way.

If you start the day genuinely saying, "I feel wonder, relaxed and refreshed," and maintain this attitude then the minor inconveniences of the day will bounce off your skin as if they are trivial, which, from a perspective, they are.

"As you sow, so shall you reap," says the famous bible verse. So to keep yourself in a state of mind where most stressful events will bounce off your skin all you have to do is maintain a positive attitude and positive expectations.

Of course don't overdo the positive expectations. Just say and feel like,' no matter what happens it is a part of your day and you can deal with it easily'. This will keep you relaxed and poised.

There is an old story that might be appropriate here.

There was a farmer whose horse ran away. All his neighbors came by to say how sorry they were at his misfortune. All he said was, "We will see."

Next, his horse returns fallen by a group of wild horses. His neighbors congratulate on his good fortune and the farmer once again says, "We Shall see."

Then his son falls off the same horse and breaks his leg. The neighbors once again exclaim at his misfortune and once again he says, "We shall see."

In a few days the army comes by collecting young men for a war. The farmer's son was ignored as his leg was broken. His neighbors congratulate him and all he says is, "We shall see."

Notice that in this story every event of the day or week did not make the farmer giddy with happiness or depressed at having a bad day. He maintained an open positive attitude and didn't let the events of the day get to him. Of course this may seem a little extreme to some but you get the idea.

In conclusion, if you expect yourself to handle a given situation with ease then your stress will decrease. If you expect yourself to handle a situation with difficulty but still able to come out fine then your stress levels will also stay down. If you take every event of the day or week as something extremely important, bad or good, that too will increase your stress. What you expect will create your day around you.

Instant Stress Management Principle #4: What You Resist The Most Stays With You

Have you noticed that when you try to avoid something it keeps happening? For example, you could be saying to yourself that you will not get angry over a traffic jam but you still do. Or maybe you are trying not to yawn so you don't give off the impression of getting bored, but often you fine that you need to yawn almost nonstop.

If you imagine something stressful you feel stressed. For example; imagine having to wake up extra early to attend a seminar or having to work through a 10 mile traffic jam. On the other hand, if you imagine something relaxing you feel relaxed for example; imagine laying back on the beach or a picnic in a park. This aspect of how your mind works make it clear that the images you have on your mind will influence your mind body system.

When you are trying very hard to resist something then what you are resisting will be on your mind. i.e. You have to keep an image or thought in your mind of what you are resisting to be able to resist it. If you don't do this then you won't know what you are trying to resist. So by the very act of resisting an idea or thought you end up keeping it on your mind so what you resist must stay with you.

Here is another example; Imagine that you meet a person who says to you that he/she will give you a $1000 if you don't think of a pink elephant all day. Of course, this is a really weird thing for anyone to say and I'm sure you don't spend your time thinking of something as random as a pink elephant. However, trying to resist that image of a pink elephant with a thousand dollars on the line would be almost impossible. Once again, what you resist tends to stay with you.

To apply this to stress management just realize that if you are trying very hard to resist something that may cause you stress then you end up feeling more stress in relation to it. Instead, what you need to do is practice an alternative form on that you find relaxing.

Instead of resisting something, accept it and focus on something more appropriate. This will help you deal with stress better in all aspects of your life.

What's causing your stress?

A slow buildup of everyday annoyances: a dead car battery, traffic jam, buttons that pop off your clothes as you are going to an important meeting. It's the little things that get under your skin

Is it a tight schedule and seemingly insurmountable problems? Bills to pay, a boss to please, a colicky baby to pacify? Juggling many roles is a main cause of stress.
Maybe it's positive and negative life changes, from the joy of a wedding to the loss of a spouse, from the exhilaration of a job promotion to sadness at moving away from old friends.

Perhaps the cause of your stress is inner conflict. Anger with your boss actually may be old anger against a parent bubbling to the surface. If you can recognize a pattern from the past, this can be an instant stress reliever. Take some time, even just 30 seconds and write down your feelings.

What you need to do is relax. Huh? It can't be that simple! Yes, it can and you can do it. No, we can't control other people and situations. What you can do is control how you respond to people and events.

What you have done is to give away control to others. What you need to do is regain that control, seal it up and only let the twins out when it's really necessary.
When was the last time you actually relaxed? Can you remember what it was like? Were you calm and collected? Was your breathing normal? Were your muscles loose? And, did you feel that way without any outside stimulants like drugs? If so, the good news is that you can restore that same feeling at will. Yes, you can definitely take it back whenever or wherever you choose.

When your mind is bypassing the chemical twins and sending truly relaxing messages to your body, wonderful things begin to happen. Just as the chemical twins jump to attention when you stress, other chemicals go to work when you relax causing you to have a feeling of contentment.

While relaxing, actions taken by people and external events are still important but not necessarily personal. You are able to discern that no one is launching a direct attack upon you or anyone or anything of yours.

Small problems remain small problems and not the woolly mammoth charging down upon you. Large events will become smaller and not cause you to get out of your car during gridlock and shout obscenities to the drivers in front of you.

Those people who are horrible and annoying, shrink to a caricature serving up no more significance in your world than an ant on a picnic table. As you continue your journey toward relaxation, you can watch these people with amusement. When you reach the point of total relaxation you are able to see your world as it is, not for how you feel about it.

Everything you do is a matter of choice. You choose to be angry, happy or indifferent. You make a conscious choice to take action or not to take action.
On the opposite end of the spectrum are the chemical twins controlling what you know is stress and you are bumped, pushed and thrown into chaos. No choice and no idea why you don't have a choice.

Obviously, relaxing is a good thing because it gives you choice. It puts you back in the driver's seat instead of the chemical twins.

So relax already! Sure, just like that.

Do you remember tormenting your neighbor's cat as a child? You had the upper hand until kitty fought back. You'd step away from the torment and probably forget all about it until the next time you scratched. It took a few lessons, but pretty soon you understood if you tormented the cat, the cat would fight back. So you stopped. That was a conscious action taken to prevent being hurt. It was a survival strategy just like fight or flight, except that this was behavior modification instead of an automatic response.

As you grew older, the behavior for survival changed but the bottom line is that you probably used a dozen behaviors without even thinking about it every day of the week. The one behavior that you probably overlooked is the most important one of all, the behavior to relax.

If relaxation is just another behavior, then that means it's a learned response. And, if that is the case you are able to change the behavior. Chances are you were never taught how to do that, which is why you are reading this in the first place.

You have to teach your brain how to do it. Actually, your brain already knows how subconsciously, but you need to teach it how to do it consciously. In order to do that, you need an understanding of how your mind works.

Everything you have ever encountered or done in your entire lifetime is permanently recorded in your subconscious mind. Most of it is not remembered consciously. If I ask you, "How much is two and two," you will immediately answer, "four." That was from your conscious memory. But if I ask you what you had for dinner ten years ago tonight, it will more than like be impossible for you to consciously remember it at all. However, your subconscious remembers it in great detail.

When you drive your car, you are probably thinking about all kinds of things other than driving the car. Your subconscious, through habit, is controlling all your driving actions. You just automatically arrive at your destination without giving it detailed conscious thought.

You don't have to think "push the brake" or "ease up on the gas pedal." You do it all automatically, controlled by your subconscious. Your subconscious is designed to protect you. It controls all body functions. If you are cold in the night, it awakens you. If you need to go to the bathroom, it awakens you also. It controls your heartbeat and all other involuntary functions of the body.

Your subconscious doesn't rationalize; it doesn't ask questions, doesn't know truth from falsehood. It merely acts upon whatever information is stored within.
There are actually four states of consciousness, but for our purposes we will be dealing with just two:

Beta - this is our waking state

Alpha - first step to the subconscious

The Alpha state is where we will begin our work. This is the state where you are relaxed, the normal machinations of your conscious mind are just a little distant and you feel warm and comfortable. The chemical twins are sealed up where they belong

Have you ever sat in a car waiting for a friend or family member to run in and make a quick purchase or run an errand? It may be a warm, sunny, spring day. The window is open and you can feel a gentle breeze caress your cheek and fluff your hair. The sun feels warm and cozy on your face. Before you know it, your eyelids begin to droop as you sit and enjoy a moment of oneness with your surroundings. Not awake and not asleep, you are totally relaxed and content to drift along quietly enjoying the sensation of the warm sun and the gentle breeze.

If you have ever had this or a similar experience, you were in that Alpha state. Close your eyes and see if you can recapture the same sensations you had while you were in that state. Take a few moments to do that, then imagine a car door slamming and pulling you instantaneously back into the Beta state. Wow! What a rude awakening.

Alpha level is where you can do the best work for yourself on a subconscious level. This is also a state of meditation, and the level you work with using self-hypnosis.

The truth is that you are actually in this state every single day at least two times. Those times are the fleeting moments just before you drift off to sleep and just as you awaken.

Your conscious mind has the ability to reason out a course of action that would be helpful to you. However, the conscious mind needs the cooperation of the subconscious and will send its energy out to implement the decision.

Your energy source is the subconscious mind. No matter what you consciously do to instruct the subconscious mind to do something there is no way to permanently override what the subconscious mind has been programmed to do.

Let's take a look at some examples. If a very young child is told by a parent, teacher, elder sibling or anyone else in a position of authority:

"You never do anything right."
"What's the matter with you?"
"Why can't you be more like Billy?"
"Don't you have a brain in your head."
"Why are you so stupid?"
"You will never amount to anything!"

This child will often be a failure in life. The reason is that this child's conscious mind is not developed enough to block this type of information. Therefore, it becomes a fact in his subconscious mind.

As he/she grow to adulthood, his subconscious will be a very good student and apply everything it has learned. Remember, the subconscious is not right or wrong, good or bad, it is merely a computer just like the one you are reading from now.

The subconscious will force the conscious to act in exactly the same manner that was programmed as a child.

The subconscious mind will only accept what the conscious mind believes at the time the suggestion is offered. However, if the conscious mind changes an opinion on a given matter after it has become embedded in the subconscious the subconscious will not change with it.

These factors are important to understand before you begin your work. There are certain "tapes" in your subconscious mind that will not be changed. What you can do is create "new" responses.