On Being True to Yourself

Prior to developing this blog, I had had a different
one. The following text is an entry from that first
incarnation.

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Yesterday I got a call from someone who wanted to address Hypnosis and Confidence. However, a very short time into the conversation it seemed to me that the issue wasn't confidence at all.

It was actually that he had been reading all of these books about how you should smile, and act certain ways, to make a positive impression on people. He named it "confidence" and wanted to find a way to smile more. That's all well and good, really. The books will certainly tell you what people are most receptive to. However, the one thing that I think was lacking for me in this idea was a FIRM foundation. ACTING happy isn't the same as BEING happy...and if you ARE happy, then you don't have to ACT it.

While hypnosis can be good for creating genuine feelings of happiness, even in times when you couldn't imagine it, I suggested that what he really need to do was to be himself. His response, too general.

If someone is going around always trying to moderate who and how they are, and s/he is constantly trying to figure out how to do something different or better, then s/he is not in the moment being true to who s/he is. To be true to oneself, you're happy when you're happy...and you smile because you're happy...not because it's what someone else expects.

This is not to say that one shouldn't consider another when in their company, but every interaction has several levels, and in my opinion, I think the most important one, and the most solid (when it's clear) is the one that the person knows who they are, and acts FROM that place and not in reaction TO someone else's perceptions or expectations.

I explained to him that if he wasn't happy all that much, and wanted to be happier, the books he was reading could help superficially. However, if he wanted to actually BE happier more often, then it would be very possible hypnosis could be a building block for that change.