Sometimes it's so nice to spend hours online. Or to dream away completely with a fun series or otherwise escape reality. Everyone has a difficult period in his or her life when he or she wants to escape reality and fortunately this can be done in fairly "innocent" ways. But how innocent is escape behavior really? In this blog, I explore that in more detail.
What is escape behavior?
Escape behavior is about engaging yourself in something other than the problem.
Most studied are media to escape thoughts, such as worries, heavy moods, caused by difficult situations in your life that way[1].
What are we fleeing into?
Most of the time, we flee to the media. For example, we engage in prolonged television viewing (or Netflix), Internet surfing or gaming. These three are the most studied and are the most effective for taking a break from thinking about your problems.
But there are other ways of escape behavior, such as shopping. Compulsive shopping, that is, needing to shop, for example, is linked to escape behavior. Online shopping can even link this to fleeing into media when you are too stressed. Especially if those negative emotions persist, this can cause compulsive shopping to remain long-term. It can then also spill over into an addiction[2].
Then there are those who take refuge in gambling. This, of course, can also be done online.
Causes flight behavior
Escape behavior usually comes from negative thoughts and negative moods. If you have major fatigue, depressive symptoms, anxiety and low self-esteem, you are more likely to show escape behavior.
Gaming and escape behavior
Gaming is an active form of escape behavior; watching a series, for example, is a passive form of escape behavior. Research shows that active escape behavior often occurs when people lose their sense of control and their sense of identity.
Gaming then ensures that their sense of control and identity is still restored. This is because the role-playing of your avatar (puppet in the game) ensures that you "are" someone. In doing so, it satisfies the need for control by allowing that puppet to do things in the virtual world[3].
It is easy to guess that this active form of escape behavior can be addictive if the problem is difficult to solve in real life.
Social media and escape behavior
Facebook is one of the most well-known social media channels used for flight behavior. Using Facebook to escape increases the likelihood of a Facebook addiction, but this may not always be the case.
For example, if you are an active Facebook user, which means you regularly post something on Facebook, Facebook can become an addiction. This is due to Facebook's liking features that create a "good" feeling.
Instead, are you a passive Facebook user? You look at it but don't do much else with it, then the chances of getting a Facebook addiction are much lower[4].
Gambling and escape behavior
People take refuge in gambling when they can't actually keep up with society's idea of work and capitalism. After all, gambling is a way to get money "without working" anyway (I imagine many poker players now think this is hard work after all).
The daily problems of work can be forgotten for a moment when you go gambling and especially when you win. Especially if that person's daily activities are fairly risk-free and he/she still feels the need to experience risk and its thrill.
People can go gaming to be freed from boredom, stress, anxiety, and other daily frustrations.
What effects flight behavior has
Escape behavior has short- and long-term effects, and it doesn't even always have to be bad.
The positive effects are:
- Relaxation
- Improved mood
- A sense of belonging somewhere (in the case of online gaming)[5].
The negative effects are:
- Withdrawal
- Excessive media usage.
- Escape behavior becomes an addiction.
- Shopping (too much) puts you in money trouble.
Stopping escape behavior before it becomes problematic
As long as escape behavior provides relaxation, improved mood and a more social life, there is not much to worry about.
Does flight behavior actually cause your social contacts to diminish. That you only watch television, surf the Internet or play games and have no other real life. You feel guilty every time you buy something because your savings account is dwindling fast.
Surely it's time to stop the escape behavior before it becomes truly problematic.
This is where hypnosis can play a role.
Initially, they look at the beliefs you have combined with the escape behaviors you have.
In addition, look at thoughts before, during and after the escape behavior.
This can be done, for example, with a Socratic conversation while under hypnosis. Through this you discover for yourself what the foundations for certain thoughts are and what your beliefs are based on. Usually through such a conversation you will come to the conclusion yourself that some beliefs do not make sense.
This offers the chance that the hypnotist can then provide new well-true suggestions that you can then incorporate as new beliefs.
These may include suggestions such as:
"With your escape behavior, you are replacing human interaction with another activity."
"Your escape behavior is a substitute for association life."
"The money you gamble you never get back, while you do get some back from social connections," says Dr. K. K., who is a member of the community.
"The time you spend on television/internet/social media can also be spent doing something active (possibly with friends)."
In addition, a hypnotist can also use regression to find out when this flight behavior began in order to get to the root cause of the flight behavior and make it disappear. Ultimately, you do this as someone who suffers from flight behavior yourself, but the hypnotist helps you with this while you are under hypnosis.
Visualize not finishing the escape behavior
Another way to stop the escape behavior is to use guided visualization to visualize not finishing the escape behavior.
- For example, you go to Netflix but get bored and go do something else.
- You go to town to shop, but you get bored and go home again.
- You log into your online game, but you get bored and stop playing.
The idea behind the "boredom" technique is that when gaming and gambling, for example, you can get all excited about what you are going to do. By breaking this pattern and linking the escape behavior to boredom, the urge to perform the escape behavior becomes much smaller[6].
While visualization will be more extensive during hypnotherapy than in the examples in this article, this is the moral of the story.
Post-hypnotic suggestions
Once you have identified thought patterns that lead to the escape behavior, you can use a post-hypnotic suggestion to make sure you stop that thought process.
This may include suggestions such as:
"From this moment on. When you notice that your thoughts are leading you to flight behavior. Stop that thought. Consciously relax your body and focus on your breathing a few times and think of a pleasant alternative."
Post-hypnotic suggestions are often given after or at the end of a guided visualization, making the post-hypnotic suggestion incredibly logical to the person under hypnosis.
Flight in moderation
So fleeing behavior is a very normal human phenomenon. People can flee into all sorts of things. Most studied are flights into media, such as watching television, social media and gaming. In addition, shopping and gambling (and probably other things that can be addictive) are also known to be used for flight.
It only becomes a problem when the positive consequences of escape behavior, such as relaxation, are overshadowed by the negative consequences of escape behavior.
So in that case, hypnosis can help stop this flight behavior in multiple ways. This can be done by identifying and changing your beliefs. The article discussed Socratic Conversation, but regression can also be used for this purpose. In addition, guided visualizations that break your pattern and post-hypnotic suggestions help to stop your behavior for the escape behavior.
Want to know exactly how all these techniques can be used to help you against escape behavior, or to help other people get rid of escape behavior?
During the hypnosis playshop you can test if you can bring someone under hypnosis. These are given in Wormerveer and in Zwolle.
Want to learn much more than just that? Then come to one of our seminars or register directly for a training course at the Hypnosis Institute Netherlands. The trainings are also given in Wormerveer or Zwolle.
Ask about online options if that suits you better.
[1] https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/9781118783764.wbieme0154
[2] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0969698915301533
[3] https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/JCM-04-2016-1775/full/html
[4] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0747563217300511
[5] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0360131518300599
[6] https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Antonio_Madrid2/publication/21197816_A_Hypnotic_Protocol_for_Eliciting_Physical_Changes_Through_Suggestions_of_Biochemical_Responses/links/551d97f80cf29dcabb0306d8/A-Hypnotic-Protocol-for-Eliciting-Physical-Changes-Through-Suggestions-of-Biochemical-Responses.pdf#page=196
