Balancing: how to ensure a more stable life

Life has its ups and downs, but if your life feels like a roller coaster you may still very much want to have a more balanced life. How do you get that to happen? In this blog we take a closer look at it.

Balanced positive emotions

Of course, you want to get off the emotional roller coaster—and above all, feel happy and content, rather than constantly struggling with depressive thoughts. Research shows that when people receive help to think more positively, it benefits their well-being and their sense of living a good life.

Positive psychology, for example, does not aim to deal with mental problems, but to help people to simply be more focused on the positive aspects of life, regardless of whether they suffer from mental problems or not[1].

But how do you ensure balanced positive emotions?

For example, you can look at certain factors that contribute to positive emotions and reducing imbalances in your emotions. For example, consider:

1. Giving meaning to your life
2. Virtue/Equity of Your Life
3. Resilience
4. Wellbeing

For example, by not only pursuing pleasure in your life, but by also looking at how you give meaning to your life, you can generally experience more positive feelings through that satisfaction that you are doing something "good" with your life than if you just live from pleasure to pleasure[2]. So alternate that pleasure with something that gives meaning.

How do you view human nature?

Your mindset also plays a major role in how good and balanced you feel. For example, how you think about human nature can have a significant impact on your mindset. Do you believe that people are inherently bad and have to try very hard to be good (something many devout Christians believe), or do you think that a person is a blank slate or even inherently good? The answer to that question alone can evoke a certain basic emotion.

If you are preoccupied with "I can't do something bad" all the time, your focus is also more likely to be on everything you do wrong, which can create deep negative emotions that can make you unhappy and unbalanced.

By looking more positively at human nature, you can already be more positive in life.

It’s also helpful to consider what currently triggers positive behavior in you and why you sometimes suddenly slip into negative behavior. Is it due to stress, sadness, anger, or other negative emotions? If so, you can think about how to improve that situation[3].

Why do you suffer from imbalance?

Imbalance, or the emotional roller coaster, is something that can stem from various problems in your life. At work, for example, you might be affected by it if you suddenly have to deal with a reorganization. As an entrepreneur, you can also be greatly affected by it, and of course, if you’re directly or indirectly dealing with illness, this can evoke a wide range of emotions.

One thing these problems have in common is that you feel you have no control —and that’s what causes problems and negative emotions. If you can control even one aspect of a reorganization, it in turn generates positive emotions[4].

There are also multiple ways to deal with emotions. For example, entrepreneurs can reframe negative emotions or suppress those negative emotions. This does not help make your business a success. What does help entrepreneurs, one of the things, is to not include that negative emotion in your facial expression[5].

If you become ill, or if a loved one develops a chronic illness or has a disability, this can have a significant impact. For example, you may have to accept a situation that isn’t pleasant, and that can make you very angry at first, before you’re able to adjust to the new situation.

In addition, willpower also plays an important role when your personal health has taken a hit[6].

Sometimes a condition—such as bipolar disorder—can also cause mood swings, which is another form of an emotional roller coaster. This is usually treated with cognitive behavioral therapy[7].

If you are in the process of rehabbing an addiction, you may also be suffering from emotions that are all over the place. Hypnotherapy is therefore often used to get more balanced emotions.

A study in which participants received eight hypnotherapy sessions to address their mood swings found that this helped reduce impulsivity, improved their ability to manage emotions, reduced cravings for addictive behaviors, and increased their focus on problem-solving[8].

In addition, hypnosis in general can also be used for more positive balance in your emotions[9].

Hypnotherapy for greater balance

So there are a number of things to take away if you suffer from emotional imbalance.

• Giving meaning to your life.
• Doing good things in your life.
• Resilient coping.
• Doing things to improve your well-being.

Let’s start with the latter, since that’s something many people struggle with. What can you do, for example, to improve your well-being? Think about eating healthy, getting enough exercise, and even making sure you relax enough. A day at a spa to pamper yourself is also a way to feel better—especially when you combine it with finding meaning in your life and doing good deeds.

Still, pampering yourself is often something that reveals emotional blocks . After all, are you really worth it? Eating healthy is often seen as expensive, and depending on your beliefs about money and yourself, something might hold you back from taking good care of yourself.

A spa day is also expensive indulgence, but doing it occasionally can be very good for your health. With hypnosis, you can figure out why you find it difficult to enjoy yourself in your life and allow positive experiences, for example.

Dealing with problems in a resilient way is also something you can strengthen through hypnosis. Fear of failure and perfectionism, for example, can be major obstacles to resilience, and these are precisely two issues that are often addressed with hypnosis.

Doing good things in your life can involve, for example , forgiving people , helping others, maintaining good relationships, holding the door open, and so on.

Helping or forgiving someone is sometimes harder than you think, with hypnosis you can change your way of thinking about doing good things so that it is easier for you.

Doing good things can already give meaning to your life, but that alone can sometimes feel like it's not enough. For example, many people see their work as a kind of mission of their lives.

Thus, I believe it is important for everyone to see hypnosis as something positive and that you can use to solve problems. That is how I give my life meaning and one of the reasons why the Hypnosis Institute Netherlands was founded.

A hypnotherapist can also help you determine the meaning of your life or what you can use to give your life meaning. By working toward some kind of higher purpose, you will find that you can become more emotionally stable and balanced.

So how does hypnosis help?

There are all ways hypnosis can work. For example, for giving meaning to your life you can take a symbol journey, in it you can symbolize certain life events and find a red line in your life that helps you determine what your purpose here is now.

What does something mean to you?

Visualizations can help you see how to do things better. With a family constellation, you can improve the bonds within your family by mentally moving people closer to or farther away from you, allowing you to interact differently (and better) with your family.

To improve your resilience, you can focus on building your self-confidence and strengthening your self-esteem. This can also help you give yourself permission to do things you enjoy—things that make you happy and are good for you.

For example, repeating suggestions that make you feel more confident and self-esteem are ways to improve your resilience and generally feel better.

These may include suggestions such as:

"I can figure anything out."

"I am worthy of indulgence."

"I do good things."

"I am valuable to my fellow man."

These are just examples. Depending on your beliefs and problems with balance, you may receive or think of other suggestions if you are trained in hypnotherapy.

Would you like to learn more about hypnotherapy and how you can use it to help others? Then join us for the free online masterclass.

Or enroll in one of Hypnosis Institute Netherlands' training courses or seminars .

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