Emotional block: Resolving with mental tricks

A blockage is generally something that is in your path that requires you to stop. You can often grasp this, but an emotional block involves something different. You then have more of a blockage in your mind, in your head shall we say. You then have a mental block, you cannot grasp this

A blockage occurs on the road to something

In general, then, a blockage is something that arises on the road while you are going somewhere. So the fact that we often use the word blockage is actually quite interesting, because apparently you want to be somewhere, but something is blocking you from getting there.

For example, you might experience a mental block when you have to give a presentation that could be very important for your career—but why is that, exactly? Your goal is to be successful, but something is happening in your subconscious that causes you to falter during or before the presentation—perhaps these are beliefs about success, self-worth, or even self-confidence.

As paradoxical as it may sound, people can even suffer from a fear of success.

Symptoms of an emotional block

An emotional blockage can be identified by a number of things:

• You can't figure out how to achieve your goals anymore.
• You feel stuck in your life.
• You feel like you're not moving forward anymore.
• You put on a mental mask to your social circle.
• You avoid activities because you are afraid of making mistakes.
• You’re afraid of being rejected.
• You no longer feel motivated to achieve your goals.
• You focus more on negatives.
• You are easily jealous or irritated[1].

These are all symptoms that fit certain beliefs about self-esteem, self-confidence and your beliefs about success.

You may feel like you have an emotional block due to these types of beliefs. You can't really grasp an emotion alone.

Therefore, herewith first some practical tips for resolving emotional blockage.

Tip #1: Name a block as something you do

In that case, it’s often more helpful to say “I’m blocking myself,” because a block is something you have. That’s something you can address. If you can’t address it, then it’s more something you’re doing—even if it’s unconsciously.

For example, when you think about public speaking, you feel something in your body. You then block as it were, but how do you actually do this? When you know this, you can also unblock yourself. You can then unblock your emotional block more easily.

Tip 2: Consider what is actually happening inside yourself when you have a blockage

For example, you might start looking angry and feel tense. Certain thoughts come to mind . These are things you do. Then, using various techniques, you can explore how to do things differently, how to see things differently, think differently, or feel differently when you hit a mental block.

For me, feeling differently and seeing differently are often the entry points to help people resolve an emotional block.

Tip 3: Change the having to doing in your mind

This makes it easier to change. In fact, by saying you are blocking, by making it a verb, you are also taking responsibility somewhere for your own behavior.

This means you also take responsibility for changing it. You don't need a pill from a doctor to make it go away. No, you can do this yourself and it's okay to get help with that. To the person who helps you, such as a coach, psychologist or hypnotherapist, for example, you can describe what you actually do when you block. By doing so, you also give the person helping you tools to help you move forward.

Also check out this video on removing an emotional block:

Emotional block release

A time when many emotional blockages occur is when students want to get their doctoral degree. These blockages then manifest themselves in not being able to properly formulate text, which often has to be good for research reporting, or poor interaction with their supervisor. This then causes decreased confidence that things will work out, decreased confidence in their own ability and the feeling of just not being able to do anything is also described as one of the complaints.

Feeling ownership of the blockage is an important step to still finding a solution to move forward with the doctoral degree. To do this, they must also be able to clearly identify their problem. So describing what is happening and what they themselves are doing is important for this[2].

Tip 4: Find a buddy to meet your goal with

This research also reveals that having people who support you to achieve your goals helps you overcome your blockage as well.

For example, if your goal is to exercise more, exercising with someone can help you not get blocked if, say, it rains one time when you were supposed to be running.

If your goal is to do well at work, it's a good idea to find someone with the same goal. You can then practice presentations with each other, for example, or point each other to good courses or books about your field.

Change the beliefs that block you

As mentioned earlier, the symptoms associated with an emotional block are often the result of beliefs. For example, you might have thoughts about the negative effects of success. Or thoughts about whether you’re even worthy of, say, achieving a certain position. You might feel like a fraud, even though you’re actually good at your job.

To detect these kinds of illogical beliefs, you can seek help from a hypnotherapist. For example, he can help you through a socratic conversation to find out which beliefs are actually causing you to block. That you keep failing to do what is necessary to achieve your goals.

The hypnotist can then use a variety of techniques to help you change that belief. This can be done, for example, by symbolically changing something within you or through regression.

If your goal is more in your family circle, even using family constellation can make emotional blockages disappear.

Tip 5: Make sure your goal serves a higher purpose

Japanese research shows, for example, that blockages to achieving personal or business goals are more often related to whether or not you achieve existential meaning than to economic wealth[3]. So it must feel somewhere like you are doing something for a greater good. That your life has purpose, so to speak.

So make sure your goal is more than just making money. For example, helping others can make you feel good about your goal and motivate you to achieve it.

Tip 6: Stimulate your creativity

By doing something creative, such as painting, dancing, writing stories or something similar, you stimulate your creativity, which can also help you achieve goals outside of such a hobby. This helps you think out-of-the-box again.

Tip 7: Use self-hypnosis

At times when things get tough, self-hypnosis can also help you break the block. Once you have found help with a hypnotist, they can give you some kind of homework in the form of affirmations that you repeat during self-hypnosis.

You learn how self-hypnosis works during the hypnosis sessions, and which affirmations you get depends on the beliefs that are causing your emotional block. You can repeat these daily in order to be less bothered by the blockade for a long time, this helps, among other things, to prevent it from coming back.

These can include affirmations such as:

Success creates more love.

I am worthy of achieving my goals.

I help people.

I love the small and big things in life.

These are just examples. Depending on your beliefs, you may be given other affirmations to take home as homework.

Would you like to learn more about hypnosis? Then sign up for the free online masterclass.

Would you like to get started right away to help yourself or others overcome their emotional blocks? Then sign up for the training program at the Hypnosis Institute of the Netherlands.

Also pin this handy infographic as a reminder:

[1] https://exploringyourmind.com/what-is-emotional-blockage/

[2] https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-94-6300-512-8_13

[3] https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1683478X.2017.1281534