Title: Does Hypnotherapy ACTUALLY Help With Anxiety
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### **Intro**
I’m going to be honest with you. The word ‘hypnosis’ used to bring two things to my mind: stage shows where people quack like a duck, and scam artists. I absolutely did not believe it was a real solution for something as serious as my anxiety. But my anxiety… well, it was winning. It was a constant, low-grade hum of static in my brain that would occasionally spike into a full-blown panic. It was that tightness in my chest during work meetings, the racing thoughts that kept me up at night, the endless loop of “what ifs” that turned simple decisions into monumental tasks. Frankly, it was exhausting.
So, I decided to become a guinea pig. I was desperate, and my desperation finally won out over my skepticism. This video is my 30-day journey trying clinical hypnotherapy. But it’s more than that. This isn’t just a vlog about my feelings. I also went deep into the scientific evidence, the neuroscience, and the clinical data… and what I found completely shocked me and challenged every single one of my preconceptions.
So, does it *actually* work? Can you really be guided into a state of relaxation to reprogram the very roots of your anxiety? Or is it all just an elaborate placebo effect? Let’s find out.
### **Hook: The Problem**
If you’ve ever had anxiety, you know it’s not just “being worried.” It’s physical. It’s a phantom weight on your shoulders, a cold knot in your stomach, a film over your eyes that makes the world look just a little bit more threatening. For me, it showed up in a hundred tiny ways. I’d rehearse phone calls in my head ten times before actually dialing. I’d avoid social events because the thought of small talk was somehow more terrifying than public speaking. My sleep was a wreck. I remember one night, lying in bed at 3 AM with my heart pounding for no reason at all, just consumed by this overwhelming sense of doom. That was my rock bottom. I had tried everything I could think of: meditation apps I’d use for three days and then forget, journaling that just felt like writing down my anxious thoughts in a nicer notebook, breathing exercises that only seemed to make me *more* aware of how fast my heart was beating.
I had been to talk therapy, specifically Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), and it did help. It gave me tools to consciously challenge my negative thought patterns. But it felt like I was constantly fighting a battle with my own mind, using logic to beat back this illogical beast. It was like I was a security guard at the front door of my brain, constantly checking IDs and turning away unwanted thoughts. But the anxiety wasn’t just ringing the doorbell; it felt like it already lived inside the house, like it was part of the building’s wiring. The subconscious, automatic reactions were still there. My logical mind knew an email from my boss wasn’t a life-threatening event, but my subconscious was treating it like a tiger in the bushes. That was the gap I couldn’t seem to bridge—the conscious understanding versus the subconscious, gut-level reaction. And that’s when someone, half-jokingly, mentioned hypnotherapy. My first reaction was to laugh. Seriously? The thing with the swinging pocket watch? No way.
### **Section 1: The Turning Point & The Plan**
I was hugely skeptical. The whole concept felt flimsy, unscientific, and honestly, a little embarrassing. Hypnosis, in my mind, was for entertainment, not for treating a legitimate mental health condition that was impacting every corner of my life. I pictured a guy in a waistcoat telling me I was getting very, very sleepy before making me cluck like a chicken. It seemed to go against the very idea of empowerment. Why would I want to give someone else control over my mind when the whole problem was feeling out of control in the first place?
But then, that desperation I mentioned started to gnaw at me again. I was tired of the fight. I was tired of white-knuckling my way through the day. The idea of a therapy that didn’t just talk to my conscious, logical brain but could somehow get to the deeper, automatic programming started to sound… well, appealing. If my anxiety was a deeply rooted weed, maybe I needed something that could get to the root instead of just trimming the leaves. I started reading, tentatively at first, fully expecting to find a lot of pseudoscience and magical thinking. I stumbled upon forums and personal stories online. People were describing their experiences in a way that really resonated. One woman wrote, “Trying hypnotherapy felt like my ‘last resort’ when I was experiencing some really dark days with crippling anxiety. After just one call… I had real hope.” Another person who had suffered for six years said they were skeptical but had nothing to lose, and found a “great sense of relief.” These weren’t people talking about being magically “cured”; they were talking about a process that helped them feel calm, clear, and in control.
That was the turning point. The promise wasn’t about losing control, but about gaining it. So I made a decision. I’d approach this like an experiment. I would commit to 30 days of clinical hypnotherapy. I’d document the process, my feelings, my doubts, and any changes, no matter how small. And, crucially, I would run a journalistic investigation at the same time. I would look at the science. I would read the clinical trials and understand the neuroscience. I needed to know if this was real.
So, here’s the plan: I’m taking you with me. You’ll see my journey through the first session, the mid-point check-ins, and the final verdict after 30 days. And along the way, we’re going to stop and explore the science. We’ll look at what researchers say is actually happening in your brain during hypnosis. We’ll examine the clinical evidence for anxiety treatment. We’ll separate the myths from the facts. This is “The Skeptic’s Journey,” and my goal is to come out the other side with a clear, evidence-based answer to the question: Does hypnotherapy *actually* help with anxiety?
### **Section 2: The First Session & The Skepticism**
Finding a hypnotherapist was the first hurdle. I knew I didn’t want a “stage hypnotist” or someone with a vague “wellness” certificate. I was looking for a *clinical* hypnotherapist, ideally a licensed mental health professional who uses hypnosis as a tool. And that distinction is critical. Clinical hypnosis isn’t a standalone therapy; it’s a technique used within a therapeutic framework to help clients change subconscious patterns that lead to things like anxiety and overthinking. After some searching, I found a licensed therapist who specialized in anxiety and used a combination of CBT and hypnotherapy. This felt like a good bridge between the familiar and the unknown.
I’m not going to lie, walking into that first session, my skepticism was at an all-time high. My mind was racing. ‘What if I can’t be hypnotized?’ ‘What if I say something stupid?’ ‘What if this is all a massive waste of money?’ The therapist’s office was just… a normal therapy office. No crystal balls, no velvet curtains, just a comfortable chair.
We started by talking, just like a regular therapy session. She asked about my anxiety, my triggers, and what I wanted to achieve. I explained my goal: not to get rid of anxiety entirely—I know that’s not realistic—but to turn down the volume. To stop the automatic, physical fight-or-flight response to everyday stress. She explained that clinical hypnosis isn’t about being asleep or unconscious. You are awake, aware, and completely in control the entire time. It’s more like a state of deep, focused relaxation, kind of like when you’re completely absorbed in a good book or a movie and the outside world just fades away. In this state, your conscious mind—the critical, analytical part of your brain—takes a backseat, which makes the subconscious mind more open to new, helpful suggestions.
Then, it was time for the hypnosis itself. This part is called the ‘induction’. She had me get comfortable and close my eyes. Her voice was calm and steady as she had me focus on my breathing. Then, she used a technique called progressive muscle relaxation, asking me to tense and then release different muscles from my toes all the way up to my face. Honestly, for the first five minutes, it felt a little silly. My inner critic was loud. ‘You’re just sitting in a chair with your eyes closed. This is ridiculous. You’re not being hypnotized.’ My foot was twitching. I was hyper-aware of every little sound.
But I stuck with it, focusing on her voice. She started using imagery, asking me to visualize a safe, peaceful place. She described walking down a set of stairs, with each step taking me deeper into relaxation. And then, something started to shift. The critical chatter in my head began to quiet down. The outside noises faded. My body, which is usually a tense knot of anxiety, actually started to feel… heavy. Relaxed. It wasn’t sleep. I was fully aware of where I was and what was happening. But it was a state of profound calm I hadn’t felt in years. It was a stillness not just in my body, but in my mind.
She then began to introduce suggestions, phrased in a gentle, positive way. She talked about my mind becoming calmer and my body feeling more at ease in stressful situations. She suggested that the next time I felt a wave of anxiety, I would be able to observe it without being overwhelmed, like watching clouds pass in the sky. She was essentially offering my subconscious a new way to respond to old triggers.
When she guided me back to full awareness, counting me back up the “stairs,” I opened my eyes feeling dazed, but in a good way. I felt incredibly rested, like I’d just had a long nap, but my mind was sharp and clear. Did I feel magically cured? No. But I felt… different. The constant static in my brain was gone. There was silence. And that, in itself, was a revelation. I left that first session still a skeptic, but now, I was an *intrigued* skeptic. It felt like something had happened, but I didn’t know what. And my inner journalist needed to find out why.
### **Section 3: Science Deep Dive 1 – What is Happening to the Brain?**
That feeling of deep calm and mental stillness wasn’t just in my head. It turns out there’s a growing body of research showing measurable changes happen in the brain during hypnosis. This was the first real shock to my skeptical system. I thought hypnosis was some vague, unprovable state of mind, but neuroscientists can actually see its effects using tools like fMRI and EEG scans.
So, what’s really going on in there?
First, let’s talk about brainwaves. Our brains produce electrical activity, and different patterns are associated with different states. During our normal, busy, waking life, our brains are dominated by Beta waves. This is the state of active thinking, problem-solving, and alertness. But it’s also the state of stress and anxiety. Using EEG scans, researchers have found that during a hypnotic induction, there’s often a big increase in Theta wave activity. Theta waves are the same ones that are dominant during deep meditation and that dreamy state right before you fall asleep. This is a state of deep relaxation, but also heightened internal focus. So, when the therapist was guiding me down those stairs, she was helping my brain shift from high-alert Beta to calm, focused Theta. It’s not magic; it’s a guided process of changing your brain’s electrical state.
Second, brain scans have shown that key networks change their activity. One of the most important is the **Default Mode Network (DMN)**. Think of the DMN as your brain’s “idle” mode. It’s what’s active when your mind is wandering, you’re thinking about yourself, ruminating about the past, or worrying about the future. Sound familiar? For people with anxiety, the DMN is often in overdrive. A landmark 2016 study from Stanford University used fMRI scans and found that during hypnosis, there was a decrease in activity in the DMN. This is huge. It means hypnosis can literally quiet the part of your brain responsible for anxious rumination. That explains the mental silence I experienced. The constant, anxious chatter was turned down because the network that generates it was temporarily offline.
At the same time, the Stanford study found an *increase* in the connection between two other areas: the **dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC)** and the **insula**. It sounds complicated, but it just means this: The DLPFC is like the CEO of your brain, involved in planning and regulating your thoughts. The insula is the mind-body connection hub; it processes bodily sensations and links them to emotions. By strengthening the connection between them, hypnosis allows for more conscious control over how your body feels and reacts. You become less reactive and more able to manage your internal state. Instead of being a passenger on a runaway train of panic, you’re put back in the driver’s seat.
Finally, hypnosis seems to directly calm the body’s stress-response system by activating the **parasympathetic nervous system (PNS)**, often called the “rest and digest” system. This is the opposite of the “fight-or-flight” response that anxiety triggers. It slows your heart rate, lowers blood pressure, and promotes physical calm. This is why things like progressive muscle relaxation are so effective—they are direct cues to your body that it’s safe to switch off the alarm.
So, my first major scientific discovery was this: Hypnosis isn’t just “relaxing.” It is a specific neurological state where you quiet the brain’s anxious chatterbox, enhance the connection between your conscious mind and your body, and calm your physical stress response. It’s not about losing control; it’s a state of focused attention that gives you *more* control. My skepticism was still there, but it was now being challenged by hard, neuroscientific evidence. This wasn’t just in my head; it was *in my brain*.
### **Section 4: Week 2 Check-In & Lingering Doubts**
The week after my first session was… interesting. The profound calm I felt right after didn’t last forever, which I expected. The hum of anxiety started to creep back, but it felt different—less of an overwhelming roar and more of a distant buzz. I found myself in situations that would normally trigger me, like a tight deadline or a crowded grocery store, and the physical response was noticeably dampened. The knot in my stomach was looser. My heart didn’t skyrocket. It was a subtle but definite change.
The therapist gave me a recording of our session to listen to at home, which is a common practice to reinforce the suggestions. I listened to it every night before bed. Some nights, I’d drift off into that same deeply relaxed state. Other nights, my mind would wander, and my inner critic would pipe up again. ‘Are you sure this is working? Maybe it was just a one-off. Maybe you’re just having a good week.’
This is where the doubt really hung around. The biggest question I had was about the placebo effect. How much of this was real, and how much was just because I *wanted* it to work so badly? I had invested time, money, and hope into this. Was my brain just tricking itself into feeling better? It’s a valid scientific question. It’s hard to create a true “placebo” for hypnotherapy—you generally know if you’re being hypnotized or not—so it can be tough to separate the effects of hypnosis from the effects of positive expectation and a supportive therapist.
I went into my second session at the end of week two with a list of these questions. I told my therapist about the improvements but also about my skepticism. She didn’t dismiss my concerns. Instead, she reframed it. She explained that the placebo effect is often misunderstood. At its core, it’s about the power of belief and expectation, which are powerful psychological forces. Clinical hypnosis, she argued, is a way of systematically and intentionally *harnessing* that power. It’s not about tricking you; it’s about providing a structured process to help your subconscious accept the positive beliefs and outcomes that you consciously want.
In our second session, she built on the first. The induction process felt more familiar, and I found it easier to get into that focused state. She introduced more specific suggestions tailored to my doubts, using metaphors like imagining my mind as a garden where we were pulling out the weeds of anxious thoughts and planting seeds of calm. The most powerful part was a technique where I visualized my future self, a version of me who handled stress with ease. She had me imagine stepping *into* that future self, to feel what it felt like to be calm and in control.
I left that second session with a renewed sense of purpose. The doubt was still there, but it was quieter. And another, more hopeful voice was getting stronger. Even if part of this was a placebo, it was a placebo that was giving me tangible relief. It was reducing my physical symptoms and improving my sleep. And it was giving me a feeling of agency over my own mind that I hadn’t felt before. I was starting to realize that maybe the question wasn’t “Is it real or is it a placebo?” Maybe the real question was, “Does it work?” And the answer, so far, seemed to be yes.
### **Section 5: Science Deep Dive 2 – The Subconscious & Neuroplasticity**
My experience of visualizing a calmer self felt powerful, but my skeptical brain needed to know *why*. How can just imagining something change your reality? This led me to two fascinating concepts: the subconscious mind and neuroplasticity.
First, the subconscious. This isn’t some mystical idea; it’s a psychological term for the part of our mind that operates below conscious awareness. It runs our automatic habits, our ingrained beliefs, and our emotional reactions. Experts estimate the subconscious drives as much as 90% of our automatic reactions. This is why my logical brain could know an email wasn’t a threat, but my subconscious, which had been wired for years to associate work pressure with danger, would hit the panic button anyway.
Clinical hypnosis is designed to bypass the critical, conscious mind and speak directly to the subconscious. In that relaxed Theta-wave state, the “gatekeeper” is relaxed, allowing for what’s called **cognitive restructuring** to happen at a much deeper level. The therapist isn’t implanting ideas against your will; they’re offering suggestions your subconscious can choose to adopt. It’s like updating a computer’s source code. Instead of just dealing with error messages on the screen (conscious anxiety), you’re rewriting the faulty code that’s causing them.
This is where **neuroplasticity** comes in. For a long time, we thought the adult brain was pretty much fixed. But we now know the brain is constantly changing and reorganizing itself based on our experiences, thoughts, and behaviors. Every time you learn something new or even just think a thought, you are physically strengthening or weakening neural pathways. As the saying goes, “neurons that fire together, wire together.”
Chronic anxiety carves deep neural pathways. When a situation triggers you, a specific network of neurons fires. Do this enough, and that pathway becomes your brain’s default response. You’ve essentially trained your brain to be anxious.
Hypnotherapy uses neuroplasticity to build new, healthier pathways. By repeatedly guiding you into a state of calm and suggesting new responses, the therapy encourages different sets of neurons to fire together. When I visualized myself handling stress with ease, my brain was being stimulated as if I were actually doing it, activating the same sensory regions. My brain was literally creating and rehearsing a new neural pathway for “calm in the face of stress.”
Each time I listened to the recording, I was strengthening this new pathway. It’s like creating a new trail in a forest. At first, the old, worn path of anxiety is easier to take. But with each repetition, the new path of calm gets clearer, wider, and easier to access. Eventually, it can become the new default.
This was the piece of the puzzle that made everything click. It wasn’t magic; it was brain training. The suggestions weren’t just empty words; they were catalysts for neuroplastic change. I was actively participating in rewiring my own brain. This understanding shifted my perspective entirely. I was no longer a passive recipient of some mysterious treatment; I was an active agent in my own healing, using a powerful tool to reshape the hardware of my own mind.
### **Section 6: The Breakthrough & The Results**
The third and fourth weeks were where the most significant changes started to stick. Listening to the audio track daily became less of a chore and more of a welcome ritual. I noticed that the state of deep relaxation was easier to access, not just during the sessions, but in moments throughout my day. Using a simple breathing technique the therapist had taught me as an “anchor,” I could trigger a mini-version of that calm state before walking into a meeting or making a tough phone call. It felt like I’d been given a remote control for my own nervous system.
The real breakthrough, the moment I knew this was more than a placebo, happened during week three. I had to give a presentation to an important new client. Historically, this scenario would have sent my anxiety into overdrive for days. I would have had sleepless nights, a racing heart, a shaky voice, and that awful feeling of my mind going blank under pressure.
This time, I prepared, and I felt the familiar stirrings of nervousness—which is normal—but the overwhelming, paralyzing dread was gone. The night before, I slept soundly. On the day of the presentation, I used my breathing anchor before walking in. I felt centered and calm. As I started speaking, my voice was steady. My thoughts were clear. I wasn’t just reciting a script; I was present, engaged, and able to respond to questions thoughtfully. I felt… confident. The tight feeling in my stomach, my constant companion in these situations for over a decade, was simply not there. After the presentation, which went extremely well, I sat in my car in a state of near disbelief. I had just navigated one of my biggest triggers, not by fighting my anxiety, but because the anxiety, in its debilitating form, just didn’t show up. It was a profound and emotional moment. I realized the underlying pattern had actually changed.
By the end of the 30 days, the results were undeniable. So, to answer the question of this video: Did hypnotherapy *actually* help with my anxiety? Yes. Absolutely, yes.
But it’s important to be specific. It didn’t erase anxiety from my life or make me immune to stress. What it did was fundamentally change my relationship with anxiety. The constant, high-alert static is gone. The automatic, out-of-proportion fight-or-flight response has been dialed way, way down. I sleep better. My confidence has increased dramatically. I feel like I have been given back control over my own mind.
And this personal experience is powerfully supported by science; I’m not an anomaly. A major 2019 meta-analysis that looked at 17 different trials found that people who received hypnosis had a greater reduction in anxiety than 84% of the people in control groups, with the effect described as “moderate to large.” Another comprehensive review from 2023 confirmed these robust effects for anxiety and stress reduction. Studies have shown its effectiveness for everything from reducing anxiety in cancer patients and before medical procedures, to helping students with exam anxiety.
One of the most crucial findings from the research, which mirrors my experience, is that hypnosis is often most effective when it’s combined with other therapies, like CBT. It isn’t necessarily a replacement for talk therapy, but an enhancement. It takes the insights learned in CBT and helps embed them at a deeper, subconscious level, bridging that gap between *knowing* you shouldn’t be anxious and actually *feeling* less anxious.
### **Conclusion & Call to Action**
I started this journey as a total skeptic, convinced hypnotherapy was little more than a party trick. Thirty days later, my perspective has been completely transformed—not just by my own experience, but by the compelling scientific evidence that backs it up. I’ve learned that clinical hypnosis is not about mind control or losing consciousness. It’s a legitimate, evidence-based tool that works by guiding your brain into a natural state of focused relaxation. This allows you to access and update the subconscious patterns that drive anxiety, using your brain’s own capacity for change—its neuroplasticity—to build new, healthier pathways.
For me, the result was a dramatic reduction in my daily anxiety and a newfound sense of control. And the science shows I’m not alone; multiple large-scale reviews demonstrate that for many people, hypnotherapy is a highly effective treatment for anxiety with low risk.
Now, it’s important to say that hypnotherapy is not a magic bullet. Results can vary, and a person’s natural ability to enter a hypnotic state, sometimes called “hypnotizability,” can play a role. It’s also a tool best used by a trained, licensed professional as part of a wider treatment plan. This isn’t something to try with a random YouTuber or a stage performer. Finding a qualified clinical hypnotherapist is key.
My journey from skeptic to believer has been profound. It taught me that the mind is more malleable than I ever imagined and that there are powerful, evidence-based tools out there that go beyond traditional talk therapy.
So, if you’re a skeptic like I was, I don’t expect you to just take my word for it. In fact, I encourage you not to. Do your own research. Look at the science. I’ve put links to some of the key studies I found in the description below so you can check them out yourself. Read the personal stories, but also read the clinical data. Talk to a qualified professional. Your anxiety is real, and you deserve a solution that is grounded in real evidence.
If this journey was helpful or intriguing to you, and you want to see more explorations into the science behind our mental well-being, please subscribe and hit that notification bell. I’m genuinely curious to hear from you—what are your thoughts on hypnotherapy? Have you tried it? What are your biggest questions or skepticisms? Let me know in the comments below. Thanks for coming on this journey with me.
