hypnosis, a talk with ricky kalmon [video]
2023-10-12 00:39:26
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Today, I'm going to be speaking with Ricky Kalman, a hypnotist. My curiosity around hypnosis has been growing recently because I've been going through this journey trying to quit nicotine. And it's been far more challenging than I ever could have anticipated. And I've been exploring every option to help me quit, and one of the options I read about online was hypnosis. It's been life-changing for many people, and I just want to understand how and why it works, and honestly, what it even is in the first place. What really is it?
Ricky is a hypnotist, but more than anything, he's a mindset expert. He speaks on how our mindset can be the greatest tool in achievement, reducing stress, increasing productivity and potential. He's worked with Fortune 500 companies, sales teams, executives and sports teams. His book is called Leverage Your Mindset, Overcome Limiting Beliefs and Apply Your Life. Be Less Stressed, happier, and more Mindful.
So I present to you Ricky Kalman, hypnotist, mindset expert I can't wait. Let's start with the first time you were exposed to the concept of hypnosis.
If you know me from my early part of my career, most people did know that. I did magic as a kid. I was a kid magician. I saw a hypnotist. I was completely blown away, I didn't know what I was watching. And I also thought, man, this has to be rigged.
Come on, there's got to be a trick to this, there's got to be some secret to this. We became good friends. He literally pulled me aside.
This was not my intention, he said. I want to teach you how to do this. And I said, why, I mean, I literally go, why? He literally came out and said, because I really feel like you'll do something with this more than anybody else did. I was 15 at the time.
For several years, I just studied what it was, to really understand what's really happening. Once I understood it, I was like, this is opposite of what most people think. Because even when I say I'm a hypnotist to somebody, what do you think? The first thing is, they say.
I mean, I think a lot of people think that's a scammer.
Right, scammer, you're going to put me under, don't want to look in my eyes, afraid to even talk to me.
All that stuff, I mean, even today on an airplane, I mean, if I tell anybody, it's like, uh-oh, here we go. It has nothing to do with that at all, it has nothing to do with being in a trance or being controlled by somebody.
So back when I was very young, I said, Well, why don't I create a show? That's the opposite of what people think, It's the opposite of the swinging watch. At the same time, make it highly entertaining, energetic, fun. But can I show people how to do this? Can I show people that, really? There's a secret here, but the secret's within ourselves.
And here I am today, and I kind of morph into not only doing the show, but really now teaching people how to do it. From studying better, reducing stress, becoming a better version of ourselves. It was really important to me to not only have fun, but show people what this is.
Well, I guess my next question has to be, what is it? because I don't know like, what is hypnosis?
Let's start from scratch. Okay, driving here today? you drive by yourself. Did you drive?
Yep, I drove all right, kind of daydreamed a little bit, for sure, wandered off.
You knew where you were going, you'd been here before, you kind of knew where to exit everything else, so you were kind of like, in this highway hypnosis, right? Yep.
You ever driven 10, 20 miles and all of a sudden you just blink. You couldn't remember how far. You just got there totally, but you were still protecting yourself. Yep, call to action comes in.
If your safety or security was in danger, what would you do? You'd snap out of it whatever you were drifting off to, Yep, let me go one step farther. You're in your car, you're at home, you're doing something, and your jam comes on.
Your song, but nobody else is around, what do you do? You just start jamming out, right? You lose yourself in the song. And if you know the words, and even if you can't even carry a tune, you are literally into the moment.
When you hear your song and you're by yourself and you know nobody's looking, there's no fear, there's no doubt, there's no preconceived judgment, nobody's judging you. No, so when you're hypnotized, all that doubt's kind of put off to the side. It's in the room.
It's going to protect you. Yeah, it's kind of like there, but you're so hyper-focused on being in the now.
Interesting.
So I help people get rid of that feeling of, you know, fear, doubt, or whatever it is. It's something that kind of enters the room, that kind of controls your world and be so hyper-focused on what the task is. So, I guess in the best thought process. To me, a state of hypnosis is not being asleep, being unconscious or being in a trance. Although, when you see somebody hypnotized setting them up in a situation, they might look slumped over like a rag doll, yeah.
But they're there, they're there.
They're there. Yeah, you know, I can't walk up to somebody and go sleep, you know, yeah, yeah.
It's kind of like this really great feeling of relaxation, clarity, and you feel like you got this jolt of energy at the same time.
How do you think it works when it comes to sort of changing somebody's mindset completely? Because so many people have had such powerful experiences with it. Where they're able to go against odds in statistics to quit something or change their mindset. They've been able to fully transform their lives through this mysterious act.
How does that work? Think about the minute you get up in the morning as you talk to yourself, do you think that as you internally speak to yourself, it sets your day?
For sure.
So if you think and visualize somebody that's being hypnotized, aren't they being set up in reality by a suggestion? Mm-hmm, Okay, so you're with me so far? mm-hmm.
So if every word that we say to ourself internally, like our self-talk, we look in the mirror, we get dressed, we figure out if this looks good on us. Whatever, you know, we do it everybody, I don't care. Again, I'll say we all have that self-talk totally. It could be our best friend or our....
Enemy Yeah, exactly, yeah, so, but at the same time, we talk about the enemy like it's somebody else in the room. Oh, my mind got the best of me.
Yeah, whose mind are you talking about? Yeah, it's yours, yeah.
That's very true.
So you have to realize that your internal voice can be your best friend or your worst enemy. Totally. So, if those words that you say to yourself are that powerful, aren't you kind of hypnotizing yourself daily?
Totally.
All right, let's go back, let's go even go deeper than with that question or that statement. Then, who is the most powerful hypnotist in the world?
I guess it's you.
Yeah, ourselves, everybody has a moment in life, everybody has a moment during the day or a week. Where they're kind of misguided, misthought, maybe a thought comes in the room, and it kind of holds them back.
But I think it's important to step back and reset sometimes and realize that that power that we're talking about this, and that's a powerful thing. Because you asked me, where's it come from? It's us, it's individually us.
This is the way I'm thinking of it, but I could be totally wrong. Hypnotizing somebody is putting them in a state where their voices are quiet. So then you can then come in and you can put your voice in, and you can, and then their voices repeat it later. Is that it?
I'm hiring you. That's the greatest way of putting it, because, honestly, that's then you get it. I'm the kind of the catalyst here. But you said something that's so important because people need to get this. If you look at hypnosis or a hypnotist to make you do something, you will be looking forever.
So if I have a subject that's really willing to experience, whether it's a show or self care, understand. I'm not going to make you do something, I'm going to help you get in the relaxed state. I'm going to repeat what you just said. Yep, I'm going to give you the suggestions. And then it's your job to what resonates with you to engrave it.
So we all live by our phones, right? I mean, they're the coolest thing ever. We live by them. They're probably not three feet from us on a regular basis, right?
Mine's under my belt right now, I'm sitting on it.
There you go, all right? So we take full advantage to update the software that makes those things run. A phone is basically a hard drive. without the software, it doesn't work.
Our brain's the same way, totally our brain is this massive hard drive. But the difference between our brain and the phone, the phone is limited on its space, your brain's not. If we update the phones to work better, why aren't we updating the most powerful hard drive in the world?
And that's up here because the brain basically works on the last message you send it. Oh, it's going to be a bad day. Well, guess what, something bad happens.
You pretty much say, See, I told you so, but I really do believe that. When we kind of connect with our own internal thoughts and we realize before we say something, how powerful it is, we hypnotize ourselves. And then we realize. It's my job to update my software right now.
It's interesting because I think about myself and this could be a personality type thing or not. I'm not sure, but I get stubborn about updating my software. Do you know what I'm saying? You're not alone. So, like, for example, I think a lot of people know, whether we call it hypnosis or not. That the way that we talk to ourselves, the way that we speak out into the world, it's not nothing, you know, it's, it's powerful.
But there's. It's so bizarre because I think so many people have like this mental block.
About fixing that, like, I feel like people are very in denial of that truth and I don't know, have you seen that?
Going back to what you said about we don't update our software, we don't guide ourselves because we get comfortable. Sometimes we fear change, we fear change because we think, well, if this changes, it might cause pain. Nobody gets in line for pain, right?
But we get in line for something we want, we'll stand in line for 20 minutes for, you know, whatever it may be.
An ice cream sandwich.
Exactly, I almost said that. And yet at the same time, we will play out well. Why start if we're going to possibly fail? And we don't look at sometimes as change as an opportunity to grow. I think when we step back and we realize we are all students of life, the people you admire, the people you think are successful, they all have something in common.
They probably have something in common with their the way they think and their mindset and the idea of people that are successful. Not everybody is successful the first time.
No.
So you just got to show up for yourself. And you said something just a few moments ago about how powerful our words are.
Yeah.
I say this to myself every single day. Words are magic to the receptive listener, and that's me or somebody else.
I've never thought of hypnosis as something that you can do to yourself.
All hypnosis is self-hypnosis, all of it. I will fight any hypnotist that says that they have the power to put somebody under. I mean, that's literally, I mean, seriously, I think I almost laugh at the theatrical kind of, you know, magical, mystical, swinging, watch, the cape and all that.
I'm like, Seriously, when I started, I'm like, I'm going to do the complete opposite. We're going to dispel the fact that I have the power to put you under. I always tell people you have the remote control. I mean, literally, you can either turn it up, turn it down, put me on mute, put yourself on mute, change the channel.
It's totally up to you.
What's the difference between? Like, meditation keeps coming to mind, right?
I'm so glad you're going there. Okay, great, this is awesome.
What would you say? The difference is between hypnosis and meditation?
Okay, here we go, you set it up meditation, get present, get tranquil.
Get calm, get aware, whatever it might be, just get really in tune with yourself and awareness. But then when you think about meditation, when somebody goes well, I meditated to visualize my future.
I meditated to visualize my relationship, I meditated to appreciate, to have happiness and gratitude. Well, wait a minute if you're doing that. Isn't that kind of self-hypnosis so very overlapping principles and titles?
So at times I'll actually say, I'm going to put you maybe in a meditated state. It depends on who I'm talking to and what I'm addressing. Because at the end of the day, my success is based on your success. So this isn't about me. I mean, it's like, in my mind, I'm like, Okay, I'm going to do this, yeah.
How many times?
Do you watch sports at all?
No.
Okay.
But even if you?
The Olympics, yes, gymnastics.
All right, so perfect example, yes, okay. So when an Olympic athlete is being interviewed after they just won, whatever it is.
Mm-hmm.
Think about what they might say if they were being interviewed, and if you can imagine somebody being interviewed, I bet you. They give credit to their belief of their ability. They usually talk about their belief in what they were going to do. Yeah, think about the celebrities, the musicians, the actors, the actresses that have come from nothing and built up this huge career.
Usually they go, I just believe in myself. I want to thank all the people around me and we just really had this vision. Then they give credit to their talent, you know, the hard work, right, totally. So if you listen to a gymnast or whoever it might be, they'll give credit. Second, to the hard work and the pain and the ankles and the ice packs, but they give credit to their mind first.
So think about anything that you think you're really good at. And a winning feeling. Would you give belief to that winning feeling based on your belief that you could do it first?
Honestly, yeah.
Okay, yeah, but it still took hard work. It still was a lot of determination, a lot of resilience, but you gave belief to what you were going to do.
It's almost like it's because it's the hardest thing to keep in place.
Like your hope, but is it?
Well, I guess, see, that's also you're so right. We convince ourselves that it's a mind game.
Don't stop there. You hit a really strong point because I'm sure there are people right now that are listening to this going. I know what she means because we do this, we put up this block. Well, I can't, I don't know if I'm good enough. Why try? I don't think it's possible. We've all said, I don't think it's possible, it's on part of our life.
So why do we do that? Well, maybe is it a defense mechanism because we don't want to feel failure.
That's always what happens. I always use that as a defense mechanism.
I mean, so, but if we acknowledge it because it's going to walk in the room, I mean, it has the key to get in the door. So when that fear comes into play, or that defense mechanism that says, maybe, hey, Emma, maybe you should try this. Because if you fail, people are going to look at you and they're going to judge you. And all of a sudden, well, wait a minute, you're human. Let them sit in the corner.
Give them a timeout, timeout. Yeah, exactly.
It's like one of those things that's so much easier said than done. And I think that that's why, you know, people, probably people come to you and they're like, I need, I need to, like, I need to start, like, I need to help, I need help getting started. I'm curious what people come to you for? Because I can think of a million different things that I need to be hypnotized for, a million, by the way, a million different things.
And we'll talk about that later. But like, what do you find you can help the most with when it when it comes to starting people on that journey?
I think self-awareness is first.
Interesting.
I think when it goes, comes down to it, it, it, you start to realize. I think this is one of the things I talk about in everything I do. The greatest investment you'll ever make in your life, all your material things that you know, the expense of. Whatever it may be, and we do it, we covet our expensive stuff, we save our money for whatever it may be.
We protect it, we hold on to it. But it can be replaced. It might have sentimental value. Whatever it may be, even if you saved up and you finally bought whatever it might've been, it still can be replaced.
Totally.
But we do forget to put ourselves first. And so I think that starts with getting people to really become very aware of self-care. Interesting, and I say self-care rather than say self-help. Self-help sounds like there's a problem.
Right, I'm helping. No, no self-care.
Yeah, because we all, like we all have our issues. I'll use myself as an example. I recently was like, I'm quitting nicotine.
It has been so terrible. And that's actually what sparked my interest in hypnosis, because this shit is hard, and I just didn't even anticipate it being that hard. But see, I know, see, I know exactly what you're going to say.
It doesn't have to be hard.
No, it doesn't.
You know, it's so funny. I was at a party recently and I was talking to this kid about quitting nicotine, and he got really into meditation. So it's just sort of a similar concept, but under a different lens.
A different umbrella.
A different umbrella. But he was talking about how it was so easy for him to quit nicotine. When he started meditating, and I was like, Listen, I was like, he just has something, I don't, you know, it's all this self-talk.
We assume it's because we look for the quick fix, we look for the magic, whatever it may be, and it can't be that easy. Yep, listen, nothing in life is easy.
Yeah, but the more you do something, we get really good at it.
Let's say I were to come to you and say, OK, I want to quit nicotine, what would you do? Does the work continue outside of the office? Do you think that you can hypnotize somebody and they walk out that day and it's done, or does the work have to continue in a way?
I mean, you're going to walk out of one session, you might have success. I have shown people literally one time, cigarettes the worst tasting thing they've ever experienced. Wow, literally.
Yeah.
And yet life is unpredictable, so how do you kind of, like, guide yourself so you create habits of understanding how to do it yourself? My goal is is that even when I, if I do work with somebody one on one. I've worked with athletes and individuals. But I want to teach them enough skills. Whether it's one, two, three or even a whole months of coaching that you don't rely on me.
OK, give you a perfect example, Emma, I want you to visualize, just work with me. We're going to role play for a second, all right?
I'm so ready, all right.
I want you to visualize licking the bottom of an ashtray. Would you have a cigarette right now?
Do I I only ever used a vape? OK, so use a vape example?
All right, so what if, what if I'm going to be visual for a second? What if you dropped your vape in dirt, sand, grit?
Spoiled food, right? Something gross? What if you dropped it in something really disgusting? Would you put that vape in your mouth?
Fuck no.
OK, so right now I'm asking you, yeah, if I took your vape pen and just dropped it in muck water or just gross? Perfect example. I mean, I'm going to get graphic here.
Yeah, if I took your vape and dropped it in the toilet and came back out and said, here.
I've dropped my vape in the toilet and I had to throw it out.
OK, you wouldn't put it in your mouth, right? No, that's a visualization, yeah.
So, and I'll tell you why this works so well. It's like, if you, if an athlete stands there right before the pitch, the you know the, you know the big game. And they just visualize success, they visualize determination, they visualize grit, you know, game on fierce feelings. Yeah, they're probably going to go out and play a great game, yep, or if they stand there and go, that opponent's really hard, they're going to be tough to beat.
What are the they've just given themselves? Two rows of destination, success and failure?
Yep.
So I use visualizations a lot with people in that relaxed state. So right now, you're hypnotized, your eyes aren't even closed. Do you want a vape pen right now up against, you know, your lips, if it was just dropped in the toilet?
I Yeah, I don't need it right now. OK, I'm not interested in that right now.
My job is then to show you how to engrave that. So if that desire comes in the room, guess what comes in stronger the visualization?
Everyone has hypnosis all wrong, everyone is judging this concept beyond belief.
Totally agree.
I think hypnosis is just mindfulness at the end of the day, but it's guided and controlled with a goal in mind.
You just said it guided and controlled. So if I ask you to close your eyes right now, I'm not going to do it, but if I ask you to close your eyes. I'm going to help you relax really, really well, really, really comfortable, I'm going to help you just completely de-stress. That's my. That's where everything starts.
That's like the secret ingredient to baking a cake right now. And at that state, where you stop thinking about your to do's, your tasks, emails you have to do later on, who you're supposed to meet tonight. Whatever it is, you don't think about those things. Yeah, and we just focus on that visualization of you dropping that vape pen in toilet water.
Oh, thank God.
And it becomes such a strong conversation that's repeated over and over. So again, going with what you said. I think that there's a lot of misconceptions, predetermined thoughts based on what hypnosis really is, and to me, it's just a guided meditation.
Now I'm excited because I'm not afraid of it. I think I've always been so afraid of the idea of hypnosis because I'm a very anxious, paranoid sort of person. I have a tendency to. If I feel out of control, I panic, and so to me, the idea of hypnosis. I'm like, I feel like I'm going to be out of control.
You're absolutely right there. A lot of people will say, Well, I would never be hypnotized because I don't want to feel out of control. Well, to be honest with you, you have more control than you think.
Well, I honestly think in a lot of ways, you know, based on what I'm hearing so far. Like, hypnosis can give you more control if you are using it, if you understand it and you use it within yourself, like you now have more control.
Absolutely, you know, there are so many things that we cannot control in the world. We can't control somebody else's opinion, we can't control what we hear, but we can control how we perceive and react. In our own reality, we have control over how somebody else's words are going to affect us.
Or do we believe in what we can do based on our own internal voice? Think about what you want to do as you grow your brand and who you are. You don't have to share that, but you have internal beliefs, those internal beliefs are fed and fueled by you. And the more and more you focus on that. Even when something doesn't go your way, and it's not going to all the time. How do you make sure that you are always in control over your destiny? And you are.
What do you believe is the best way to keep the software in your brain at the most optimal point as often as possible? Like, how? How do you recommend up keeping your brain software?
All right, so I'm going to, I'm going to go back to it again, because this is my philosophy. If you just spent five or 10 minutes a day, five or 10 minutes a day to kind of reset. And you can do it multiple times, you can do it in the morning, afternoon. You know, after a big whatever, it may be a big accomplishment. Every day we should be setting time. In fact, I'm going to give everybody a task.
If you're listening right now, give you a takeaway and don't dismiss the simplicity of this. Use your phone a regular basis. Do you set reminders on your phone all the time, right? So there's calendar reminders and somebody.
You're sharing an alert with somebody, somebody sends you an invite, you have to do this at this time or meet them somewhere. We rely on that message, we hold ourselves our name to it.
We show up, I mean, you don't just go. No, we made a contract, we made a promise. OK, my point to me. How often do you set a reminder on your own phone for yourself to stop reset?
Never OK. Today's the day. Yeah, when this, when we're done recording, I'm going to watch you do it, I can't wait.
I want to see you put a reminder every day and repeat it every single day. Yeah, and you can move. It might not be in the afternoon, might be it might be in the morning.
Might be before you go to bed at night. But what if every day you spent five or 10 minutes just focusing on some new software? Maybe being a little appreciative towards the things you had experienced that day, maybe just kind of resetting your thoughts, you know, sometimes in life we look for the big, huge thing that's going to happen to make us happy, and we don't celebrate the small little things we do.
So I think it's important to what's my win for the day.
Yeah, do you think hypnosis is targeting the conscious mind or the subconscious mind?
Wow, there's an overlap there or both? Yeah, no, I think it's an overlap of what's unconsciously happening. Because, in essence, how? Let me ask you a question.
How unaware are we, or do we think we are of being unaware?
I think most people are very unaware, myself included at times.
Weird, it could be anything from the things we say to the way we respond to things. I mean, I'll give you an example. Let's say I asked you to go to dinner and I mentioned the name of a restaurant. And let's say, three years ago you went there and it was horrible.
Worst experience ever. So when I mention the name of the restaurant, what happens?
I mean, guttural, eww, no.
Right, yeah, you've not. Your subconscious pulled out of your memory bank. That software threw that memory forward so fast, because that's what it does. Yep, and I would have responded and said, No way, I'm not going with you.
I'm not going there. You didn't even ask me, Well, why do you want to go there? Is there something I don't know? Maybe they've changed chefs, yeah.
Maybe it's a different owner, new owner. I mean, we've all done. I've actually said it, I'm not going back to that place ever again.
But sometimes we have to hit the pause button again. I know I'm just, you know, I'm having this conversation with myself, like, going, OK, don't be so closed minded, don't be so fearful. It can get out of control, though.
I'm not telling somebody to be so self, you know, and critical of their thoughts. Because we don't want to do that. We don't want to get to a point where we're like, judging now everything, we're questioning everything. What am I saying the right now?
I just want. It's kind of like you want to create this software that's constantly evolving and growing. Because everything about you, Emma, your personality, your likes, your dislikes, your feelings, your emotions, your arguments, your resolutions, your commitments, your gratitude. Think about it. It's probably played out in your head on a regular basis all the time before it even happens.
It's so true.
Before you're given an opportunity to something, what does our mind do? It starts to run through our head. What would this be like? Is this possible? Can I do this?
Am I worthy? And what wins is the self-belief.
It's one thing to.
Tell yourself.
That you believe in yourself. It's one thing to say that you're grateful for something, It's one thing to say you believe this will come true. But what I've noticed in my own life is that the only time that.
That truly works, that sort of manifesting truly works, is when I believe it in my gut. Do you think that if you say something to yourself enough, it becomes true, or do you think that there's something else?
That needs fixing in that situation.
Our old limiting beliefs will either take us to a place of failure or doubt, or we have an opportunity to grow so.
I'm going to ask you a question. We've been sitting here for a while. I'm going to ask you a question. I want you to come up with the first answer without even thinking about it.
Get ready.
Are you going to quit nicotine?
It was not obvious for me. I almost said, No, I literally was about to be like, no, because I don't want to.
OK, so there you have it. Oh, it sucks.
But, but, but yes, I know.
OK, so now let's because everybody, I'm sure there are people right now that can really understand your hesitation. So that was genuinely real. So the more we work on ourselves, the more we start to realize what we're capable of doing. I know deep down, just from our conversations, you're going to, you're going to stop nicotine.
I know I will, I know, I know, yes, but that pause in there, that that little pause, that's what I'm there to do is help you with that.
It's figuring out where, why there's that hesitation, right?
Is to help you with that internal talk. And then you figure out if you really do understand this, you're going to go. Oh, I want more.
I totally go well. It's already like melting my brain out of my ears and then reformulating it in a whole new way.
But again, it goes back to. It's like, you just, you know, you just have these conversations, you figure out what's, what direction you want to go. Yeah, and you kind of touched on it.
Does that self-talk really have that much power? And the answer is, you've already teed it up perfectly. Yes, yeah, one hundred percent.
To zoom in on, like limiting beliefs. Yeah, do we have to have some? or do you think we don't need them at all?
Like, is it unsafe to have no limiting beliefs?
No, I think that they're going to be there and that's that's part of life. It's just how to navigate when something throws you a curveball, you know, when something is a storm, how do you rise above the storm? I mean, I'm not trying to be cliche here, but how do you rise above? You know the everything else going on in life and find the good of what just happened.
You know, how do you fuel the fire? how do you show the force of nature? You know who you are? I mean, you know, even if it's just something is that you think is so small, could be huge in the back of your thought process.
What I've noticed with myself is I'm the least in touch with.
Me when I'm drowning myself in entertainment, but I've noticed that that's something I do as a coping mechanism. Like when I don't want to software update my brain because that sounds like too much work. And when I don't want to address all of these changes that I know I need to make, I drown myself in entertainment.
Sure, do you binge watch?
I for me, it's like it's scrolling on Instagram, it's going on Pinterest, it's online shopping. It's watching YouTube videos that aren't educational because I do love watching like an educational thing on YouTube.
But I'm definitely not doing that when I'm trying to drown like, I'm not, it's all, it's only things that are just it's junk, you know, junk for the brain.
It's not true helpful, it's not teaching me anything, it's it's, you know, it's that.
I feel like we're in such an overstimulating time that it's harder than ever to properly hypnotize yourself, properly meditate. OK, but you're going to be like, it's not it. It isn't hard, it doesn't have to be hard.
Back to your, that's a limited belief. What are we going to do? what are we going to do? When we're done recording? You're going to do it.
Where's your phone? We're going to make an appointment and you can change the time because you're in control. Yeah, you said it. But think about if you just sat for five minutes, if we made an appointment for five minutes on your phone and that alarm goes off. You know that's what you should be doing, and when you do that, then everything else just kind of put off to the side and you focus on you.
And whatever the task at hand is afterwards, whether it's calling somebody important, having a relationship with somebody, prepping for the next project. Whatever you have, watch how easy it is, everything else after that, watch how more focused you are on whatever you're going to do after that. Five minutes.
It's interesting because I've gone through phases where I've been so dedicated to.
Taking those five, 10 minutes, and it's never lasted longer than, like, a few months. What's so interesting is I know how helpful it is and I know how beneficial it is. But yet I get lazy and I'm like, you want to be automatic?
You want that to be an auto thought, Yeah, that like driving our car. Let's go back to the beginning of this interview. So I said to you, driving your car becomes an automatic response called highway hypnosis. First time you ever got behind a wheel, you're probably nervous.
Nobody can talk, don't turn the radio, don't talk to me, don't distract, yeah.
The second day, you're like, a pro, right? So same thing. You start to repeat something over and over again, and maybe it won't disappear. Maybe it becomes part of who you are, your personality. Everything you do on a regular basis is repeated.
You got really good at that, and you either get really good at the bad habits, or you get really good at the good habits, the good habits. Because how often do you hear somebody saying, I have a habit of not vaping? Yeah, do you ever hear somebody say that?
No, you hear, I have a habit of vaping. We give it power, yep.
When it comes to, you know, the good habits it sounds like. To me, the best path to take towards establishing those good habits is to remove the limiting beliefs. Telling you that establishing those good habits is going to be challenging or impossible. And then just doing it, and that's it when it comes to bad habits.
What's that?
What's that process?
So you have a bad habit. if you stop the bad habit, what have you replaced it with? You know, sometimes people say they don't want to stop, you know, smoking or using nicotine or vaping is because they're fearful that they're going to start eating right. They take one vice and replace it with another one, because it's a satisfying thing.
They use food as a comfort. Is vaping a comfort to you? Yeah, now, so let me ask you, I'm not going to use you in the example here, but I'm going to use somebody else, yeah.
If I ask somebody about smoking or vaping, I would usually ask them, Where do you do this? do you take a break? do you do it in your home? do you do it in your car? do you do it?
You walk away from everybody else and you walk outside just to have some personal me time, and so you go a little deeper with that conversation. So are you using the vaping as an excuse to get away from your reality, to calm yourself down? And that inhale of oxygen, which our brain craves, our body craves, because oxygen is a source of life, a source of everything we need it.
Exactly can't live without it, yeah. So are we really craving a little more oxygen to calm ourselves, to reduce stress? Is it really the vaping or the nicotine that's reducing the stress?
Or is the time out, is it the personal awareness, is it a distraction from whatever you know it might be? And then, when you do, quit using that as the excuse, what are you replacing it with? And and usually somebody will say, I don't.
I usually, you know, food is usually my other comfort. MM Hmm. well, maybe it's just breathing. Yeah, everybody's different.
But are you craving the vapor? are you craving more oxygen? are you craving time out? are you craving relaxation?
You know what it is for me, does it relax you? It's or it's the. I've always had an oral fixation, like since I was a kid, suck my thumb my whole childhood, till nine years old.
Quit that very challenging. At like 15, I start vaping, and it replaces that oral fixation because I'm a very anxious girl we look at.
Quitting a bad habit as like a loss, almost in a weird way, you know, like I think from my perspective.
I've almost felt the sense of loss when I decided I was going to, like, stop vaping.
Because you're probably playing out something that hasn't even happened yet in the back of your mind.
But I feel like, Oh my God, my life I'm going to have, I'm going to be missing something, right? But I think it's so valuable for somebody who's trying to quit a bad habit to be like, No, I'm not. It's not a loss.
I'm replacing that with something else, so that replacement is so huge, and I didn't even think about that once during my.
Ongoing journey of stopping completely.
One day soon, soon, one day soon, but we have time, we have time, I have time. But I think the replacement's huge. Because it's like, it's those moments when you're anxious, or like, I'll use me as an example, it's the moments when I'm anxious. And all I want is a vape, because I used to just hit the vape.
Think about what you're, you're asking, you're asking for a time out.
Well, I'm very inspired, that's for sure, because I think I've been enabling myself in a lot of areas to.
Have bad habits, you know, to not be as self-aware as I know I want to be and should be. I don't know. I've sort of more recently convinced myself that.
That's too hard, and I think it really comes down to being able to spot the lies that you tell yourself. Is so, it's so powerful, but I also think it's one of those things that once you're aware of it.
You can't unsee it.
Do you know how many people right now are listening to this? that can resonate? This resonates with them? How many people are sitting, listening? Is driving a car, walking with friends, just listening to this conversation going? I understand that, I understand that I have a big decision, I think I have to apply for college. I have to make a decision on this and it's going to be hard. Or I have to go to work to do a new job I've never done before.
It's a limiting belief there. It's not just about breaking a bad habit, it's about exploring what's possible. But think about how many people right now have an overwhelming task of change and growth. They're not alone now.
I feel like there's nothing else to say.
Oh, there's more. We can go ahead.
To be honest, we need a part two because we need to do a whole episode about falling in love and how that's hypnosis. That's, that's the next episode. We're doing that, that's you'll come.
I'll pull you back in one day because we have to do.
I see careers, love life, relationships. Yeah, you can, you know, you can.
It's never ending.
No, it's not.
Thank you for doing this.
Oh, you're awesome.
This is not the last time. OK, you did. You melted my brain in all the best ways.
Oh my gosh, I love that.
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