| Here's how phobias work. There are two parts | | | | dangerous. This is the basis of a phobia: a |
| to your mind - one that thinks, and one that | | | | fear response attached to something that was |
| feels. The thinking part is the conscious, | | | | present in the original trauma. The response |
| rational mind that you are using now as you | | | | is terror, shaking, sweating, heart pounding |
| read this. The feeling part is the | | | | etc. And because of the sloppy |
| unconscious, emotional mind. It takes care of | | | | pattern-matching it can get stuck to |
| automatic tasks like regulating the heart, | | | | literally anything - animal, mineral or |
| controlling pain and managing our instincts. | | | | vegetable. It may not even be glued to the |
| It's the unconscious mind that is programmed | | | | thing that caused the trauma. So a child |
| to act instinctively in times of danger. It | | | | attacked in a pram by a dog may develop a |
| reacts very fast - making you run or fight - | | | | phobia of prams rather than of dogs. It is |
| rather than allowing your thinking mind to | | | | because phobias are created in this way, by |
| philosophize while you are attacked by a | | | | our natural psycho-neurology, that they are |
| tiger. This has great survival value. The | | | | so common. It's the way we are wired. |
| unconscious mind is also a very fast learner. | | | | Approximately 10% of people have a phobia. |
| The same emergency route that can bypass the | | | | It's a very human thing. And it's precisely |
| rational mind in times of danger can also | | | | because they are created by the unconscious |
| stamp strong emotional experiences (traumatic | | | | mind that they seem so irrational. Of course |
| ones) in the unconscious mind. This makes | | | | they are - the rational thinking brain hasn't |
| evolutionary sense - it ensures that we have | | | | had a chance to go to work on them. Many |
| vivid imprints of the things that threaten | | | | traditional phobia treatments, including |
| us. And just as we have two minds, so we have | | | | drugs, attempt to deal with the phobia by |
| two memory systems: one for the facts and one | | | | calming things down after this response |
| for the emotions that may or may not go with | | | | pattern has triggered. They treat the |
| those facts. Sometimes, when a person | | | | symptoms, not the cause. To treat the cause, |
| experiences a very traumatic event, the | | | | this trapped traumatic memory has to be |
| highly emotional memory of the event becomes | | | | turned into, and saved as, an ordinary |
| trapped - locked in the emotional brain - in | | | | unemotional memory of a past event. The |
| an area called the amygdala which is the | | | | emotional tag, the terror response, needs to |
| emotional storehouse. There is no chance for | | | | be unstuck from that object or situation. |
| the rational mind to process it and save it | | | | This is exactly what a remarkable therapy |
| as an ordinary, non-threatening memory in | | | | called the Fast Phobia Cure does. It allows |
| factual storage (in the hippocampus). Like | | | | the phobia sufferer to review the traumatic |
| the memory of what you did last weekend. | | | | event or memory from a calm and dissociated, |
| Instead, the emotional brain holds onto this | | | | or disconnected, state. The rational mind can |
| unprocessed reaction pattern because it | | | | then do its work in turning the memory into |
| thinks it needs it for survival. And it will | | | | an ordinary, neutral, non-threatening one. |
| trigger it whenever you encounter a situation | | | | And store it in factual memory where it |
| or object that is anything like the original | | | | should have been to start with. This happens |
| trauma. It doesn't have to be a precise | | | | very quickly because the mind learns fast. It |
| match. This is pure survival again. You only | | | | learns the fear response quickly and it |
| need to see part of a tiger through the | | | | learns (or relearns) the neutral response |
| bushes for the fear reaction to kick in again | | | | just as quickly. And when that happens the |
| - for the "fight or flight" response to | | | | phobia is gone. |
| trigger - you don't have to wait until you | | | | |
| see the whole tiger or identify it exactly as | | | | Guy Baglow is a leading phobia specialist and |
| the tiger that attacked you before. In fact, | | | | founder of the mindspa phobia clinic ( ), |
| it probably only has to be something orange | | | | the UK's leading specialist private phobia |
| and black moving through the bushes. This is | | | | clinic in Harley Street - a world centre of |
| why the pattern matching process is | | | | healthcare excellence in London. An online |
| necessarily approximate, or sloppy. You err | | | | clinic ( ) has downloadable treatments |
| on the side of safety. You don't have to have | | | | including the Fast Phobia Cure. |
| all the details to know if something is | | | | |