In our pursuit of mental wellbeing, it’s natural to seek out helpers, therapists, coaches, healers, who promise insight, relief, and meaning. Many practitioners do this work with integrity and care. But there is a dangerous line where guidance quietly turns into governance, and the helping relationship becomes something else entirely. Nicola Barragry a fantastic Hypnotherapist and friend recommended I listen to a podcast that told the story of a healer Ann Craig. Listening highlighted how important it is to understand what a helpful relationship is, appears and what is good and healthy in the therapy space. With the increased search for rapid healing and spiritual experiences more people are entering into unhealthy relationships and engaging in unhealthy practices on the therapy space. To understand how this can happen, it’s important to look at the cautionary case of Anne Craig, whose work in London’s elite social circles became the focus of the investigative podcast Dangerous Memories. Her story offers a powerful blueprint for what can go wrong when boundaries dissolve and influence goes unchecked. 1. The Lure of the “Pink Room” For Anne Craig’s clients, the experience didn’t begin with fear. It began with allure. She was often recommended by word of mouth among wealthy families as “that amazing healer lady.” The setting: Sessions took place in her home in Kensington/Chelsea, in a space famously described as “the pink room.” The hook: For young, intelligent women at a crossroads, the intimacy of a private home felt more enlightened and personal than a clinical consulting room. The experience: Early sessions were described as deeply validating. Clients felt profoundly seen. Craig was charismatic and warm, creating the sense that the “truth” behind their unhappiness was finally being uncovered. This is where ethical practice matters. In professional therapy, clear physical and relational boundaries are not cold, they are protective. They exist to ensure the work is about your growth, not the practitioner’s influence. When those boundaries blur, empowerment can quietly slide into enmeshment.

Thank you so much for coming along to Meditation for Wellbeing tonight. It was really lovely to share that space with you. I’ll upload the guided meditation into the classroom over the weekend, and it will be there free for the whole month. So if you missed the session, or if you’d like to revisit it in your own time, you can dip back in whenever it suits you. And a very warm welcome to everyone who is new to the community 🌿 You are so welcome here. This is a gentle, supportive space, feel free to share, to chat, to reflect, or simply to quietly take what you need. There’s no pressure to show up in any particular way. I’m really glad you’re part of the Joyful Mind Community. 💫

Recently, I’ve found myself having to use very strong, very explicit language in order to get the medical intervention I needed. Not dramatic language. Not poetic language. But crisis language. The kind of words that make people sit up, take notice, and act. It struck me how revealing that is. There seems to be an unspoken rule in many systems: if your language isn’t serious enough, you won’t be taken seriously. If you don’t use the right trigger words,pain, risk, trauma, severity, your distress may be minimised, delayed, or politely parked. And that made me think more deeply about the power of words, not just in moments of crisis, but in everyday life. As a hypnotherapist, I use words all day, every day. Carefully. Intentionally. With awareness of how a single phrase can soften a nervous system… or tighten it. How one word can open possibility, while another quietly shuts it down. This is something Peta Heskell explored beautifully in her article The Power of Words. She reminds us that words are not neutral. They don’t just describe experience, they create it. Language evokes physiological responses. Posture changes. Breathing shifts. Muscles tighten or release. Words land in the body. What stayed with me most from her writing is the idea that people attach deeply personal meaning to words. A word like “stress,” “anxiety,” or “confidence” might sound simple on the surface, but for the person hearing it, it carries years of memory, sensation, and emotion. When we repeat certain labels, especially to ourselves, we aren’t just naming something; we’re rehearsing it. And yet, look at how casually we use big words now. Trauma words for ordinary distress. Crisis language for normal human struggle. Harsh, absolute language when we’re simply tired, overwhelmed, or needing care. That kind of language can be useful when it needs to be useful, as I experienced firsthand. But when it becomes our default inner dialogue, it can quietly keep the nervous system on high alert.

Tonight’s class is all about learning how to feel better in your body and calmer in your mind — using simple, practical tools you can actually take into daily life. We’ll be exploring: 🌿 Breath-based meditation to bring the mind out of overwhelm and back into the present moment 🌿 Nine-round breathing — a structured breathing practice that gently clears mental noise and steadies the nervous system 🌿 Body scan relaxation — a deeply soothing practice that helps release physical tension and is especially helpful for sleep This class isn’t about “emptying the mind” or doing meditation perfectly it is about learning how to notice what’s happening in your body, soften where you can, and give your system a chance to reset. When we feel good — even a little bit better — we cope better.We breathe more freely.We think more clearly.We respond rather than react. These practices are: ✔ gentle ✔ accessible ✔ suitable for beginners ✔ and easy to use at home, in bed, or in moments of stress If life has felt busy, heavy, or overstimulating lately, this is a chance to pause, reconnect, and give yourself some proper care — not by adding more effort, but by letting go. All welcome.Come as you are. No experience needed 💛

Last year at the IHA convention I picked up some old journal articles and today I read a case study from Val Walker. Blew my mind, offering a striking illustration of the mind–body connection taken to an exciting biological edge. It quietly challenges the assumption, still dominant in much of mainstream medicine, that healing is purely a mechanical process driven by protein synthesis, cell division, and time. From a hypnotherapeutic perspective, the body does not merely repair itself automatically; it responds to instruction. The subconscious mind, in this view, functions as the blueprint-holder for physical integrity. What makes this case particularly compelling is not simply the speed of recovery from a severe injury, but the quality and completeness of that recovery, and the unexpected secondary healing that followed. At the centre of the case is Bruce, whose finger injury was surgically reconstructed with the clear medical expectation that recovery would be limited. His surgeon was explicit: 95% functionality was the maximum possible outcome, with permanent structural compromise and visible deformity. This prognosis became part of Bruce’s conscious understanding of his body’s future. Hypnotherapy intervened not by contradicting surgery, but by working at a different level of the healing process. In hypnosis, the theoretical foundation of cellular regeneration rests on the role of the Autonomic Nervous System (ANS). The ANS governs digestion, immune response, circulation, and tissue repair, processes that occur outside conscious control. By entering a deep trance state, Bruce bypassed the analytical, critical mind that had absorbed the surgeon’s prognosis as fact. In that state, suggestions could reach the subconscious without being filtered through doubt or perceived biological limits. Rather than focusing on abstract positivity, the hypnotic work likely involved precise, embodied imagery: increased blood flow to the injured area, efficient nutrient delivery, and the gradual “knitting” of bone and tissue at a microscopic level. This form of visualisation I teach at The NCCH as body talk or primal imaging and it is not just symbolic in nature; it operates as a language the nervous system understands sensation, movement, and expectation.