Hypnotherapy for a problem

Feeling Lost? How Hypnosis Helps You Find Direction

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Feeling lost does not mean you have no direction to find. In identity research, it can mean you are actively exploring options without having committed to one yet, or that you have stopped exploring at all, and the two call for different responses. Hypnosis can help with one specific job: getting clear about what matters to you, so that your next step has something to aim at. It cannot hand you a purpose.

What kind of lost are you?

In Erik Erikson’s theory of personality development, identity crisis is a stage of adolescence, a period of deep reflection on how you see yourself. The Wikipedia article on identity crisis also describes James Marcia’s research, which sorts people by two things: whether they have explored alternatives and whether they have committed to any. Marcia’s four statuses were described for adolescents; applying them to adult life is an extension, but they offer a useful vocabulary:

  • Foreclosure: an identity taken on without much choice. A crisis can follow when that borrowed identity stops fitting.
  • Diffusion: neither exploring nor committing, described as an apathetic state.
  • Moratorium: open-minded and thoughtful, but in crisis over who you are. The article’s example is a college student who has changed majors several times and still cannot find their passion.
  • Achievement: having explored and then committed to important parts of who you are.

If you are in moratorium, feeling lost can be part of the process. If you recognize foreclosure or diffusion, the first task is to start exploring.

Why is direction different from a goal?

Acceptance and commitment therapy, developed by Steven C. Hayes, draws this distinction. The Wikipedia article on the therapy lists among its core principles:

  • Values: discovering what is most important to you.
  • Committed action: setting goals according to those values and carrying them out.

A value, in this sense, is a direction you can keep moving in, such as being useful to people or making things well. A goal is a stop along the way. If you have reached or abandoned a goal without knowing the value behind it, the next goal is hard to choose.

How do you find your values?

By looking at evidence from your own life rather than waiting for a feeling of certainty:

  • When did time disappear? List moments when you were absorbed in what you were doing.
  • What do you admire in others? The qualities you respect in other people may point to your own values.
  • What made you angry? A sense that something important was being ignored can show what you care about.
  • Which choices still feel right years later?

Look for themes across the answers, then write each one as a direction, beginning with a verb: “to teach,” “to build,” “to look after.”

What can hypnosis do when you feel lost?

In the reflection step. A session can give you a quiet, absorbed state in which to revisit the moments on your list in detail: where you were, what you were doing, what mattered about it. You can also rehearse taking one small action in the direction of a value. The values themselves come from your own life; no session can tell you what your purpose is.

When is it more than feeling lost?

The identity crisis article notes that identity diffusion can overlap with conditions such as depression. If feeling lost comes with persistent low mood, hopelessness or withdrawal from people and things that used to matter, talk to a doctor or licensed therapist before working on direction.

One sentence and one step

Finish this sentence in writing: “Whatever job, place or relationship I end up in, I want to keep __.” Then choose one action you could take this week that moves in that direction, however small, and put it in your calendar.

This article is general information, not medical or psychological advice; talk with a licensed clinician about your own situation.

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