Coffee With Hilary and Les from State of Mind Hypnosis and Training Centre

New Year, New Mind: Align With Intention, Not Pressure

Hilary & Les Season 3 Episode 44

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We reflect on the last hours of the year, turn sleep into a nightly practice for guidance, and lay out a kinder way to set intentions without pressure. We align goals with seasons and stages of life, swap guilt for patience, and choose small daily actions that shape the river.

• asking for help in dreams and lucid recall
• sleep as relaxation rather than something to force
• specific questions leading to clearer night insights
• honoring old wisdom while rejecting unhelpful beliefs
• easing new year pressure with gentle rollout
• imagining your healthiest self now
• letting go of the past and keeping the lesson
• aligning goals with seasons and stage of life
• patience as shaping the river, not stopping it
• one intention, daily inspired action, steady focus

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SPEAKER_04:

We are on the line. Last day of 2025.

SPEAKER_00:

I think there are a few people who want to see that one gone.

SPEAKER_04:

I see a lot of like dumpsters burning and with 2025 on it.

SPEAKER_00:

It's been a lot of changing.

SPEAKER_04:

Yep. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00:

And it uh you know it's a trajectory.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, I feel like I'm in a slingshot right now.

SPEAKER_00:

Explain.

SPEAKER_04:

Well, the feeling I have is terror.

SPEAKER_00:

Don't push the button, don't push the button, push the buttons.

SPEAKER_04:

No, it's uh just feeling like I'm being pulled back to to be let go, you know? Yeah. I didn't sleep well last night. I I was asking for help all night about trying to figure up this new year, and I kept having crazy dreams, but nothing made sense. So I was like, damn, I didn't get help, but maybe it was helpful.

SPEAKER_00:

I don't know. Well, I think, you know, it's a I think first of all, it's a fantastic practice.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Right? You you can reach a point where you feel pretty confident. Uh I could use words ancestors now, people who you love and are in your life and who have passed, they care, and they they still exist, they just don't exist in physical form here with you now. And you know, I've made it pretty clear over the last while just how hypnosis sort of leads you inevitably to an awareness that you're not alone. And that you never were and you never will be. And you can really use that and to then be in the practice every night to turn to those people and ask for help, ask for help for whatever you want. And I think the more specific you ask, the more what you get makes sense, right? Saying I need help, sometimes you get stuff and then you go, well, what the hell does that mean? And yeah, but it was still help. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

When you get really specific, like I'll I'll you know, I'll say, well, you know, why why am I having this aching pain in my sacroiliac? Why am I having such resistance to this thing? Why or help me understand how I can overcome these things I'm going through now. And yeah, and help has come to me in yeah, countless different forms. My favorite's always when they have a song stuck in my head when I wake up.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, you've got a lot, or you have at least over the last month helpful.

SPEAKER_00:

Anyway, I think it's a great practice. I think it it's always worth giving it a try. And in fact, what'll happen, I think, for most people is at some point in the night, you remember that you asked for help and something will be going on in your dreams. And those dreams become uh, you know, what people refer to as lucid dreams. You start to be aware that you're asleep and you're dreaming. And you can then say to yourself, Oh, I need to remember this. This is the thing I need to remember. And for some people, you can wake up and write it down. And for some people, it'll just be there waiting for you. When you wake up, it'll be a series of words or an image or a sound, or in my case, a song. It's usually for me a phrase or a song or an image that sort of brings me peace, that somehow during my sleep, it brought me some peace. And it's then just a tool to use through the through the morning, through the day, if I can remember.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

So I think it's a great practice to do that. And to be aware that even if you didn't understand the help, you were helped. And if you really want to be able to understand it, you got to be more specific in what you're asking for help with, I think.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

That's the way it works for me. That's uh the way it works for other people that I've discussed this with. Yeah. Yeah. So there's there's a good one right now. Just this year, I'm not gonna let my sleep be passive. I'm going to engage my sleep in a way that's going to help me grow. I'm going to prepare for sleep before I sleep. I'm going to remember that sleep is simply the natural result of relaxing the mind and the body. To try to sleep is almost antithetical. It's it's against your purpose. To try to sleep is like an oxymoron. You can try to rest because then you will attempt to relax your body and relax your mind. But sleep is just a natural result of a relaxed mind and a relaxed body.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And I'm not dismissing what some people go through, who go through real difficulties in falling asleep. I'm just saying that you've been doing it since you were born. It comes naturally. And yeah, so to approach your sleep in a in a better way, in a more relaxed and peaceful way, to learn how to relax your body and your mind quickly will result in falling asleep quickly. To go to sleep with the intention that your sleep will serve you physically, emotionally, that your dreams and your activities in the night will be helpful for your dreams and activities during the day. Yeah, sleep can be a really wonderful time.

SPEAKER_04:

I read recently, and I'd maybe have to look it up again here, but I read that the Egyptians during their reign built specific houses, temples for people to go and sleep specifically to get information.

SPEAKER_00:

Such an awareness.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah. Yeah, I feel like so much of our lore and myth and even real stuff comes from way back when, and we we had so much more belief in people that would come and say, This is what happened in a dream, or you know, this is gonna happen, or prophecies, you know. Anyway, I'm getting off track, I feel.

SPEAKER_00:

No, no, heck no, this is all good stuff. To yeah, I think, you know, it makes me think about just how our our society has become a real marketplace. And we we think everything has a price, we think everything should have a price, and we forget that markets get controlled by the dominant players in those markets. That's why we have laws against that kind of stuff. And so what happens is these wonderful ideas that people could just share. You know, I had this experience. People get dismissed and and you know, canceled when they say things that fall out of line with sort of the common point of view, which is really shaped by markets and players in the markets. So I think I think this stuff is valuable for us to share this stuff that is, you know, it's all stuff that's been taught to us by one person or another. And that's a really cool thing to remember, right? That there's very little in your mind that you didn't receive from somebody else. A great reminder as you try to rely on ideas and information, and that you're allowed to you're allowed to take control of that. You're allowed to dismiss the things that don't serve you and pursue the things that seem to serve you, and yeah, share the world ones that you have found helpful.

SPEAKER_04:

New year, new mind.

SPEAKER_00:

Sounds like something should be in a bottle. Yeah, here's a bottle of new mind. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Not new you anymore, it's new mind. Yeah.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

So what do you think is a good way to approach a new year? It's right there now, it's just hours away. One more sleep, as they say.

SPEAKER_04:

I think that it's good to approach it without too much pressure. I think when humans say to ourselves, I'm starting this on this day, and that's the only day I'm starting it, it puts a lot of pressure on on people. So I think easing into it with, yeah, I'm gonna try this on this day and that on that day, and this is just going to be a natural rollout of what I'd like to do, then it's not so much, well, if I don't do everything I'm talking about tomorrow, you know, the first, then like if I if I don't get it all done, then I'm a failure and I'm just gonna give up and try again next year. Which so many people do. I mean, we do it on the the macro and we do it on the the micro scale, like you know, I'm gonna start that Monday, and then by Tuesday you haven't you haven't done it, and then you feel bad, and and then oh, I guess I'll start again Monday. You know, it's just these constant pressures.

SPEAKER_00:

It's always next year.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah. Yeah. For me, I've had this thought, and uh this is a very personal way of thinking, but it came to me the other day and I wouldn't I wouldn't, you know, pressure anyone to think this way. It's just my own. But I had this thought of eating healthier, thinking healthier, seeing myself in a new light. And I thought, I want to see who I am at this age now. Like I'll never be this age again. And who am I? What what is what do I look like when I'm feeling my healthiest and and I'm thinking my healthiest and I'm eating my healthiest? What does that Hillary look like? And I don't want to miss her, right? I don't want to miss that, seeing that and experiencing that because suddenly I'm gonna be 50, 60, you know, hopefully, and I'm going to have look back and go, oh, I missed her. Like, you know, and so I want to I hope that I I don't know if this makes sense, but it does to me. But just changing now to be as much as I can, you know, the the the I'm gonna use the word best, the best that I can be without too much pressure, but I I just want to know I want to know what I look like healthy, you know? Yeah. And that was a new thought for me, right? Uh it wasn't like, oh, I gotta look this way, I gotta, I gotta be this way, I gotta think this way. It was very much like I know she's under there, and I I only get one time to see her, right? So I want to see her now.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, and I just say that that's the magic, finding a new way to think of it, finding a new way of approaching it. You know, these little tiny experiments with our mind that we do every day, just trying to think of things differently. That's that's where the magic waits for us, right? Because these old ways of thinking are just habits, they're locked in, and they've already proven themselves to be inadequate. Right. I didn't get where I wanted to go with my old way of thinking. There are lots of things I can do different, but the first thing that needs to be different is the way I think, the way I think of myself, the way I think of the world, the way I think of this process, the way I think of the goal, right? So I think that's cool, right? It's a new way. It's now it's like uh a gift you give yourself that you get to unwrap. And the unwrapping is actually just uh being a little more deliberate about what you choose to eat and what you choose to do for exercise and yeah, you know, who you choose to be around.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah. You know, we have to eat all the cheese and cookies in the house for you can't have them lined around.

SPEAKER_00:

Don't want to waste them. I mean, I just bought that damn box of quality street chocolates. What a dumb thing to do, man.

SPEAKER_04:

Yesterday for breakfast, I finished off the chocolate and I thought I thought, oh good, there's no more in the house.

SPEAKER_00:

Which are my particular favorites. They're the ones I like to give to my friends because I like them so much.

SPEAKER_04:

Um yeah. One for them, one for me.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, usually. I pull up to the to the checkout with my cart filled with cans of quality street chocolates. They should be paying us for this advertisement.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, basically.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

You're the devil, says John. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh man.

SPEAKER_00:

But there it is. There's the magic. The magic is in thinking of things differently, you know, and to think, you know, uh, you know, I think it starts with letting go of the past. The past is the past, it's gone. It's literally gone, right? It's like having a$10 bill, going to the store and spending it, right? And then spending all your time thinking about that$10 bill. Like what a waste of time, right? It's gone. It's gone. You ain't getting it back. You might get another one if you want. You can go after getting another one if you want, but that one's gone. And then, oh, did I spend it right? Did I spend it wrong? Oh no, no, did I make mistakes? Oh, come on, it's just gone. It's a resource and it's gone now. But there's more waiting for you on the other end, right? There are more$10 bills coming. You can spend them differently. But it's to think of time like that, it gets spent and then it's gone. And to dwell on it or waste a lot of time regretting it or judging it or yearning for it to come back, that was the best ten dollars I ever had. It was my favorite. My grandma gave it to me. It was fresh and new. Nobody'd ever spent it before. Yeah, I spent it for the first time. Right. It's still gone. And what's really neat is that because it's gone, there is now, there is the$10 you have in your hand right now. It's right there. And if you're busy thinking about the last$10, right, you're not going to be deliberately spending this$10. So 2025 for everything that it was is worth reflecting on and taking away the growth, taking away the lessons. Some lessons we learn the easy way. You know, we do the right thing and we go, oh, that worked out. And some lessons we learn the hard way. Oh, that didn't work out. How can I do that better next time? Take the lessons with us, be smarter, be more capable, be more skilled. But that's now who we are, right? The lessons, it's not the time. It's the things we gained from the time that we carry with us, not the time itself. There's fresh time sitting here right now, waiting for us to spend. And so the past of 2025, take those lessons, take that growth. Be proud of the distance you've traveled in your mind and in your book in your life. Be proud of the things that you didn't do right that you now have learned. Cast off any judgment. I don't need to judge last year. I don't need to, I don't need to criticize myself or or you know, start giving myself a talking to. I don't need to do any of that. The lesson is learned, and now I want to embrace the lesson. And often one of the things, one of the mistakes we make is we learn, I don't want to do that anymore, but we don't have a replacement for it. Right. To say, I don't want to do that anymore, without saying, I do want to do this more, I think is not really learning the lesson. You know, being aware that that is not something I want to repeat is not the same as being aware of what you want to accomplish. And that's the stuff you carry into the present that you are armed with to face the future. It's a lovely symbolic process we go through. You know, the days get short, short, short, and then they start getting long, and then we call it a new year. We know that we can begin again, and every moment holds that. Every moment holds an opportunity to begin again. And so we I think we already recognize the incredibly, I'll use the word pregnant, this incredibly pregnant moment that we have that's full of potential, that's full of new life, that's full of incredible opportunities. And that's, I think, part of the reason why everyone in some way or another yearns for the new year.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah. And there's there's been a lot of, I don't know, I don't know if it would be talk or knowledge coming out that the a natural new year for new beginnings for humans is not January 1st. It's like springtime.

SPEAKER_02:

Right.

SPEAKER_04:

As humans, we're not supposed to be starting new big endeavors January 1st. We're supposed to be hunkering down and just going inward, right? Now, I don't know if that makes sense for places in the world that aren't full of snow. But metaphorically, it's a time to it's a time to do a lot of introspection introspection and and and look at life and be be calm and relaxed and yeah, just go with the go with the flow. Excuse me. And then the natural time to start things is is springtime. Things I mean, think about it, like trees start their leaves, flowers come up, grass starts growing. That's that's more the natural cycle.

SPEAKER_00:

In many ways, we're blessed with the nature that we have here, because we have all those seasons and all those cycles. And they're very, very distinct. And they don't last a long time. You know, you enter one new season and then they go. And I think the the metaphor of seasons is a good one to embrace. To ask yourself, you know, what season am I in in my in my life, in the whole of this span that I intend on being? Where am I in that process? And then, you know, what are the things, what are the the endeavors I can engage in? What are the endeavors, you know, I've been don't I don't know if it sounds morbid or not, but you know, I'm aware, and I said this to my son yesterday, I'm in my third season. I'm in my my third age, right? The first age of just figuring things out and becoming, and then the second age of accomplishing and accumulating and building and family and home and all that stuff. And I really am at the end of that second age. Done all that, kids are on their own. You know, I'm I want to cast off in many ways all this stuff I've spent so much time accumulating. And now I'm in another age. And so I think a first reflection is what age are you in? And what do you want to accomplish with that age? What are the things that sat in the back of your mind, reminding you and telling you someday, someday, are these is this an appropriate time for those things in your life? Is it time to bring those things forward? What are the things you want to accomplish?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And I think stage one, as you reflect on a new year, is you know, letting go of the past. Stage two is the anticipating what your what your desires are. What are your in establishing what are your intentions?

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

What do you want to accomplish? What do you want to to be with yourself, with your world, with your with your loved ones, the close ones? What is it that you have been yearning for?

SPEAKER_04:

And I think it's important to note here is we've been talking about the fire horse, year of the fire horse. And we've been talking about it as if it starts tomorrow. Now, intentionally, if we have intention for ourselves, it could start tomorrow, right? But in terms of the Chinese New Year, it doesn't start till February 17th, right? So it's it's also just a great testament that people all around the world have these celebrations of new beginnings, right? A change is happening all kinds of times of year. And I think it is telling you that you you can you can do this anytime, right? It's intention with a you know some excitement, maybe, not not so much pressure, but just knowing that you don't need a specific date to make changes. You can change your mind at any time.

SPEAKER_00:

And it is good to align your yourself with nature, however you're experiencing it, where you are. You know, nature is an incredible force, and it, you know, it doesn't it doesn't take a lot of thought to realize that nature is really successful, right? Nature really does succeed. Life in nature continues. Yeah, um, it's not always pretty, and it's not always, yeah, it's not always what we want it to be as we try to shape it, but it's it's there and it's successful. And it aligns with the seasons, it aligns with the weather, it aligns with high water and low water, it aligns with clouds and sun, it aligns with each other.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

You could do worse than to find your way to align to nature and see yourself as preparing here in the new year for a growth season, a cultivating season, a planting season that's only a couple of months away here. It might be imminent where you are, and decide what's going in that garden, what's going to be cultivated this year. I think it's important to see things as steps, right? The ancient Taoist saying, you know, the journey of 10,000 miles starts beneath your feet. There's the goal off in the distance, but every single step needs to be taken. There's not a step you can skip. There's not a step that you don't have to pass through to get to your destination. The destination calls us, it drives us, it excites us, it causes a yearning inside us. And it is those those energies, the energy of the yearning, the energy of the motivation to take each step, knowing that each step of itself is valuable, each step is necessary, each step has its own development to it. You know, patience is an interesting concept. Again, I guess I'm relying on the Tao Ta Ching today. Patience is not learning to wait. Patience is understanding that everything happens in its time, and your efforts need to be aligned with that understanding of how things happen. And often things happen quickly once you embrace patience. Once you embrace patience and you understand that there are steps and stages, processes that need to take place, and your energy and your focus is now on those steps rather than just the goal. It's amazing how quickly those steps and stages seem to arise. And each one is important of itself because each one is a step towards that goal.

SPEAKER_04:

Could letting go be another word for patience or words?

SPEAKER_00:

Well, I think letting go of the patience is letting go of your insistence that it be your way. Patience is accepting that you know that if you want to let go of something first, you must let it be. Boy boy, I'm in the Taota Chin today. If you want to get rid of something first, you must let it be. You need to be aware of it, you need to see it, you need to understand it, you need to see its dimensions, you need to understand its forces, and then you're in a position to respond to it and guide it. You know, we don't we don't expect that we can take a powerful river and build a wall and that the river will stop. The river won't stop. You can build a great big hole, but soon that hole is full, and the water will continue. The water will find a way around a dam. The water finds its way through. And in the same way, the force of life, you can't build a block and try to hold it and take it for yourself. But what you can do is shape its path. With a river, I can put up some large walls that will guide it in the new direction. I can dig a trench that will guide it in a new direction. The water's going to continue. And I can shape that, but I can't stop it and I can't own it. And so when I see that as just that obvious message of nature, then it becomes, well, what are the little things I can do to shape this, right? This goal that I have. And then your patience is now aligned with meaningful strategy, knowing that water is going to find gravity and it will make its way through. It will carve its way through. We look at the features and nature around the world. Water carves its way through. But when we use the water, the force of the water for a mill or a pump or the tides we use now to make electricity, when we align ourselves with the forces, we accomplish big things.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah. And I think most of us put up huge walls to stop the water. And then we wonder why we can't get at the water.

SPEAKER_00:

It's crashing through.

SPEAKER_04:

So in my mind, and I I thought this a few months ago, like, what do you need to let go in order for the water to flow through you?

SPEAKER_00:

I don't think we let go of our intentions. I think we let go of how.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And we follow the signs.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

We follow that which shows itself to us. And we move in increments that sometimes go very, very quickly and sometimes go slowly. Yeah. So if you've let got let go of the past and you started to look at your preferences and the things you might want to accomplish, and then you start to let go of the how and focus on the what you can do now, and you acknowledge the forces that were going to work with you and against you, and try to align yourself with that. Then I think what comes next is daily inspired action. I think you have to hold the intention. I think intending to do too much can work against you. I think, you know, sort of thematically focusing it and, you know, picking a meaningful goal for yourself, something that you want to attain, and it can be very, very simple. I just, you know, I just want to go to a beautiful destination this year. That's a wonderful goal for yourself. It's a wonderful intention for the new year. It is certainly something that's motivating and exciting and to be compelling, keep you motivated, keep you moving forward. Looking at it as a series of accomplishments that you need to just go through through the time it takes to accomplish those things. Being steady in your intention. I think that's that's a great way to be gentle with yourself while at the same time being determined.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah. Does anyone have any does anyone you have any questions? No, no questions.

SPEAKER_00:

Ways to think about it, ways to approach it. You know, I have 52 weeks. And in the next 52 weeks, there's things I want to do. And in those 52 weeks, I want to align myself with the forces that will help me accomplish that. I want to find the incremental practices that I can engage in. I want to live in the present. I don't want to be focused on the future. I want to be focused on what I can do here in the present. I want to let go of the past. I want to understand the stage of life I'm in and align my goals with that larger stage. What is my time about right now? Is it a time of preparation? Is it a time of curiosity? Is it a time of exploration? Is it a time of deliberate action? Is it a time of recuperation? I think that if I was to give a message to our folks on this day, it would be to set intentions and be deliberate, but patient. And in all of that process, be aware that every action you take towards your intentions is an act of self-love. You're telling yourself you're worthy of this. You're telling yourself you deserve this. You're telling yourself you're allowed to have this. You're permitted. You're telling yourself that you're not alone. You love and are loved. You are lovable, and you're allowed to love yourself and give yourself this gift of your intentions. In this next little patch of life that you have, this 52 weeks, this 12 months, this 365 days that you're looking at with a fresh eye and a new excitement. I love myself so much. I'm going to give myself what I want. And I'm going to focus my desires, create an intention, and act deliberately towards that. Yeah, be gentle with yourself. Be determined, but be gentle.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah. Excuse me. Yeah, I think that that was that was a good one.

SPEAKER_00:

You have any message?

SPEAKER_04:

Message for the people.

SPEAKER_00:

Message you want to put out there in the world.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, I think I think more and more I'm getting on board with this idea of trying to let go of the pressure of getting something done right now or making sure I do something right now. Because along with pressure comes guilt, I guess. And guilt, as we said in a whole other podcast, is unhelpful and not even needed. So yeah, I think I think that's what I'm focusing on. There's a question here that we we can either take a little bit of time to answer today or we can do it tomorrow. Interesting to look at stages. Are you both in the same stage of life? How do you align with that? How do you align that? I don't think we're in the same stage of life. But uh mentally, no, I don't know.

SPEAKER_00:

I think you can be in different stages and learning similar lessons.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

I think lessons are cyclical, right? As soon as you think you understand something, something comes along and says, no, wait a second. The subconscious mind is deep and it's filled with layers. And you know, one of the things I remember as as a hypnotist, I always remember that we might be able to realign things and remove things and get rid of some old beliefs from the subconscious mind. But two things happen. Other beliefs rise to the surface, and you've got to look at those. And life keeps on happening, which means you're still building new beliefs. Right? And so you can think that you've learned a lesson or you can think you've got an awareness. You know, that's the thing that's smacking me right between the eyes in the last six months is the more I think I know, the more life challenges me and says, No, you don't. Back you go. What about this? And I go, What? Where did that come from? Yeah. Yeah, I keep learning lessons deeper and deeper and deeper. And I think that's really normal. So I think people can be in different, completely different stages of life, but have really meaningful lessons that they're going through with somebody else. Friends come in and out of our lives, and sometimes they're there for a short while. But boy oh boy, are we are they good companions to walk a certain part of the journey?

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

Pick up more on that tomorrow.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah. All right. Well, thanks for hanging out, and we will see you in the new year. Have a good day.