You know what you "should" do. You might even know why you're not doing it. And yet here you are, watching yourself make the same choices, repeat the same patterns, and get in your own way in the same predictable ways.

That's the maddening thing about self-sabotage. It doesn't feel like a mystery from the inside. You can see it happening in real time and analyze it afterward with impressive clarity. And none of that analysis actually stops it from happening again.

If you've spent time in therapy, done the journaling, read the books, and still feel stuck, this post is for you.

Why Insight Isn't Enough

We live in a culture that treats self-awareness as the solution. If you just understand your patterns well enough, you'll be able to change them. That's the underlying promise of most self-help and a lot of traditional therapy.

For some people and some patterns, that's true. Insight creates change.

But for a lot of people, insight and change are two completely different things. You can have crystal-clear understanding of exactly where a behavior comes from, what it's protecting you from, how it's holding you back, and still not be able to stop doing it.

That's not a failure of intelligence or effort. It's a clue about where the pattern lives.

Where Self-Sabotage Actually Lives

Self-sabotage isn't a conscious choice. Nobody decides to blow up a good opportunity or push away something they want. It happens automatically, driven by subconscious programming that runs faster than thought.

That programming usually has a logic to it. At some point, some version of staying small, not succeeding, not being seen, or staying in control felt like the safest option. The subconscious mind filed it away as a survival strategy.

The pattern isn't irrational. It was rational once, in a specific context that probably no longer exists. But the subconscious doesn't automatically update when the context changes. It keeps running the old program until something intervenes at that level.

Thinking harder about the pattern doesn't reach it. Understanding it intellectually doesn't reach it. You need to work where it lives, and it lives in the subconscious.

What Hypnotherapy Does Differently

Hypnosis creates a window of access to the subconscious mind. In a relaxed trance state, the critical, analytical part of your mind quiets down enough that we can work directly with the patterns underneath.

That means we can do a few things that intellectual insight can't.

We can find and update the original belief that's running the pattern. Not through analysis, but through working with it directly in the subconscious. Often clients are surprised by what comes up. The source of a persistent pattern is frequently something that seems small, something that wasn't even recognized as significant at the time.

We can also replace the old programming with something new. Not through affirmations you repeat and don't believe, but by working at the level where belief is actually formed.

IEMT is another tool I use for this, particularly when the self-sabotage is tied to specific memories or identity-level beliefs. If part of your subconscious genuinely believes you're not the kind of person who succeeds, or gets to have what you want, or stays in good relationships, that belief needs to be updated at the level where it was formed.

The Pattern You're Tired of Repeating

• Getting close to a goal and then finding a way to not quite reach it.
• Sabotaging good relationships while chasing unavailable ones.
• Starting well and then falling off.
• Knowing exactly what to do and not doing it.
• Achieving external success while feeling like a fraud or waiting for it to fall apart.

These patterns look different on the surface but often share the same structure underneath: a subconscious belief about safety, worthiness, or identity that is quietly steering the ship.

The conscious mind wants the goal. The subconscious mind has a different agenda. Until those two are aligned, the pattern continues regardless of how much you understand it.

What Change Actually Looks Like

When the work goes well, the behavior or reaction that used to feel compulsive just... stops being that compelling. The pull isn't there in the same way. It doesn't always come with a dramatic insight. Sometimes it's just that the next time the old trigger appeared, you do something different without it feeling like a battle.

Frequently Asked Questions

How many sessions does it take to address self-sabotage? It depends on how deeply rooted the pattern is. Some people see significant shifts in three to five sessions. Others with more complex or longstanding patterns benefit from longer work.

What if I don't know where the pattern comes from? You don't need to.This is what the exploration is for.

What if I've tried hypnotherapy before and it didn't work? If it didn't help before, that's worth discussing in a consultation. It often has more to do with the fit and the method than with whether hypnotherapy can work for you. Also, I have other modalities such as IEMT and coaching to help you get to your goal. 

Ready to stop watching yourself get in your own way? Book a free consultation. Let's figure out what's actually running the pattern and what it will take to change it.

Want to learn more before diving in? Take my Wait, Why am I like this? quiz! 

You've put in the hours. You know your horse. Your trainer says you're ready.

And then you get to the show, and something happens. The rhythm you had in every single practice ride is suddenly nowhere to be found. You come home frustrated, wondering why you can ride beautifully at home and fall apart when it counts.

This is performance anxiety. And it's one of the most common, least-addressed training gaps in equestrian sport.

It's Not a Confidence Problem. It's a Nervous System Problem.

A lot of riders hear "performance anxiety" and think it means they're not confident enough, not experienced enough, or not mentally strong enough. That framing makes it worse, because it turns a physiological response into a personal failing.

Here's what's actually happening.

When your brain perceives pressure, whether it's a judge, a fence you've fallen off before, or the crowd watching, it can trigger a stress response. Your heart rate goes up, your muscles tighten, your attention narrows. And because you're on a 1,200-pound animal that is sensitive to your physical state, your horse responds to all of it before you've even registered what's happening.

Your nervous system is running a program it learned a long time ago. The program says: high stakes equals threat. And when it fires, it fires fast.

You can't out-think it. That's the part most riders don't realize. By the time the anxious thoughts show up, your body is already ahead of them. Trying to calm yourself down with logic in that moment is like trying to stop a horse mid-bolt by reasoning with him.

Why More Practice Doesn't Always Fix It

The instinct is to train harder and practice more, hoping that repetition will eventually override the anxiety. Sometimes it works. But for a lot of riders, the anxiety isn't coming from a lack of skill. It's coming from a subconscious pattern that more riding time doesn't touch.

You might have a horse who had a bad experience at shows and passes that tension to you. You might have internalized pressure from a trainer or a parent years ago and still carry it in your body. You might have one fall, one bad round, one moment of public embarrassment that your nervous system filed under "dangerous" and has been protecting you from ever since.

Whatever the source, the pattern lives below the level of conscious thought. And that's exactly why you can know you're ready and still not feel ready.

What Actually Moves the Needle

Mental training for equestrians isn't about positive thinking or pre-show pep talks. The work that actually produces lasting change happens at the level where the pattern is stored: the subconscious mind.

IEMT is one of the most effective tools for this because it helps your mind to reprocess those past negative experiences and those challenging feelings. We can work with the beliefs, memories, and conditioned responses that are driving the anxiety. We can update the threat response so your body stops treating riding like a danger zone. We can help your nervous system learn what it feels like to compete from a place of calm focus rather than managed panic.

IEMT (Integral Eye Movement Technique) is particularly useful when the anxiety is tied to a specific memory or experience. If there was a fall, a bad show, a moment that lodged itself in your body and never quite let go, IEMT can help reprocess that memory.

Most riders notice a shift within a few sessions. Not the absence of nerves, because some nerves are useful, but a different quality to them. The kind that sharpens your focus rather than scattering it.

The Riders Who Do This Work

Mental training used to be thought of as something only elite athletes needed. That's changed. Riders at every level are starting to understand that the mind is part of the training program, not separate from it.

If you're putting serious time, money, and energy into your riding, and you're leaving the mental piece out, you're working with an incomplete toolkit.

Ready to close the mental training gap? Book a free consultation and let's talk about what's getting in the way of your best riding.

If you've been researching options for trauma, anxiety, or emotional stuck-points, you may have come across the acronym IEMT and wondered: what is that, exactly?

You're not alone. Despite being an increasingly respected modality in trauma-informed practice, IEMT (Integral Eye Movement Technique) remains less widely known than approaches like EMDR or CBT. That's starting to change, and for good reason.

This post is a plain-language introduction: what IEMT is, how it works, what it's effective for, and what a session actually looks like.

What Does IEMT Stand For?

IEMT stands for Integral Eye Movement Technique. It was developed by UK-based therapist Andrew T. Austin, drawing on elements of Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP), hypnosis, and the emerging understanding of how eye movements relate to emotional memory processing.

The "integral" in the name refers to its dual focus: IEMT works with both traumatic or distressing emotional memories and identity-level imprints: the deeply held, often unconscious beliefs about who we are that are formed by significant experiences.

The Two Core Targets of IEMT

1. Emotional Memory Imprints

These are memories, often from the past,  that still carry a significant emotional charge. When you recall them, you don't just remember them intellectually; you feel them. The anxiety returns, the shame flares up, the grief feels fresh, the anger surfaces.

This is the hallmark of an emotional imprint: the memory hasn't been processed to completion. It's still live. Still influencing how you feel in the present.

IEMT uses specific eye movement patterns to help the brain reprocess these memories, reducing or eliminating the emotional charge attached to them, so that the memory can be recalled without being re-experienced.

2. Identity Imprints

These are subtler, and arguably more impactful on long-term wellbeing.

Identity imprints are the conclusions we've drawn about ourselves from our experiences. "I'm not safe." "I'm not enough." "I'm fundamentally broken." "People always leave." "I have to stay in control or everything falls apart."

These aren't necessarily conscious beliefs. They operate more like background software, shaping how we interpret situations, what we expect from others, and what we believe is possible for us.

IEMT's identity work targets these foundational patterns directly, helping to loosen and update the beliefs that were formed under conditions that no longer apply.

How Is IEMT Different From EMDR?

This is the most common question, and it's a fair one. Both IEMT and EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) use eye movements as part of the therapeutic process. But they differ in significant ways.

Protocol and structure: EMDR follows a detailed, structured 8-phase protocol. IEMT is more flexible and typically less protocol-driven, which can make it faster and easier to integrate within a broader therapeutic framework.

Focus on identity: EMDR primarily targets traumatic memory and its emotional residue. IEMT explicitly addresses identity-level beliefs as a distinct target, making it particularly useful when the presenting issue isn't just a traumatic memory, but a pervasive self-concept that needs to be updated.

Session length and pacing: IEMT sessions are often shorter and may produce results in fewer sessions than a full course of EMDR, particularly for focused presenting issues.

Integration with other modalities: IEMT integrates naturally with hypnotherapy, NLP, and other approaches.

Neither approach is universally "better." The right choice depends on the specific person and their presenting needs.

What Is IEMT Effective For?

IEMT has been used effectively for a wide range of presentations, including:

• Trauma and PTSD — both single-event and complex/developmental trauma
• Anxiety and phobias — including social anxiety, health anxiety, and specific fears
• Grief and loss — particularly complicated grief where the emotional experience feels stuck
• Shame and guilt — which often have a particularly strong identity component
• Anger and resentment — when emotional reactions feel disproportionate or hard to regulate
• Low self-worth and self-esteem issues
• Relationship patterns — when the same dynamics keep repeating across different relationships
• Stress and burnout — particularly when connected to specific experiences or beliefs

What Does an IEMT Session Look Like?

An IEMT session typically begins with the practitioner establishing a clear understanding of the presenting issue: what the client is experiencing, when it shows up, and the associated feelings. 

The practitioner will then guide specific eye movements (usually asking the client to follow their  finger)  while holding the emotional memory or belief in mind.

Unlike EMDR, IEMT doesn't require the client to vividly re-experience the memory in detail. The process is typically less activating, which many clients find more manageable, particularly those who have found trauma-focused work overwhelming in the past.

Between sets of eye movements, the therapist will check in: has the emotional intensity shifted? Has anything new come up? What does the client notice now when they think about the original memory or belief?

Most clients notice a reduction in emotional charge relatively quickly. The memory remains, but the distress attached to it changes.

Who Is IEMT For?

IEMT is worth exploring if:

• You have specific memories that still feel emotionally raw or unresolved
• You notice patterns in how you feel about yourself that don't respond to insight or self-work
• You've tried talk therapy and feel "stuck" despite having good insight into your patterns
• You want to work at a deeper level than conscious thought and behavior
• You're looking for an approach that tends to be effective in fewer sessions

Where to Start

If you're curious about IEMT, the first step is a conversation.

Book a free consultation to find out whether IEMT, hypnosis, or a combined approach is the right fit for what you're working through.

If you've ever joked that anxiety is basically your entire personality, and you were kidding-not-kidding, you may consider yourself an "anxious girlie." It's become this half funny, half painfully accurate way to describe a very specific experience: overthinking every text before you send it, replaying conversations from years ago, and somehow being both the most prepared person in the room and the most convinced something is about to go wrong.

The label is funny because it's relatable. But underneath the joke, there's something real going on, and I want to actually talk about what that is, instead of just laughing along with the memes.

What "Anxious Girlie" Actually Describes

Being an anxious girlie usually isn't about having a diagnosed anxiety disorder, though it certainly can overlap with one. More often, it's describing a nervous system that's used to running in a heightened state. Some signs you might recognize:

• You over-explain yourself, even in casual conversations, because you're worried about being misunderstood
• You mentally rehearse conversations before they happen, and then replay them again afterward
• You feel a low hum of "something is wrong" even when nothing actually is
• You've gotten really good at appearing calm on the outside while your mind is doing laps on the inside
• Rest feels unproductive, so you keep yourself busy even when you're exhausted

If a few of these hit close to home, you're not imagining it. Your nervous system has learned to treat uncertainty as a threat, and it's been running that program for a while, probably longer than you realize.

Why the "Just Relax" Advice Never Works

Here's the frustrating part. Most advice aimed at anxious people assumes the problem is a thinking problem, so the solution is always some version of "just think differently" or "just relax." If that worked, you would have already done it.

Anxiety like this lives in the nervous system, not just in your thoughts. Your body has learned a pattern of scanning for danger, and that pattern runs automatically, underneath your conscious thinking. That's why you can logically know everything is fine and still feel like it isn't. You're not failing at managing your anxiety. You're dealing with a nervous system that needs to actually be regulated, not just reasoned with.

What Actually Helps Anxiety

The good news is that a nervous system that's learned to be anxious can also learn to feel safe again. It just takes the right kind of support, not more willpower.

A few things that genuinely make a difference:

• Naming the pattern instead of just feeling it. Journaling prompts that help you notice when and why the spiral starts give you actual data instead of just vague dread.
• Working with your body, not just your thoughts. Simple tools like tapping, breathwork, or guided relaxation calm the physical anxiety response, which then makes the mental spiral quieter too.
• Reframing the inner critic, not silencing it. The voice that says everything is about to go wrong is trying to protect you. Learning to gently redirect it works a lot better than trying to shut it up.
• Consistency over intensity. A few minutes of nervous system care every day tends to do more than one big overwhelming effort every few weeks.

This is why I created The Anxious Girlie's Guide to Chill. It's a 39 page workbook that combines journaling prompts, nervous system regulation tools, thought reframing exercises, a mini tapping guide, and trackers to help you actually notice your patterns instead of just riding them out. It's built for the version of you that's tired of "good vibes only" advice and wants something that actually addresses what's happening underneath the anxiety.

You're Not Too Much, Your Nervous System Just Needs Support

If you've been carrying this pattern for a long time, you might have started to believe it's just who you are. It isn't. Your nervous system that adapted to feel unsafe, and with the right support, it can learn something different. Being an anxious girlie doesn't mean something is wrong with you. It means your body has been working overtime trying to protect you, and it's allowed to finally get a break.

You can find my Anxious Girlie's Guide to Chill on Etsy.

Generalized hypnosis audios can be helpful for a lot of things, and they're often the first stop for people who are curious about hypnosis but not quite ready to book a session. I use them myself once in a while, out of professional interest or for inspiration for my own work. Sometimes I just need them in the moment. I struggle to sleep on an airplane, so the last time I flew overseas, I put on a sleep hypnosis audio and it did the trick when nothing else was working.

I offer a handful of generalized hypnosis downloads for purchase, along with some free hypnosis audios on YouTube, because I think they're a great low-pressure way for people to get curious about hypnosis or get a feel for my voice and how my sessions tend to flow. Funny enough, a lot of my clients tell me those generalized recordings don't even sound like me once they've done a real one-to-one session with me. That contrast is actually a good jumping off point for this post.

What Generalized Hypnosis Audios Are Good For

Here's the thing about generalized hypnosis audios: they're general by design. They lean on well-established hypnosis techniques and common NLP strategies so they can appeal to as wide an audience as possible. That's not a flaw, it's just how they're built to work.

This makes generalized hypnosis downloads a solid fit for broad, common goals like:

• Sleeping better
• Building self esteem
• Reinforcing healthy habits

If your goal is fairly universal and you don't need anything tailored to your specific situation, a generalized audio can genuinely help, and it's an easy, affordable way to start.

When a Custom Hypnosis Recording Makes More Sense

A custom hypnosis recording takes things a step further. Instead of speaking to a general audience, it's built specifically for you, based on your goals and your current circumstances. Nothing generic about it.

A lot of clients turn to custom recordings when they want extra support but don't have the time or budget for a one-to-one session. I see custom hypnosis recordings used a lot for specific, time-sensitive situations like:

• Preparing for a dentist appointment
• Getting ready for surgery
• Supporting a smoother childbirth experience

They're a great tool when you have a clear goal and a defined window of time to work with. Custom recordings also come in handy for people who have already been through a series of hypnosis sessions and just want a little extra reinforcement afterward. They're convenient, they're effective, and they're a lot more affordable than ongoing one-to-one work, which makes them an easy addition to your toolkit.

Why a Personal Hypnosis Session Is Still the Gold Standard

As helpful as recordings can be, nothing replaces a personal, one-to-one hypnosis session. In an individual session, we actually have time to sit down and talk through your goals, figure out what's working and what isn't, and I can explain how your mind works and why you might be stuck in certain patterns in the first place.

In the method of hypnosis I practice, I also spend time learning how your mind specifically receives and processes information, so the suggestions I deliver are shaped around what's actually going to land for you. That's something no pre-recorded audio, generalized or custom, can fully replicate.

One-to-one sessions also give us the flexibility to adjust in real time. As your hypnotist, I can gauge the level of hypnotic depth you're experiencing in the moment and adapt the session accordingly, something a recording simply can't do once it's finished and packaged up.

So Which Option Should You Choose?

Honestly, all three of these tools have their place, and it really comes down to where you're starting from and what kind of support you need right now:

• Generalized hypnosis audios are a great low-cost entry point for common goals like sleep, self esteem, or building better habits.
• Custom hypnosis recordings are ideal when you have a specific goal and timeframe, or when you want extra reinforcement between sessions.
• Personal hypnosis sessions offer the deepest, most tailored experience, with real-time adjustments and a genuine understanding of how your mind works.

All of these methods are worth exploring on your journey toward self improvement. Wherever you're starting from, there's a hypnosis option that can meet you there.rt customizing

People come to IEMT carrying many different concerns: anxiety, grief, fear, difficult memories, troubled relationships. Beneath the specifics, though, there is often a quieter and more disorienting question. Not just what is wrong, but who am I ?

And more precisely, who would I be without this?

It is a question worth sitting with. Because for many clients, the emotional patterns they want to resolve are not experienced as problems that happen to them. They are experienced as part of who they are. The anxiety is not something they feel; it is something they are. Self-criticism is not a habit they have fallen into; it is the voice of their own truth speaking back to them.

From athletes sidelined by injury to parents navigating an empty nest, it is surprisingly easy to confuse a change in circumstances with a loss of self.

Identity Is Not Fixed

The most important thing to understand is this: identity is not something handed to a person at birth, fixed in place by personality or genetics. It’s constructed; built up over time through the accumulation of emotional experience.

When clients are asked when they first began to think of themselves in a particular way, they can almost always trace it. There is a memory, or a cluster of memories, or a period of life that anchors the self-perception. Or there is the familiar belief: I've always been this way. But upon exploration, that is rarely true. The identity did not emerge from nowhere. It was learned.

How Identity Forms

In IEMT, we understand identity formation as moving through several interconnected stages.

It begins with emotional experience. Something happens: a loss, a humiliation, a moment of acute fear, a prolonged stretch of stress, and the person responds. That response is registered by the nervous system and stored in memory.

When similar experiences occur, similar responses follow. Over time, these repeated states begin to take on a life of their own. They stop being reactions to specific events and become generalized ways of relating to the world. A person does not merely feel anxious at school; they become someone who feels anxious. They do not merely carry shame about one mistake; they become someone shame lives inside.

And as these patterns repeat, they begin to shape the narrative. This is how I am. This is who I am. This is just me. The emotional pattern is no longer experienced as external to the self.  It’s been incorporated into identity. It becomes part of how the person explains their choices, how they make sense of their experience, how they introduce themselves to the world.

Imprints

In IEMT, these foundational emotional experiences are called imprints.

Imprints are not conscious decisions. Nobody chooses to become someone who flinches at criticism, who assumes rejection before it comes, who cannot rest. These patterns form beneath the level of deliberate self-construction, laid down before a person had either the resources or the vocabulary to process what was happening to them.

What is significant about imprints is how thoroughly they organize experience. A person carrying an imprint of unworthiness does not encounter the world neutrally. Ambiguous feedback reads as confirmation. Positive responses are discounted; negative ones are amplified. The world consistently seems to reflect the imprint back, because the imprint is shaping what is perceived in the first place.

This is why approaches that work only at the level of conscious thought so often feel incomplete. The thinking may change, anxiety may be managed better, and the self-critical voice may quieten. But the underlying imprint remains, and with it, the emotional pattern it supports.

What Changes in IEMT

IEMT works directly with the emotional memories that anchor imprints. By targeting the specific experiences in which a particular way of seeing the self was first established and reducing the emotional charge held in those memories, IEMT creates the conditions in which the identity can shift.

This is not cognitive reframing. It’s not about thinking differently about oneself. The work is at the level of stored emotional experience: the raw material from which the imprint was originally built. When that material changes in its emotional intensity, the imprint built upon it tends to become less stable.

What clients frequently report is not dramatic revelation. The identity statement — I am someone who struggles with this — begins to feel less like a fact and more like a story. And one that is no longer as accurate as it once seemed.

Who Will I Be After This?

As IEMT work progresses, clients sometimes raise a question that is easy to underestimate. If this changes, who will I be?

This is not an abstract concern. For people who have organised their lives around a particular self-perception (even a painful one) the prospect of change can feel genuinely disorientating. The familiar version of themselves, however limiting, is known.

This deserves to be taken seriously. Identity change, even when it is welcomed, involves a reorganization of the self. The person is not simply having a problem removed. They are becoming differently oriented: relating to themselves and the world from a different position. That transition sometimes calls for additional support: coaching, skill-building, or ongoing therapeutic work of another kind.

But in many cases, what clients find is not something entirely new. They meet a version of themselves they had glimpsed before the difficult experiences accumulated,  a version they had always suspected was possible, but had not been able to reach. The work does not create a new self from nothing. It uncovers something that was already there, beneath the layers of what was learned.

Identity, as it turns out, is not a destination. It is a process. IEMT offers a different relationship with that process, one in which a person is no longer entirely at the mercy of what was learned in the past.

When clients understand that their self-perception has been shaped by emotional experience rather than representing some essential, unchangeable truth about them, something shifts in how they hold it. The “identity” becomes something that happened to them, rather than who they are.



And from that position, change becomes conceivable. Not as self-reinvention, but as a gradual movement toward a self that is no longer defined by what was most painful.

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