Harry Potter fans will be perfectly familiar with The Ridiculous Spell. If you are not (yet) a convert, Harry uses this particular spell when wants to turn a negative situation or feeling into a positive one. By waving a magic wand at a person, or scenario, Harry is able to transform a moment of fear into a moment of comedy.
What Potter enthusiasts may not know is that when you visit a phobia-cure specialist they will actually use something very similar to the Ridiculous Spell to help desensitise you from your fear, memory or phobia.
What Potter enthusiasts may not know is that when you visit a phobia-cure specialist they will actually use something very similar to the Ridiculous Spell to help desensitise you from your fear, memory or phobia.
So, is it magic? Not exactly but there is every chance that fixing your fear or phobia really can be as simple as waving a magic wand at it.
So how is phobia treatment like The Ridiculous Spell?
Take for example a spider-phobia (Arachnophobia). You are faced with a ‘huge’ spider. You see this really ugly, enormous, terrifying spider, making its way over to you.
What do you do? The chances are you start to panic, run around like a lunatic and scream at your partner or housemate to come and rescue you. If you live alone, you might make your way to another room and close the door behind you.
This situation is very serious – at least in YOUR mind it is. Over the years, from the original development of this fear or phobia (depending on the degree that it affects you), you have blown this ‘spider’ out of all proportion. He probably looks bigger than he really is, brighter than he really is, and you become more aware of sensations and sounds around you. You are in fight or flight mode and the adrenaline is pulsating around you.
Much like in a horror movie, you have, over time, created a scene that you play over and over in your head. You probably hear certain noises, see a certain scenarios; and, just like the horror movie, everything has been blown out of all proportion. The sounds are much louder than in reality, and the scene looks big, bold and… terrifying.
This is where the phobia-cure specialist can step in and help you – not your fear – become the director of your own personal movie, allowing you to change and edit the scene, any time that you want to.
Here is how YOU can use the ‘magic spell’:
Take whatever it is that you see in your mind, when you are feeling terrified – and then reframe it as a family film. Change the colour, maybe make it black and white, and change the soundtrack. For example, if it is a spider that you are scared of, give him googly eyes and giant pink daisy-shaped sunglasses, and put him on sparkly roller skates, then add the Benny Hill theme tune. You can’t help but smile now, can you?
That’s exactly what Harry’s Ridiculous Spell does – it makes a serious, scary situation funny.
Feels good, doesn’t it? Best of all, doing this works – and the reason that it works is that it is not actually possible to feel two emotions at the same time. So when you take charge, and edit your ‘movie’ from a horror to a comedy, and it raises a giggle from you then it is impossible to feel fear at the same time.
When I am working with my clients, I get them to change their movie, and their internal dialogue as many times as required, so that the movie is changed forever, and they find it impossible to feel the same way again about their ‘phobia’.
It’s a pretty powerful ‘spell’.
So, next time you think Harry Potter is just some silly school boy Wizard, remember, he might actually be one of the world’s best phobia therapists!
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