Neil Cox Hypnotherapy

13/09/2025

Ever noticed how one image can transport you straight back to the past?
For me, it might be:
The fuzzy static of a VHS tape 🎞️
The BBC Test Card with that little girl and the clown 🎯
Neon arcades glowing in the 80s night 🌈

The moment you see it, you feel it. A rush of memory, a little spark of warmth, maybe even a smell or a sound that comes back too. That’s your hippocampus and amygdala at work — the brain’s memory and emotion centres. They’re wired to respond instantly when an old, familiar cue pops up. Psychologists call it state-dependent memory: your mind relives not just the memory, but the state you were in at the time.

This is why nostalgia feels so powerful. A single retro trigger can change your whole mood in seconds.
And here’s the connection: hypnotherapy uses this very same brain mechanism. By activating certain positive memories or associations, we can help your brain shift into calmer, happier states. It’s not about living in the past — it’s about harnessing the way your brain naturally works.

So whether it’s a ZX Spectrum loading screen, a VHS rewind, or even the smell of a pencil case from school, your brain has a remarkable ability to turn memory into mood.

👉 Question for you: What’s the one retro trigger that instantly takes you back?

12/09/2025

Only in the middle of the night do we become world-class mathematicians:
“If I fall asleep in 7 minutes, I’ll get exactly 4 hours and 23 minutes…”

Of course, that never works.
Hypnotherapy helps you stop clock-watching and let your brain slide back to rest.

Do you do midnight maths too?

08/09/2025

Kids fight sleep. Adults do it too — just in quieter ways.
Overthinking, scrolling, one more episode…

The 10 Day Sleep Reset is about teaching your brain to welcome sleep back in.
Do you know when you’re fighting sleep?

06/09/2025

You finally get into bed, lights out, and suddenly your brain decides it’s the perfect time to replay every conversation you’ve ever had.

Sound familiar?

The 10 Day Sleep Reset helps calm the overthinking mind so you can let those thoughts drift by instead of clinging on to them.

What’s the oddest thing your brain has thrown at you at bedtime?

Tired of waking up at 3am? Struggling to switch off before bed?The Sleep Reset is a 10-day hypnotherapy audio programme designed to gently guide you back into natural, restorative sleep — one day at a time.Created by hypnotherapist Neil Cox, this dow...

06/09/2025

Do you remember the “sleep gadgets” from the 80s and 90s?

Whale sounds on cassette tapes 🐋
Clunky bedside machines with three sound settings (rain, sea, or static crackle) 🌧️
Lava lamps that were supposed to relax you… but mainly just hypnotised the cat. 🐈‍⬛

Back then, the science of sleep was still in its disco trousers. People were desperate for rest, but we didn’t really understand the brain’s role in it.
Fast forward to now: we know so much more about what actually helps the mind switch off.
It’s not about a gimmicky gadget.
It’s about guiding the brain into the right state — calm, balanced, and ready to rest.

That’s exactly what hypnotherapy does. Instead of masking the problem with background noise, it helps you re-train your brain itself — so that sleep becomes natural, not forced.

The funny thing is, those old whale-song cassettes did work for some people. Why? Because the brain loves patterns and familiarity — they gave the mind permission to relax. Today, I use that same principle, just with modern neuroscience and hypnosis techniques instead of rewinding a tape at 2am.

So while the retro gadgets looked cool on the bedside table, science has given us a much better option: helping the brain switch off properly, so you can actually drift off.

👉 Here’s a fun one: Did you ever try a sleep gadget back in the 80s or 90s?

05/09/2025

People talk about “falling asleep,” but a more appropriate word is drifting.
The Reset helps you drift, gently, without effort — because effort and sleep don’t belong in the same sentence. 🌊

When was the last time sleep just carried you away?

03/09/2025

If you’re still wide awake after 20 minutes, don’t lie there stressing.
Get up, do something calm, and come back when you feel sleepy again.

The 10 Day Sleep Reset gives you the tools to make that moment come sooner.
Do you already use the 20-minute rule?

01/09/2025

Ever noticed how the more you worry about sleep, the less you get?
That’s because stress keeps the brain stuck in fight-or-flight mode — the very opposite of rest.

Hypnotherapy helps calm that overactive system, retraining the brain to let go so sleep comes naturally.
💤 Your brain can learn to rest again.

31/08/2025

If counting sheep actually worked, I’d be out of business. 🐑
Luckily, the brain has better ways of settling down.
The 10 Day Sleep Reset helps you find them — without a single sheep in sight. 😉 How many sheep do you think you’ve counted in your life?

https://shop.coxhypnotherapy.com/b/cjQeb

30/08/2025

If you grew up in the 80s, you’ll know this sound: 🎶 eeeeeeek… brrrttt… screeeeech!

Waiting for a ZX Spectrum or Commodore 64 game to load could take 10–15 minutes. Sometimes longer. Sometimes it crashed halfway through and you had to start all over again.

It was frustrating, sure… but those loading screens actually gave us something rare: mental downtime.
Staring at rainbow stripes.
Listening to the screech of the cassette.
Daydreaming while you waited.

In those moments, your brain was idling — and idling is powerful. It’s when creativity sparks, when stress hormones ease off, when your mind resets.

Fast forward to today. We’ve lost the “loading screen.” Everything is instant. Netflix loads in a second. Games stream immediately. Phones refresh endlessly. The result? Our brains don’t get the natural pauses they once had.

And that’s why so many people struggle to switch off at night. The brain has forgotten how to slow down.
This is where hypnotherapy comes in. It’s like reintroducing the loading screen — but in a good way. A guided pause for your mind. A chance to slow the chatter, reset the system, and let the brain slip naturally into the relaxed state it needs for proper rest.

So maybe we didn’t realise it at the time… but those rainbow stripes were teaching us something important: sometimes you need to wait before you can play.

👉 What do you remember most about waiting for games to load — the noises, the colours, or the frustration?

29/08/2025

Imagine waking up on a Friday morning feeling like you’ve already had a weekend.

That’s the difference good sleep makes. It’s not about adding more hours — it’s about better quality rest.

How would your week feel if your sleep actually refreshed you?