Sandra Hillawi and The Love Clinic on BBC Radio

Wednesday, 23rd July 2008 AMT Trainer Sandra Hillawi was invited by the BBC to give three radio interviews on her new book called "The Love Clinic", which is all about the energy secrets of love, sex and relationships. Sandra was broadcasted across the UK and Internationally via the Internet to an audience of hundreds of thousands. The most detailed interview was for BBC Radio Bristol and was conducted by Dj Dave Barratt. We've provided the transcript of the interview available for you here. Well done Sandra!

The following is the transcript from the Dave Barratt interview for BBC Radio Bristol. The original audio recording can be streamed direct from the DragonRising "The Love Clinic" page (on the right hand side, click the black 'play' button).

Lets welcome our guest Sandra Hillawi who has got a new book out called “The Love Clinic.” This is looking at how you can improve your love life, and your emotional life generally I suppose.

Why did you decide to put this book together?

I’ve been working in this field about understanding emotions and how we can help transform and manage our emotional states so we are more resourceful and clear in our relationship. I’ve been doing this for a number of years and in my work I’ve actually found that people are happy enough but the number of people that actually experience love is not as many as we might think.

Really? That’s surprising.

People who find obstacles to love basically in the negative emotions which comes up because of way they handle things that go wrong and difficult things in an relationship and outside the relationship that disrupts the flow and connection.

So is this book aimed at people who are not in a relationship but want to be in them, or for people who are already in a relationship but they are not going very well.
Sandra Hillawi on BBC Radio Solent Morning Show with Julian Clegg

Sandra Hillawi on BBC Radio Solent Morning Show with Julian Clegg

Both.

If you are not in a relationship but are looking for a relationship, then what it talks about are the energy secrets if you like, to attract a person to you so your not running after somebody, so they are interested and attracted to you.

Lets look at some of the old adages concerned with relationships. People often say, that if you are looking for a relationship you’ll never find one. Which if you want to be in one, that’s the last thing you’ll want to hear actually. Is that kind of true though, because maybe it is in a way.

It is, and it’s like what we need we don’t get and when we don’t need it then it actually comes to us. So that’s about the attraction process, that we can seek to create that energy that attracts somebody towards us.

So you can actually do that, can you?

Yes you can.

Well if you think about it think about when you actually do find a relationship how good you feel because you are nourished and you have someone who is paying you attention and caring for you and that makes you feel so good. So your energy is bright, light and attractive.

And then, before you know it, you’ve got lots of offers and lots of people interested. That’s because of what you are getting, and what you getting is making you feel.

So it’s all about understanding the emotions, that all those happy emotions are energy states flowing and that we are radiating attractive energy. It’s also important that when we are not feeling so good, like when we are desperate, wanting or seeking a relationship to give us something or make us feel good.

Actually, we are not attracting or giving out the right signals there.

Has some of this got to do with the fact that for many people who aren’t in relationships, that they are subconsciously putting these messages out, because on one level they are actually quite scared of getting into a relationship?

That’s right, and that might be because of past relationships and past experiences where things haven’t worked out so well and they are still holding onto painful memories, hurts and injuries, therefore opening up to let someone in will re-trigger some of these old injuries and make us vulnerable to being hurt.

So what the book is all about is understanding what our emotions are; fear, hurt, pain, anger are actually energy states in the body and all those physical sensations such as pain in the heart and the tightness in the stomach or tightness in the chest that go with the uncomfortable emotions, is actually where our energy is blocked.

Actually, there are some very simple ways that we can actually do something about that, so we can release the blocked energy that is causing the negative emotions and restore the flow in the energy system so we are feeling relaxed, we are feeling good again and feeling bright and light again, and that then makes it safe again for us to open up and attract a new relationship.

One of the other areas, that having been an agony uncle on the radio for many years, that used to strike me when people used to write to me or call in, that was many people seem to make the same mistakes for relationships over and over again. They seem to attract the same wrong people, and again at the subconscious level, they don’t feel they deserve any better.

That strikes me as quite a big problem with people.

It is, and again we can look at our relationship with our self and how we feel about our self. Actually that is one of the most important places to start, because if you could actually fall in love with yourself first, then actually you can love anybody.
Dave Barratt from BBC Radio Bristol

And also when someone loves you, you can handle that energy and be interested in them.

It is kind of an old hackneyed saying, but it’s kind of true: "If you love yourself then it’s easy for others to love you."

Absolutely.

Because you are feeling so great and so easy to be around, you are not looking in a relationship for what you can get, because you’ve already got it. You are already satisfied energetically with what you would normally be seeking in a relationship, so it’s lighter and it flows more easily.

Do you think this is a British disease in a way though, because when you say ‘loving yourself’ people often think you mean being big-headed about yourself? It’s not actually about that at all is it?

No, it isn’t. It’s about taking some time to appreciate your self.

You know, when I was researching for this book and exploring this area, everyone knows we have to start with our relationship with ourselves and we somehow need to love ourselves.

Unfortunately, how we actually do that is not obvious.

How do we get those feelings into your body so you feel loved, in the same way as when another person pays you those attentions that you feel loved. And that is one of the important areas that I wanted to try to capture and try to present to people is how do you actually come to build a loving relationship with yourself, because from there, everything else works really easily.

You use something in the book, a technique called EMO. What is that and can you explain it to us?

EMO is actually a technique, a new development in the field of Energy Psychology, which is a growing field where we deal with emotional and psychology issues through the bodies subtle energy system.

BBC Radio Solent Dj Richard Latter

EMO stands for ‘Transforming Emotional Energy’ and how it works is that we as a human spirit are processing life and the energies of life all the time. The energies of life, what people say, what people do and what we hear.

And we are processing that through our energy system and when everything is flowing, just like in the body when we have a healthy flow in the body – everything is working well.

When we are open to life, when we can absorb, digest and process and let go of life – so we are in flow. That means we are feeling happy, we are enjoying life and we are experiencing positive emotions.

But what happens to a lot of people is that they have times when they have a lot to deal with. They have a lot of life coming at them from different areas that they have to process.

So their system doesn’t process it so well, because it is too much or they have a big change come up in their life.

That energy stays stuck in the body’s energy system and that is what we feel in the pressure in the chest, we feel it in our neck and shoulders, and the head – then we start getting headaches, tension in the muscles, the tightness of the stomach and physical things that come with that.

But actually, it’s just about blocked energy.

And all this blocked energy is what causes the anger, the fear, the frustration and the anxiety.

Now we know that emotions are nothing more than energy. Is it flowing and we are feeling good? Or is it blocked and we are feeling all the uncomfortable emotions? We can start paying attention to these physical sensations of where the energy is located and simply by wanting this energy to flow, paying it attention and thinking of the energy softening.

Simply, the energy responds and the person feels a relaxation as the tightness relaxes and the energy relaxes and the energy seems to flow and be released through the body.

So in this way we have transforming fear, hurt and anger, which is a blocked energy state, into a more positive acceptance, relaxed, clarity and resourcefulness again.

What if you are already in a relationship? I mean, there are many people who are in loving relationships and have been for many years – and they continue to be loving. For some people though, it does wane and it does become difficult.

What tips would you give to people and what tips would you find in the book will help them keep their relationship fresh?

Well, there are a couple of things to think about here.

The first is that we receive from our relationships a kind of food for life. It makes us feel good.

All those attentions and the time we spend together and the appreciation and recognition we get from your partner – well you can feel that as warmth in the chest and it actually feels good.

First of all, spending time with each other in a way where you actually pay attention to each other and recognise and appreciate each other, and actually say that, and express that in different ways.

So that you are actually feeding, if you like, in a spiritual way your partner to make them feel good. Sandra Hillawi and Julian Clegg from BBC Radio Solent

Sandra Hillawi and Julian Clegg from BBC Radio Solent

The other thing is that sometimes your partner may be stressed because of something going in the family or in work that is making them feel more uptight. And if you are not able to handle when your partner is feeling stressed, because that is when they need the most support, then you will be ducking away and trying to avoid them.

And that is going to be hurtful for them.

So if you can learn to develop,and using EMO is a really good way to handle the more challenging behaviours in your partner. That may be down to them leaving things round the house, and not clearing up after themselves. Or something about the way they dress now, which is a bit different now than it was 10 years ago.

So the different things that may irritate us or we find difficult, is to notice what is going on in our body when we are feeling uncomfortable, because we are actually responsible for our own emotional state. So we can then use simple techniques of awareness, of paying attention and just softening and easing that tension in our body.

We then get more of an ability to accept, understand and appreciate and give support when and where it is needed rather than ducking away in the opposite direction because we can’t take any more moaning because we’ve had it for 10 minutes.

That’s a good point. Now, jealousy is an insecurity and that’s a big problem in relationships for some people. I kind of feel in some ways that jealousy and insecurity go hand-in-hand because it’s often born out of the other.

What is a good way of dealing with a partner that is very jealous?

There are two sides to this. The jealous person and the one that is with the jealous partner.

Obviously, that behaviour is a difficult behaviour to handle for the one who is with the jealous partner.

So again, we ask how that makes us feel?

It might make us feel trapped, it might make us feel like someone is trying to possess us or own us and that we don’t have that same freedom.

Again, these are emotions.

We can notice what is going on in our own body when we are feeling these trapped feelings and these uncomfortable emotions. We can then do something to soften and flow and release the tensions. Then what happens is the partner who is jealous, with the ability to be open, to accept and to let go, and not be hurt by that. With that ability then to flow, if you like, that energy and behaviour and handle it then comes a deeper insight as to what it is that is going on for the partner.

So you can actually see your partner in a more compassionate and supportive way and engage with them to work through what it is that is going on. Rather than saying, “Oh I’m feeling trapped and need more space” – which causes them going in the opposite direction and exasperates the problem.

Similarly for the person who is feeling jealousy, there is obviously something that is behind why this is happening. Maybe a past betrayal or disloyalty in someway?
Sandra Hillawi author of The Love Clinic

Sandra Hillawi author of The Love Clinic

Actually, they can look within themselves when their partner is paying attention to somebody else and not to them, or whatever it is that triggers the feelings of jealousy, they can notice; “Where do I feel that in my body?”

Is it tightness in the chest? Something in the stomach? Where are those feelings coming from in their body?

And again, with a little bit of awareness and responsibility for our own emotions because now we understand what they are, we can actually ease and release some of the tension and then get back to flow states.

When we are in flow, we have all our clarity, we have all our resourcefulness and we have much more connection and ability to communicate better together.

Fantastic stuff, well it’s all there in the book called “The Love Clinic” by Sandra Hillawi. It’s published by DragonRising Publishing in paperback.

Sandra, it’s been a pleasure – thanks very much for appearing on the programme.

The Love Clinic is available in the UK from Amazon.co.uk, Waterstones, all good bookshops and direct from the Publisher DragonRising
The Love Clinic is available internationaly from Amazon.com and also direct from the Publisher DragonRising
Sandra Hillaw is available for interviews, talk, features, articles and to provide expert comment on the topic of love, sex and relationships.
Sandra Hillawi contact details can be found on her AMT Members Page
DragonRising Publishing can be contacted on +44 (0)1323 700 123 of by email

Posted Jul 25, 2008