Understanding the Subconscious Mind to Transform Your Life with Leo Howson

In this week’s episode, Jenn DeWall interviews Leo Howson to learn how understanding our subconscious mind can maximize our potential and transform our lives. Leo Howson is a seasoned entrepreneur with a decade of multi-business expertise, a certified hypnotherapist and a human potential coach.

Leo’s approach to coaching draws from his diverse business background, centering on high performance and human potential. He emphasizes building a solid foundation for exponential impact, followed by targeted work on areas like flow state. Leo guides individuals towards balance, productivity and passions, enabling them to set and conquer their significant goals.

By leveraging hypnosis, mindset and flow state techniques, Leo drives profound subconscious transformations. We hope that you enjoy this conversation about how you can build more success and happiness for yourself by understanding your subconscious.

Meet Leo Howson, Entrepreneur, Human Potential Coach & Hypnotherapist

As the episode opens, Jenn welcomes Leo Howson to the show and asks him to tell the audience about himself. Now 35 years old, Leo started his first company when he was just 23. In his 30s, he found himself struggling with energy and productivity after the birth of his daughter. He was tired more often and had fallen into some bad habits like skipping the gym or neglecting nutrition.

Once he made this realization, he decided that it was time to take a closer look at getting his energy back and becoming a high performer once again. Along that journey, he learned more about harnessing the power of the subconscious mind. It worked so well for him he wanted to share that information with others. So, he became a performance coach hypnotherapist and has been helping others reach their goals ever since.

Hypnotherapy & NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming)

Later in the episode, Leo explains that hypnotherapy is nothing like what you see in a magic show or stage performance where volunteers are made to cluck like a chicken. He clarifies that those performers would likely call themselves a hypnotist. However, Leo is a hypnotherapist and helps clients bypass the conscious mind to work on subconscious issues leading to problems like anxiety, lack of motivation, or poor performance.

Jenn then asks about the use of NLP or Neuro-Linguistic Programming. Leo explains that it is a process used to change how we perceive the world. He uses it as a supplement to hypnotherapy, calling it a “user-manual for the mind”.

Understanding the Subconscious Mind

Then, Jenn and Leo define and discuss the subconscious mind. Leo describes it using Freud’s definition, saying, “If you imagine an iceberg– it’s really easy to understand. Imagine an iceberg where a small bit of the iceberg is above the water, but the majority of that iceberg is underneath the water. You cannot see it. So that top small bit of the iceberg we would look at as our conscious mind, and then that huge area underneath the water, that big part of the iceberg would be our subconscious.

They’ve proven that around 95% of our mind is made up subconsciously. So we underestimate the power of it because we’re always thinking and talking as we are now consciously. We then get stuck in a conscious mode and don’t realize the power of the subconscious. I mean it also controls breathing, digestion habits, and emotional reactions.

There’s a lot going on subconsciously that if we’re not aware of it, we are missing out on a huge, huge opportunity to generate change, influence the way we do things, and ultimately break the habits that we don’t want and start walking in the steps that we’d like to take.”

Removing Subconscious Obstacles

Later in the episode, Jenn and Leo discuss how working with the unconscious mind can help improve our performance. Leo shares that he works with entrepreneurs, leaders and athletes to uncover the root cause of their stress, lack of motivation, or other issues. By understanding the root causes, they can change their mindset and improve performance.

He reminds the audience that while we live in a modern world, our mind is constantly interpreting things as if we were cavemen. But the stress reaction that was helpful to avoid being attacked by a bear in the past isn’t as helpful when you are trying to give an important presentation.

The subconscious mind holds information from our earliest moments of life. Many times people are triggered by something stored in their subconscious thoughts but aren’t aware of it. That can turn into negative thoughts or hypervigilance or manifest in unwanted habits or behaviors. By bringing conscious awareness to the root cause, we can begin to re-program our minds and our reactions to those triggers.

Tips for “Hacking” Your Mind

Towards the end of the episode, Leo Howson shares his tips for managing your mind even if you don’t have a hypnotherapist. He recommends learning more about hypnotherapy and NLP, but also suggests starting with mindfulness practices and meditation. He especially recommends a meditation practice that originated in Hawaii, called Hakalau, or “open eyes” meditation. In this practice, you keep your eyes open, finding a focal point that allows you to blur your main vision and focus on your peripheral vision while following a set breathing pattern.

He also recommends being very conscious of how you use your phone. He begins each day by not going on social media or checking the news. He often recommends a digital detox for clients, explaining that the dopamine rush and negative messages from social media cause distraction, stress and negative thoughts.