VIDEO: Watch Paul McKenna talk to Phil Hewitt/SussexWorld about our national anxiety epidemic

Paul brings his Instant Confidence UK tour to Brighton Ironworks on March 5 (tickets on MindBodySpirit.co.uk); his new book is called Freedom From Anxiety

In the stage show, Paul will demonstrate life-changing techniques for hundreds of people to help them become more motivated, determined and confident, changing their life for the better. During his 90-minute live show, Paul will teach audiences how to: feel supremely confident; be more motivated and determined; instantly switch off fear and anxiety; feel strong in difficult situations; and feel full of optimism. His aim is to use his latest psychological techniques to fill your subconscious mind with the power and self-belief to go for anything you want in life.

As for the book, Freedom From Anxiety (published by Welbeck), Paul sets out to use cutting-edge step-by-step psychological techniques to help you train your mind and body, learn to control feelings of anxiety and experience deep calm, leading to a calmer, more joyful life. Freedom From Anxiety is divided into three sections. The book begins by focusing on three immediate anxiety relief techniques such as HeartMath, TFT (tapping on acupuncture meridian points) and Havening (which involves the touch of the side of the arms and the palms of the hands to create “relaxing delta-waves in the brain”). In section two, Paul focuses on building inner resilience and boosting good feelings using NLP and self-hypnosis techniques. The final section is about creating a richer world for yourself, employing spiritual (not religious) techniques and making room for optimism, joy and creativity.

Arguably, it has all never been needed more: “We have got eight million people suffering from anxiety at the moment. That's the official figure and it is probably more than that. And that means that you've probably got loads of other issues going on in the family like insomnia and lack of confidence. The fact is that we have come out of the biological pandemic into a psychological pandemic. We could have predicted it and it's easy in hindsight to say that we should have done more and that things could have been avoided but we've just got to deal with it. The fact is that it is affecting people of all ages and backgrounds and people from every walk of life. I've got super successful people that I know that have become unmotivated. I have treated a lot of people for anxiety particularly in the last ten years, particularly people on the frontline either by video or here in person and there's been a really phenomenal shift in the last 20 to 30 years in the world of modern psychology. Now we've got the psycho-sensitive techniques and things like hypnosis. When I started 35 years ago hypnosis was considered voodoo! But now people are able to use these techniques. There are ways to switch off the anxiety and the fear and to turn on the peace. Sometimes it can be almost instant. Sometimes it can take just a few minutes. Sometimes it can take a lot longer and be harder but there are things you can do that will make a difference relatively quickly.”