Hypnosis Auto-Suggestions Blog

H. F. Dunbar cites an interesting case of "grossesse nerveuse", which shows how deeply can imagination modify the bodily functions; she writes: "E. Graefen-berg (1929) was called to a delivery one morning at five o'clock, only to find a midwife who had been waiting forty eight hours and a physician who had been waiting twenty four hours for the final termination of labor. The patient, forty five years old, was lying in bed shaken by almost continuous bearing-down pains. . . This woman who had wished all her life for a child had succumbed to an idea of pregnancy." Autosuggestion could make the body simulate the symptoms of pregnancy and deceive two specialists; but it could not produce the baby. A remarkable case is related by Woodson. A patient suffered from dementia praecox (paranoid type), imagining that the upper part of his body was as solid within as concrete. The author contends that the patient died in consequence of this delusion.

Hypnotic Suggestion News Buletin

Here, then, is the way toward the solution of an old problem. Within the human organism, there lies a nervous system which controls and regulates the mechanical behavior of the body. Involuntary as it usually is, it is not entirely separated from consciousness. The autonomic system is connected with the central system by means of two channels, emotion and suggestion. It was the pathway of suggestion-ornamented with prejudice and superstition-that was unwittingly exploited from the olden days to the present, from the witch-doctors to the psychoanalysts. Whereas they failed to comprehend the physical mechanism of suggestion and ascribed their powers to the spirits or by whatever other names these forces were called, it is time now to abandon the antiquated attitude and to seek the explanation of phenomena of suggestion within the organism itself-that is to say, to study functions of the autonomic nervous system and structures connected with it. When we finally learn to understand this mechanism in its major details, we shall be enabled to treat human beings not at random and through guesses, but scientifically, with all that this word implies.

Suggestions Daily Info Blog

That human personalities are molded by suggestion, will be generally admitted. Take, for instance, the art of advertising. A business man, in offering his products on the market, will not describe their qualities, good and bad, in an objective manner; rather, he will dwell on the attractive, exclusive, important features and thus try to arouse human attention and desire. A sign or a slogan does not impose, it suggests. And people yield to it, if it is built and presented according to the rules of popular psychology. These facts are appreciated in the business world to such an extent that, despite the colossal expense of education by advertising, no firm or industry can afford to neglect it. Business men have grasped this lesson in educating the public "by suggestion." They know full well that public taste is directed by being whetted. But our high schools and colleges still continue to resort to the old-fashioned methods of dry assignment and recitation, with almost a complete disregard of psychology and common sense. As a result, class work is notoriously boring and ineffective, education being achieved, as it were, despite the educators' efforts, in extra-curricular activities rather than in the class-room. Some people would not believe the tragedy of this situation, but let them ask schoolboys and schoolgirls. If these are intelligent, observant and frank, the truth will be told.