Self Mastery Through Conscious Autosuggestion: Part Six

(For the next week or so, the Successful Living blog will post the complete book, "Self Mastery Through Conscious Autosuggestion" by Emile Coue. Coue, a french doctor, was one of the pioneers in the field of autosuggestion - now known as affirmations or self talk. This is his seminal work.)

Chapter 6
Method of Procedure in Curative Suggestion

When the subject has passed through the preceding experiments and has understood
them, he is ripe for curative suggestion. He is like a cultivated field in which
the seed can germinate and develop, whereas before it was but rough earth in
which it would have perished.

Whatever ailment the subject suffers from, whether it is physical or mental, it is
important to proceed always in the same way, and to use the same words with a few variations according to the case.

Say to the subject: "Sit down and close your eyes. I am not going to try and put
you to sleep as it is quite unnecessary. I ask you to close your eyes simply in order
that your attention may not be distracted by the objects around you. Now tell
yourself that every word I say is going to fix itself in your mind, and be printed,
engraved, and encrusted in it, that, there, it is going to stay fixed, imprinted, and
encrusted, and that without your will or knowledge, in fact perfectly unconsciously
on your part, you yourself and your whole organism are going to obey. In the first place I say that every day, three times a day, in the morning, at midday, and in the evening, at the usual meal times, you will feel hungry, that is to say, you will experience the agreeable sensation which makes you think and say: "Oh! how nice it will be to have something to eat!" You will then eat and enjoy your food, without of course overeating. You will also be careful to masticate it properly so as to transform it into a sort of soft paste before swallowing it. In these conditions you will digest it properly, and so feel no discomfort, inconvenience, or pain of any kind either in the stomach or intestines. You will assimilate what you eat and your organism will make use of it to make blood, muscle, strength and energy, in a word: Life.

"Since you will have digested your food properly, the function of excretion will
be normal, and every morning, on rising, you will feel the need of evacuating the
bowels, and without ever being obliged to take medicine or to use any artifice, you
will obtain a normal and satisfactory result.

"Further, every night from the time you wish to go to sleep till the time you wish
to wake next morning, you will sleep deeply, calmly, and quietly, without nightmares,
and on waking you will feel perfectly well, cheerful, and active.

"Likewise, if you occasionally suffer from depression, if you are gloomy and prone
to worry and look on the dark side of things, from now onwards you will cease
to do so, and, instead of worrying and being depressed and looking on the dark
side of things, you are going to feel perfectly cheerful, possibly without any special reason for it, just as you used to feel depressed for no particular reason. I say further still, that even if you have real reason to be worried and depressed you are not going to be so.

"If you are also subject to occasional fits of impatience or ill-temper you will cease to have them: on the contrary you will be always patient and master of yourself, and the things which worried, annoyed, or irritated you, will henceforth leave you absolutely indifferent and perfectly calm.

"If you are sometimes attacked, pursued, haunted, by bad and unwholesome ideas,
by apprehensions, fears, aversions, temptations, or grudges against other people,
all that will be gradually lost sight of by your imagination, and will melt away and
lose itself as though in a distant cloud where it will finally disappear completely.
As a dream vanishes when we wake, so will all these vain images disappear.

"To this I add that all your organs are performing their functions properly. The
heart beats in a normal way and the circulation of the blood takes place as it should; the lungs are carrying out their functions, as also the stomach, the intestines, the liver, the biliary duct, the kidneys and the bladder. If at the present moment any of them is acting abnormally, that abnormality is becoming less every day, so that quite soon it will have vanished completely, and the organ will have recovered its normal function. Further, if there should be any lesions in any of these organs, they will get better from day to day and will soon be entirely healed."

(With regard to this, I may say that it is not necessary to know which organ is affected for it to be cured. Under the influence of the autosuggestion "Every day, in every respect, I am getting better and better", the unconscious acts upon the organ which it can pick out itself.)

"I must also add -- and it is extremely important -- that if up to the present you
have lacked confidence in yourself, I tell you that this self-distrust will disappear
little by little and give place to self-confidence, based on the knowledge of this
force of incalculable power which is in each one of us. It is absolutely necessary for every human being to have this confidence. Without it one can accomplish nothing,
with it one can accomplish whatever one likes, (within reason, of course). You are then going to have confidence in yourself, and this confidence gives you the assurance that you are capable of accomplishing perfectly well whatever you wish to do, -- on condition that it is reasonable, -- and whatever it is your duty to do.

"So when you wish to do something reasonable, or when you have a duty to perform,
always think that it is easy, and make the words dificult, impossible, I cannot,
it is stronger than I, I cannotprevent myserffiom . . . . , disappear from your
vocabulary; they are not English. What is English is: "It is easy and I can". By
considering the thing easy it becomes so for you, although it might seem difficult
to others. You will do it quickly and well, and without fatigue, because you do it
without effort, whereas if you had considered it as difficult or impossible it would
have become so for you, simply because you would have thought it so."

To these general suggestions which will perhaps seem long and even childish to
some of you, but which are necessary, must be added those which apply to the
particular case of the patient you are dealing with.

All these suggestions must be made in a monotonous and soothing voice (always
emphasizing the essential words), which although it does not actually send the
subject to sleep, at least makes him feel drowsy, and think of nothing in particular.
When you have come to the end of the series of suggestions you address the subject
in these terms: "In short, I mean that from every point of view, physical as
well as mental, you are going to enjoy excellent health, better health than that
you have been able to enjoy up to the present. Now I am going to count three,
and when I say 'Three', you will open your eyes and come out of the passive state
in which you are now. You will come out of it quite naturally, without feeling in
the least drowsy or tired, on the contrary, you will feel strong, vigorous, alert, active, full of life; further still, you will feel very cheerful and fit in every way. ONE -- TWO -- THREE --" At the word "three" the subject opens his eyes, always with a smile and an expression of well-being and contentment on his face.

Sometimes, -- though rarely, -- the patient is cured on the spot; at other times,
and this is more generally the case, he finds himself relieved, his pain or his depression has partially or totally disappeared, though only for a certain lapse of
time.

In every case it is necessary to renew the suggestions more or less frequently
according to your subject, being careful always to space them out at longer and
longer intervals, according to the progress obtained until they are no longer necessary, -- that is to say when the cure is complete.

Before sending away your patient, you must tell him that he carries within him
the instrument by which he can cure himself, and that you are, as it were, only a
professor teaching him to use this instrument, and that he must help you in your task. Thus, every morning before rising, and every night on getting into bed, he
must shut his eyes and in thought transport himself into your presence, and then
repeat twenty times consecutively in a monotonous voice, counting by means of a
string with twenty knots in it, this little phrase:

"EVERY DAY, IN EVERY RESPECT, I AM GETTING BETTER AND BETTER."

In his mind he should emphasize the words "in every respect" which applies to
every need, mental or physical. This general suggestion is more efficacious than
special ones.

Thus it is easy to realize the part played by the giver of the suggestions. He is not
a master who gives orders, but a friend, a guide, who leads the patient step by
step on the road to health. As all the suggestions are given in the interest of the
patient, the unconscious of the latter asks nothing better than to assimilate them
and transform them into autosuggestions. When this has been done, the cure is
obtained more or less rapidly according to circumstances.


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