X. A Few Practical Applications
1908 first edition, complete ten chapters; scan-reviewed OCR, verse, three figure captions and original emphasis
Laura M. Westall
Water should be drunk freely, to keep the alimentary canal clean and the bowels open.
Deep breathing, more than any other agency, must be relied upon to keep the blood vitalized and the nutrition of the brain normal.
Overwork, mental strain, anxiety, and all depressing emotions should be avoided. A determined effort must be made to be cheerful; tho the sufferer does not feel cheerful, if an attempt is made to, appear so, she will tend to become so by a psychological law.
Daily relaxation should be practised — lying on the back, stop thinking, and rest the brain.
If some new pursuit is taken up, like the study of art or music, botany or floriculture, a new zest is given to life, and the physical ills may be forgotten or relegated to second place.
As the ovaries are leading factors in the disturbances, all other symptoms being mainly reflex, local treatment should be used.
Fix the attention upon the ovaries, placing the hands thereon for a short time daily, and by suggestion and imagination improve the circulation. A beneficial effect upon the sympathetic centers will thus be produced.
As much as possible the sufferer's mind should be diverted from herself. She should stedfastly refuse to talk about her ailments; and when her attention is called to herself, she will do well to form a mental picture of herself as radiantly well.
Falling Hair. — This results from poor circulation in the scalp ; insufficient bloodsupply deprives the hair-follicles of the elements of nutrition. Daily concentration of attention upon the scalp will put an end to this condition, and new hair may be grown if the hair-glands have not been destroyed by bacilli.
Selected parts of the body may be built up by the psychophysical process so often described.
It can not be dogmatically affirmed that new tissue can be added at will to any part of the body; it is a matter which individual experiment alone can determine. The conditions of life, the mode of life, the age, and assimilative capacity may one or all prevent success.
Leanness. — This may be overcome, provided there is no malnutrition or emaciating disease, by holding steadily in "the mind's eye" a picture of what one wishes to become. The experimenter should fix upon the number of pounds to be gained and see the figures as often as possible mentally. If they are written or printed and placed where they may be often seen, it will expedite the result, as will also deep breathing.
Superfluous Flesh. — This may be sloughed off in the same manner in which leanness is overcome. In this case, the experimenter should fix upon the number of pounds to be lost. He should live with the mental picture which he creates by suggestion and imagination.
In addition, there should be deep breathing to improve the vitality — excessive flesh denotes an abnormal condition.
In such cases the energy generated by the brain is largely used in converting the food eaten into flesh-forming products. The scholar, the thinker, whose mental life is intensely active, is nearly always of spare figure — the energy is consumed by his mental processes. The restless, nervous person who is constantly turning from one form of activity to another is also thin. The day-laborer, whose mind-action is slight, consumes his energy in muscular exercise. But the good-natured, easy-going individual, who takes life with a cheerful philosophy, and exercises neither his mind nor his muscles to any great extent, is quite sure to take on flesh. The accumulation of fat about the heart, particularly if the vital organs are squeezed together by tight clothing, obstructs the breathing and circulation, hence the blood becomes poor. Many fleshy people have an anemic look.
So, then, the mental energy set free by the brain must be consumed by exercise, mental or muscular, to keep the weight of the body normal.
Women especially need to cultivate deep breathing and take more open-air exercise. *
Slight Structural Defects. — It is strongly probable that slight structural defects like outstanding ears, round shoulders, or a misshapen nose may be remedied by psychophysical treatment, provided such work is undertaken before the age of thirty. The act of attention improves nutrition, as has been shown, and imagination is a power which we have hardly yet begun to reckon with.
Mental Strain. — One of the crying evils of our time is a kind of nervous frenzy — the mad haste to get somewhere or do something; the ambition to get rich, to break records, to win championships, to do the maximum of work in the minimum of time — in short, to compass the impossible.
As a consequence, nervousness, nervous exhaustion, and a long train of ills afflict constantly increasing numbers.
This anxious haste puts a strain upon the mind, which reacts upon the brain and nervous system with deadly effect. Few see it, but nevertheless this mental strain consumes the vitality, exhausts the brain, and if persisted in will finally leave its victim a nervous wreck. Some of the "kings of finance" can not sleep or digest the simplest food.
Many persons attack their daily work under this tension. The thought of the work to be done, the unconscious fear that it may not all be accomplished in the prescribed time, puts the tension on the mind, and this keys up the brain. Ordinary fatigue is thereby increased to exhaustion, and it is an exhaustion of the brain, which frequently induced spells ultimate prostration.
The remedy is simple. One has but to realize the insanity of such a course and calm his mind by an effort of will. A little common-sense mental discipline will break the habit, and the gain in health, self-control, and mental poise will be of lasting value.
"What doth it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?"