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Once, however, a correct or “successful response” has been accomplished—it is “remembered” for future use. The automatic mechanism then duplicates this successful response on future trials. It has “learned” how to respond successfully. It “remembers” its successes, forgets its failures, and repeats the successful action without any further conscious “thought”—or as a habit.
Searching for a new idea, or an answer to a problem, is in fact, very similar to searching memory for a name you have forgotten.
“Once a scientist attacks a problem which he knows to have an answer, his entire attitude is changed. He is already some fifty per cent of his way toward that answer.”
Get a New Mental Picture of Yourself
Experience has shown that when a person does change his self-image, he has the feeling that for one reason or another, he “sees,” or realizes the truth about himself.
Read this chapter through at least three times per week for the first 21 days. Study it and digest it. Look for examples in your experiences, and the experiences of your friends, which illustrate the creative mechanism in action.
His imaginings grew so strong that he actually feared going out into the business world and moving among people. He hardly felt “safe” even in his own home. The poor man even imagined that his family was “ashamed” of him because he was “peculiar looking,” not like “other people.”
We act, or fail to act, not because of “will,” as is so commonly believed, but because of imagination. A human being always acts and feels and performs in accordance with what he imagines to be true about himself and his environment.
“However, the plain truth is that when a subject is convinced that he is deaf, he behaves as if he is deaf; when he is convinced that he is insensitive to pain, he can undergo surgery without anesthesia. The mysterious force or power does not exist.”
In short, the man on the trail reacted to what he thought, or believed or imagined the environment to be.
You act, and feel, not according to what things are really like, but according to the image your mind holds of what they are like.
Why Not Imagine Yourself Successful?
your nervous system cannot tell the difference between an actual experience and one that is vividly imagined.
If you have an important interview coming up, such as making an application for a job, his advice was: plan for the interview in advance. Go over in your mind, all the various questions that you are likely to be asked. Think about the answers you are going to give. Then “rehearse” the interview in your mind. Even if none of the questions you have rehearsed come up, the rehearsal practice will still work wonders. It gives you confidence. And even though real life has not set lines to be recited like a stage play, rehearsal practice will help you to ad lib and react spontaneously to whatever
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“You must have a clear mental picture of the correct thing before you can do it successfully.”
Instead of trying hard by conscious effort to do the thing by iron-jawed will power, and all the while worrying and picturing to yourself all the things that are likely to go wrong, you simply relax the strain, stop trying to “do it” by strain and effort, picture to yourself the target you really want to hit, and “let” your creative success mechanism take over. Thus, mental-picturing the desired end result, literally forces you to use “positive thinking.” You are not relieved thereafter from effort and work, but your efforts are used to carry you forward toward your goal, rather than in futile
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Set aside a period of 30 minutes each day where you can be alone and undisturbed. Relax and make yourself as comfortable as possible. Now close your eyes and exercise your imagination.
The important thing is to make these pictures as vivid and as detailed as possible. You want your mental pictures to approximate actual experience as much as possible. The way to do this is pay attention to small details, sights, sounds, objects, in your imagined environment.
Do not say to yourself, “I am going to act this way tomorrow.” Just say to yourself—“I am going to imagine myself acting in this way now—for 30 minutes—today.”
“I am dumb,” “I have a weak personality,” “I am poor in arithmetic,” “I am a naturally poor speller,” “I am ugly,” “I do not have a mechanical type mind,” etc. With such self-definitions, the student had to make poor grades in order to be true to himself.
Within you right now is the power to do things you never dreamed possible. This power becomes available to you just as soon as you can change your beliefs. Just as quickly as you can dehypnotize yourself from the ideas of “I can’t,” “I’m not worthy,” “I don’t deserve it” and other self-limiting ideas.
It is not knowledge of actual inferiority in skill or knowledge which gives us an inferiority complex and interferes with our living. It is the feeling of inferiority that does this.
And this feeling of inferiority comes about for just one reason: We judge ourselves, and measure ourselves, not against our own “norm” or “par” but against some other individual’s “norm.” When we do this, we always, without exception, come out second best.
This striving for superiority gets him into more trouble, causes more frustration, and sometimes brings about a neurosis where none existed before. He becomes more miserable than ever, and “the harder he tries,” the more miserable he becomes.
The truth about you is this: You are not “inferior.” You are not “superior.” You are simply “You.” “You” as a personality are not in competition with any other personality simply because there is not another person on the face of the earth like you, or in your particular class. You are an individual. You are unique. You are not “like” any other person and can never become “like” any other person. You are not “supposed” to be like any other person and no other person is “supposed” to be like you.
It has been amply demonstrated that attempting to use effort or will power to change beliefs or to cure bad habits has an adverse, rather than a beneficial effect.
His experiments proved that the best way to break a habit is to form a clear mental image of the desired end result, and to practice without effort toward reaching that goal.
The important factor in learning, in short, is the thought of an objective to be attained, either as a specific behavior pattern or as the result of the behavior, together with a desire for the attainment of the object.”
they should be forgotten. If we consciously dwell upon the error, or consciously feel guilty about the error, and keep berating ourselves because of it, then—unwittingly—the error or failure itself becomes the “goal” which is consciously held in imagination and memory.
Gradually I learned to be indifferent to myself and my deficiencies; I came to center my attention upon external objects: the state of the world, various branches of knowledge, individuals for whom I felt affection.”
Is there any rational reason for such a belief? Could it be that I am mistaken in this belief? Would I come to the same conclusion about some other person in a similar situation? Why should I continue to act and feel as if this were true if there is no good reason to believe it?
Rational thought, to be effective in changing belief and behavior, must be accompanied by deep feeling and desire. Picture to yourself what you would like to be and have, and assume for the moment that such things might be possible.
It is very important that the automatic mechanism be given true facts concerning the environment. This is the job of conscious rational thought: to know the truth, to form correct evaluations, estimations, opinions.
“I don’t know,” he said. “What do you mean you don’t know?” “I have never tried.”
In short, conscious rational thought selects the goal, gathers information, concludes, evaluates, estimates and starts the wheels in motion. It is not, however, responsible for results. We must learn to do our work, act upon the best assumptions available, and leave results to take care of themselves.
Creative performance is spontaneous and “natural” as opposed to self-conscious and studied.
Conscious effort inhibits and “jams” the automatic creative mechanism. The reason some people are self-conscious and awkward in social situations is simply that they are too consciously concerned,
1. “Do your worrying before you place your bet, not after the wheel starts turning.”
Consciously practice the habit of “taking no anxious thought for tomorrow,” by giving all your attention to the present moment.
Plan all you want for the future. Prepare for it. But don’t worry about how you will react tomorrow, or even five minutes from now. Your creative mechanism will react appropriately in the “now” if you pay attention to what is happening now.
(William Osler, A Way of Life, Harper & Brothers, New York.)
This becoming more aware of what is happening now, and attempting to respond only to what is happening now, has almost magical results in relieving the “jitters.” The next time you feel yourself tensing up, becoming jittery and nervous—pull yourself up short and say, “What is there here and now that I should respond to? that I can do something about?” A great deal of nervousness is caused from unwittingly “trying” to do something that cannot be done here or now.
3. Try to do only one thing at a time.
The businessman, instead of concentrating upon and only trying to “do” the one letter that he is presently dictating, is thinking in the back of his mind of all the things he should accomplish today, or perhaps this week, and unconsciously trying mentally to accomplish them all at once.
The habit is particularly insidious because it is seldom recognized for what it is. When we feel jittery, or worried, or anxious in thinking of the great amount of work that lies before us, the jittery feelings are not caused by the work, but by our mental attitude—which
Even on the busiest day the crowded hours come to us one moment at a time; no matter how many problems, tasks or strains we face, they always come to us in single file, which is the only way they can come. To get a true mental picture, he suggested visualizing an hourglass, with the many grains of sand dropping one by one. This mental picture will bring emotional poise, just as the false mental picture will bring emotional unrest.
If you have been wrestling with a problem all day without making any apparent progress, try dismissing it from your mind, and put off making a decision until you’ve had a chance to “sleep on it.”
Sometimes forming a mental picture of yourself lying in bed, or sitting relaxed and limp in an easy chair helps to recall the relaxed sensations. Mentally repeating to yourself several times, “I feel more and more relaxed,” also helps. Practice this remembering faithfully several times each day. You will be surprised at how much it reduces fatigue, and how much better you are able to handle situations.
Psychosomatic medicine has proved that our stomachs, liver, heart, and all our internal organs function better when we are happy.
“Be happy—and you will be good, more successful, healthier, feel and act more charitably towards others.”
