HYPNOTIC SLEEP
What would we give to our beloved?
The hero’s heart to be unmoved,—
The poet’s star-tuned harp to sweep;
The patriot’s voice to teach and rouse,—
The monarch’s crown to light the brows?
“He giveth His belovèd sleep.”
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING.
The nature of hypnotic sleep has not yet been fully determined, which
is not wonderful when we remember our ignorance of natural sleep. We
may call the active hypnotic state a condition of excessive attention
to the main idea presented and complete oblivion to other ideas. But
this state is preceded by a passive condition resembling sleep. The
use and value of hypnotic sleep is now occupying the attention of
scientific men and it bids fair to be an important curative agent.
Where once the patient suffering from insomnia was treated by drugs,
he is now more successfully treated through suggestion. The change
is a most desirable one and in line with that newer thought which
recognizes the power of regeneration within the soul of the individual.
For, the main things in the development of hypnosis and suggestion as
curative agents is the recognition that an appeal can be made to the
subconscious mind, which, as Dr. Worcester says, “is more sensitive
to good and evil than our conscious mind.” To appeal to our latent
powers to overcome our own weaknesses or limitations is greater and
better than to combat these weaknesses through drugs. Many physicians
who formerly employed hypnosis have adopted a substitute for it, the
so-called hypnoidal state, mere passivity with closed eyes. Hypnotizing
is in many cases needless and dangerous.
Insomnia, like any other trouble not due to the breakdown of a physical
organ, is more a moral than a material lapse, and can best be cured
by moral means: that is, by the aid of the will and its associated
faculties. Sleeplessness, nervousness, excitability, and irritability
have their rise in mental and emotional states more often than in
physical states, and, under such conditions, treatment by drugs is of
little real use. In the disease hysteria, mental trouble may masquerade
as physical defect, for instance paralysis or even blindness, while
the physical parts concerned are in no wise impaired. The dependence
placed upon merely extraneous things does not assist in the development
of our own inner powers. Even when drugs seem to relieve the outward
symptoms, they fail to strengthen the moral nature, so greatly in need
of strength. The man of drugs only is at a disadvantage as compared
with the suggestionist in treating such disorders. Dr. J. D. Quackenbos
says, “The suggestionist invokes the better subliminal self—invests
it with control, and seldom fails to effect the desired purpose.” He
further maintains, what all investigators are now coming to admit,
that, when the patient wakes from hypnotic sleep, during which helpful,
curative suggestions have been made to him, he is “constrained to
obey the impulses of his own superior self.” The power of suggestion,
whether during waking or sleeping hours, is only beginning to be
recognized, although its use in one form or another is centuries old.
The thoughtless, as well as the thoughtful, use it more or less every
hour of the day, while all of us may know that we are occasionally the
victims of auto-suggestion when we suffer from functional ailments.
Auto-suggestion is merely the suggestion of the self to the self, and
from ill-advised suggestions spring nearly all the little impediments
to sleep and health. Such a suggestion to ourselves as that we need
certain favorable conditions for sleeping will keep us awake when those
conditions are not possible. We say, “I cannot sleep with a clock
ticking in the room with me,” and so we lie awake and suffer nervous
tortures if we hear a clock tick. Or we say of something our friends
do, or of some natural habit they have, “That makes me so nervous I
almost fly out of my skin” thus we inflict upon ourselves suffering
that we need not endure.
The strong soul will call his “superior self” to his aid to conquer
this tendency. He will suggest to himself that he is able to sleep
without regard to clocks or other disturbance; that the peculiarities
of other people have no power to irritate, annoy, or otherwise upset
his nervous system; that even in the midst of alarums he may have
peace, if he so wills, and can sleep under ordinary conditions without
fear or annoyance.
But, to be able to do this, one must have faith in himself, in
his purpose, in his own desire to overcome his fears, for, as Dr.
Worcester remarks, “the value of suggestion lies in its character
and in the character of the man who makes it.” If we say these things
to ourselves, feeling all the time that it is useless, we are
not likely to impress the subconscious mind or rouse it to activity.
Self-deception is not often beneficial in its effects. No more shall we
make headway if we merely repeat such suggestions in parrot-fashion.
You remember the story of the old woman who heard that faith would
remove mountains: so she determined to try it on the hill in front of
her bedroom window. All night she repeated to herself that the mountain
would be removed. In the morning she awoke to see the hill still in
front of her. “There,” she said, “I knew it would be.” Anyhow, the
faith that removes most mountains is the faith that gets a shovel. It
is essential that we concentrate our minds upon the matter in hand,
excluding from our thoughts anything that might distract us and that
we fix our attention upon removing the fault. It is for this reason
that the hypnoidal state, or the wakeful night or the moment when one
is nearly dropping to sleep is the best time either for suggestion
to a patient or for one to indulge in helpful auto-suggestion. As
objective consciousness fades, it is easier to impress the subliminal
self-consciousness and invoke its aid.
Those who do not know themselves well enough to be able to respond
to their own suggestion, may be helped by another in whom they have
faith. If they submit themselves willingly to suggestion, they may find
themselves so strengthened that they will shortly be able to control
themselves by auto-suggestion. Like almost all upward tendencies, this
power is a matter of development.
As we come to understand hypnotism better, we learn that we need not
fear ill results from thus yielding ourselves for a good purpose to
another,[8] for one’s subconscious self is always on watch and will
not be compelled to do that which is contrary to one’s own nature or
habit of thought. Hypnotic sleep differs from natural sleep in that
the hypnotized person usually preserves a degree of intelligence and
invariably a moral sense which are not conspicuous in normal sleep and
dreaming. Scientific investigators are quite well agreed on this point,
and Dr. Worcester’s experience has convinced him of its truth.
[8] There are grave dangers attendant on hypnotism for entertainment.
Prof. C. H. Judd of the University of Chicago says: “There is
no justification whatever for the use of hypnosis as a means of
amusement.” See Judd: Psychology.
So, if all other means of securing sleep should fail, we may have
recourse to this newest method of curing nervous and other functional
disorders. It is merely one way of getting into closer touch with the
Infinite and Universal and coming into line with life’s underlying laws.
The use of auto-suggestion is not limited to inducing sleep: it may rid
us of evil habits, disturbing thoughts, and all hatred, malice, and
uncharitableness—which in their turn interfere with sleep.
THE LAND OF NOD
From breakfast on through all the day
At home among my friends I stay;
But every night I go abroad
Afar into the land of Nod.
All by myself I have to go,
With none to tell me what to do—
All alone beside the streams
And up the mountain-sides of dreams.
The strangest things are there for me,
Both things to eat and things to see,
And many frightening sights abroad
Till morning in the land of Nod.
Try as I like to find the way,
I never can get back by day,
Nor can remember plain and clear
The curious music that I hear.
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.