Applied Psychology
PSYCHOLOGY AND ACHIEVEMENT
_Being the First of a Series of Twelve Volumes on the Applications of
Psychology to the Problems of Personal and Business Efficiency_
BY
WARREN HILTON, A.B., L.L.B.
FOUNDER OF THE SOCIETY OF APPLIED PSYCHOLOGY
ISSUED UNDER THE AUSPICES OF THE LITERARY DIGEST
FOR
The Society of Applied Psychology
NEW YORK AND LONDON
1919
1914
BY THE APPLIED PSYCHOLOGY PRESS
SAN FRANCISCO
PREFATORY NOTE
_Lest in the text of these volumes credit may not always have been given
where credit is due, grateful acknowledgment is here made to Professor
Hugo Münsterberg, Professor Walter Dill Scott, Dr. James H. Hyslop, Dr.
Ernst Haeckel, Dr. Frank Channing Haddock, Mr. Frederick W. Taylor,
Professor Morton Prince, Professor F.H. Gerrish, Mr. Waldo Pondray
Warren, Dr. J.D. Quackenbos, Professor C.A. Strong, Professor Paul
Dubois, Professor Joseph Jastrow, Professor Pierre Janet, Dr. Bernard
Hart and Professor G.M. Whipple, of the indebtedness to them incurred in
the preparation of this work._
CONTENTS
Chapter
I. ATTAINMENT OF MIND CONTROL
THE MAN OF TOMORROW
THE DOLLARS AND CENTS OF MENTAL WASTE
THE MEANS TO NOTABLE ACHIEVEMENT
A PROCESS FOR "MAKING GOOD"
INADEQUACY OF BODY TRAINING
INADEQUACY OF BUSINESS SPECIALIZATION
FUTILITY OF ADVICE IN BUSINESS
THE WHY AND THE HOW
FUNDAMENTAL TRAINING FOR EFFICIENCY
THE VIRUS OF FAILURE
PRACTICAL FORMULAS FOR EVERY DAY
YOUR UNDISCOVERED RESOURCES
MAN'S MIND MACHINE
ABJURING MYSTICISMS
PSYCHOLOGY, PHYSIOLOGY AND RELATIONSHIPS
ABODE AND INSTRUMENT OF MIND
MANNER OF HANDLING MENTAL PROCESSES
FUNDAMENTAL LAWS AND PRACTICAL METHODS
SPECIAL BUSINESS TOPICS
A STEP BEYOND COLLEGIATE PSYCHOLOGY
THE ETERNAL LAWS OF INDIVIDUAL ACHIEVEMENT
HOW TO MASTER OUR METHODS
II. TWO LAWS OF SUCCESS-ACHIEVEMENT
THE ONE-MAN BUSINESS CORPORATION
BUSINESS AND BODILY ACTIVITY
THE ENSLAVED BRAIN
FIRST STEP TOWARD SELF-REALIZATION
III. RELATION OF MIND ACTIVITY TO BODILY ACTIVITY
SPECULATION AND PRACTICAL SCIENCE
PHILOSOPHIC RIDDLES AND PERSONAL EFFECTIVENESS
WHAT WE WANT TO KNOW
SPIRITUALIST, MATERIALIST AND SCIENTIST
SCIENCE OF CAUSE AND EFFECT
CAUSES AND "FIRST" CAUSES
A COMMON PLATFORM FOR ALL
THOUGHTS TREATED AS CAUSES
SCIENTIFIC METHOD WITH PRACTICAL PROBLEMS
USES OF SCIENTIFIC LAWS
IV. INTROSPECTIVE EVIDENCE OF MENTAL MASTERY
DOING THE THING YOU WANT TO DO
SOURCE OF POWER OF WILL
IMPELLENT ENERGY OF THOUGHT
BODILY EFFECTS OF MENTAL STATES
ILLUSTRATIVE EXPERIMENTS
SCOPE OF MIND POWER
BODILY EFFECTS OF EMOTION
BODILY EFFECTS OF PERCEPTION
EXPERIMENTS OF PAVLOV
TASTE AND DIGESTION
BODILY EFFECTS OF SENSATIONS
THE FUNDAMENTAL LAW OF EXPRESSION
V. PHYSIOLOGICAL EVIDENCE OF MENTAL MASTERY
INTROSPECTIVE KNOWLEDGE
DISSECTION AND THE GOVERNING CONSCIOUSNESS
SUBORDINATE MENTAL UNITS
WHAT THE MICROSCOPE SHOWS
THE LITTLE UNIVERSE BEYOND
THE UNIT OF LIFE
CHARACTERISTICS OF LIVING CELLS
THE BRAIN OF THE CELL
MIND LIFE OF ONE CELL
THE WILL OF THE CELL
THE CELL AND ORGANIC EVOLUTION
EVOLUTIONARY DIFFERENTIATIONS
PLURALITY OF THE INDIVIDUAL
COMBINED CONSCIOUSNESS OF THE MILLIONS
EVOLUTION OF THE HUMAN ORGANISM
THE CROWD-MAN
FUNCTIONS OF DIFFERENT HUMAN CELLS
CELL LIFE AFTER DEATH
EXPERIMENTS OF DR. ALEXIS CARRELL
MAN-FEDERATION OF INTELLIGENCES
CREATIVE POWER OF THE CELL
LAYING THE FOUNDATION FOR PRACTICAL DOING
THREE NEW PROPOSITIONS
AN INSTRUMENT FOR MENTAL DOMINANCE
GATEWAYS OF EXPERIENCE
COURIERS OF ACTION
NERVE SYSTEMS
ORGANS OF CONSCIOUSNESS AND SUBCONSCIOUSNESS
LOOKING INSIDE THE SKULL
DRUNKENNESS AND BRAIN EFFICIENCY
SECONDARY BRAINS
DEPENDENCE OF THE SUBCONSCIOUS
UNCONSCIOUSNESS AND SUBCONSCIOUSNESS
SYNTHESIS OF THE MAN-MACHINE
SUBSERVIENCY OF THE BODY
VI. THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIOUSNESS
STRIKING OFF THE MENTAL SHACKLES
THE AWAKENING OF ENLIGHTENMENT
THE VITAL PURPOSE
YOUR RESERVOIR OF LATENT POWER
ATTAINMENT OF MIND CONTROL
CHAPTER I
ATTAINMENT OF MIND CONTROL
[Sidenote: The Man of Tomorrow]
The men of the nineteenth century have harnessed the forces of the outer
world. The age is now at hand that shall harness the energies of mind,
new-found in the psychological laboratory, and shall put them at the
service of humanity.
Are you fully equipped to take a valiant part in the work of the coming
years?
[Sidenote: The Dollars and Cents of Mental Waste]
The greatest of all eras is at hand! Are you increasing your fitness to
appreciate it and take part in it, or are you merely passing your time
away?
Take careful note for a week of the incidents of your daily life--your
methods of work, habits of thought, modes of recreation. You will
discover an appalling waste in your present random methods of operation.
How many foot-pounds of energy do you suppose you annually dump into the
scrap-heap of wasted effort? What does this mean to you in dollars and
cents? In conscious usefulness? In peace and happiness?
[Sidenote: The Means to Notable Achievement]
Individual mental efficiency is an absolute prerequisite to any notable
personal achievement or any great individual success. Your mental
energies are the forces with which you must wage your battles in this
world. Are you prepared to direct and deploy _Achievement__ these forces
with masterful control and strategic skill? Are you prepared to use all
your reserves of mental energy in the crises of your career?
A Mighty and Intelligent Power resides within you. Its marvelous
resources are just now coming to be recognized.
Recent scientific research has revealed, beyond the world of the senses
and beyond the domain of consciousness, a wide and hitherto hidden realm
of human energies and resources.
[Sidenote: A Process for "Making Good"]
These are mental energies and resources. They are phases of the mind,
not of the "mind" of fifty years ago, but of a "mind" of whose
operations you are unconscious and whose marvelous breadth and depth and
power have but recently been revealed to the world by scientific
experiment.
In this _Basic Course of Reading_ we shall lay before you in simple and
clear-cut but scientific form the proof that you have at your command
mental powers of which you have never before dreamed.
And we shall give you such specific directions for the use of these
new-found powers, that whatever your environment, whatever your
business, whatever your ambition, _you need but follow our plain and
simple instructions in order to do the thing you want to do, to be the
man you want to be, or to get the thing you want to have._
[Sidenote: Inadequacy of Body Training]
If you have any thought that the control of your hidden mental energies
is to be acquired by mere hygienic measures, put it from you. The idea
that you may come into the fulness of your powers through mere
wholesome living, outdoor sports and bodily exercise is an idea that
belongs to an age that is past. Good health is not necessary to
achievement. It is not even a positive influence for achievement. It is
merely a negative blessing. With good health you may hope to reach your
highest mental and spiritual development free from the harassment of
soul-racking pain. But without good health men have reached the summit
of Parnassus and have dragged their tortured bodies up behind them.
[Sidenote: Inadequacy of Business Specialization]
Nor does success necessarily follow or require long preparation in a
particular field. The first occupation of the successful man is rarely
the one in which he achieves his ultimate triumph. In the changing
conditions of our day, one needs a better weapon than the mere knowledge
of a particular trade, vocation or profession. _He needs that mastery of
himself and others that is the fundamental secret of success in all
fields of endeavor_.
[Sidenote: Futility of Advice in Business]
It is well to tell you beforehand that in this _Basic Course of Reading_
we shall be content with no mere cataloguing of the factors that are
commonly regarded as essential to success. We shall do no moralizing.
You will find here no elaboration of the ancient aphorisms, "Honesty is
the best policy," and "Genius is the infinite capacity for taking
pains."
The world has had its fill of mere exhortations to industry, frugality
and perseverance. For some thousands of years men have preached to the
lazy man, "Be industrious," and to the timid man, "Be bold." But such
phrases never have solved and never can solve the problem for the man
who feels himself lacking in both industry and courage.
[Sidenote: The Why and the How]
It is easy enough to tell the salesman that he must approach his
"prospect" with tact and confidence. But tact and confidence are not
qualities that can be assumed and discarded like a Sunday coat. Industry
and courage and tact and confidence are well enough, but we must know
the Why and the How of these things.
It is well enough to preach that the secret of achievement is to be
found in "courage-faith" and "courage-confidence," and that the way to
acquire these qualities is to assume that you have them. There is no
denying the undoubted fact that men and women have been rescued from the
deepest mire of poverty and despair and lifted to planes of happy
abundance by what is known as "faith." But what is "faith"? And "faith"
in What? And Why? And How?
[Sidenote: Fundamental Training for Efficiency]
Obviously we cannot achieve certain and definite results in this or any
other field so long as we continue to deal with materials we do not
understand. Yet that is what all men are doing today. The elements of
truth are befogged in vague and amateurish mysticism, and the subject of
individual efficiency when we get beyond mere preaching and moralizing
is a chaos of isms.
The time is ripe for a real analysis of these important problems,--a
serious and scientific analysis with a clear and practical exposition of
facts and principles and rules for conduct.
Men and women must be fundamentally trained so that they can look deep
into their own minds and see where the screw is loose, where oil is
needed, and so readjust themselves and their living for a greater
efficiency.
[Sidenote: The Virus of Failure]
The embittered, the superstitious, the prejudiced, all those who
scorpion-like sting themselves with the virus of failure, must be given
an antidote of understanding that will repair their deranged mental
machinery.
The conscientious but foolish business man who is worrying himself into
failure and an early grave must be taught the physiological effects of
ideas and given a new standard of values.
The profligate must be lured from his emotional excesses and
debaucheries, not by moralizings, but by showing him just how these
things fritter his energies and retard his progress.
[Sidenote: Practical Formulas for Every Day]
It must be made plain to the successful promoter, to the rich banker,
how a man may be a financial success and yet a miserable failure so far
as true happiness is concerned, and how by scientific self-development
he can acquire greater riches within than all his vaults of steel will
hold.
This _Basic Course of Reading_ offers just such an analysis and
exposition of fundamental principles. It furnishes definite and
scientific answers to the problems of life. It will reveal to you unused
or unintelligently used mental forces vastly greater than those now at
your command.
[Sidenote: Your Undiscovered Resources]
We go even further, and say that this _Basic Course of Reading_ provides
a practicable formula for the everyday use of these vast resources. It
will enable you to acquire the magical qualities and still more magical
effects that spell success and happiness, without straining your will to
the breaking point and making life a burden. It will give you a definite
prescription like the physician's, "Take one before meals," and as
easily compounded, which will enable you to be prosperous and happy.
In the development of one's innate resources, such as powers of
observation, imagination, correct judgment, alertness, resourcefulness,
application, concentration, and the faculty of taking prompt advantage
of opportunities, the study of the mental machine is bound to be the
first step. It must be the ultimate resource for self-training in
efficiency for the promoter with his appeal to the cupidity and
imaginations of men as surely as for the artist in his search for poetic
inspiration.
[Sidenote: Man's Mind Machine]
No man can get the best results from any machine unless he understands
its mechanism. We shall draw aside the curtain and show you the mind in
operation.
The mastery of your own powers is worth more to you than all the
knowledge of outside facts you can crowd into your head. Read and study
and practice the teachings of this _Basic Course_, and they will make
you in a new sense the master of yourself and of your future.
In this _Basic Course of Reading_ we shall begin by giving you a
thorough understanding of certain mental operations and processes.
[Sidenote: Abjuring Mysticisms]
We shall lead your interest away from "vague mysticisms" and emphasize
such phases of scientific psychological theory as bear directly on
practical achievement.
We shall give you a practical working knowledge of concentrative mental
methods and devices. We shall clear away the mysteries and
misapprehensions that now envelop this particular field.
In the present volume we shall begin with a discussion of certain
aspects of the relation between the mind and the body.
[Sidenote: Psychology, Physiology and Relationships]
However we look at it, it is impossible to understand the mind without
some knowledge of the bodily machine through which the mind works. The
investigation of the mind and its conditions and problems is primarily
the business of psychology, which seeks to describe and explain them.
It would seem to be entirely distinct from physiology, which seeks to
classify and explain the facts of bodily structure and operation. But
all sciences overlap more or less. And this is particularly true of
psychology, which deals with the mind, and physiology, which deals with
the body.
It is the mind that we are primarily interested in. But every individual
mind resides within, or at least expresses itself through, a body. Upon
the preservation of that body and upon the orderly performance of its
functions depend our health and comfort, our very lives.
[Sidenote: Abode and instrument of Mind]
Then, too, considered merely as part of the outside world of matter,
man's body is the physical fact with which he is most in contact and
most immediately concerned. It furnishes him with information concerning
the existence and operations of other minds. It is in fact his only
source of information about the outside world.
First of all, then, you must form definite and intelligent conclusions
concerning the relations between the mind and the body.
[Sidenote: Manner of Handling Mental Processes]
This will be of value in a number of ways. In the first place, you will
understand the bodily mechanism through which the mind operates, and a
knowledge of this mechanism is bound to enlighten you as to the
character of the _mental_ processes themselves. In the second place, it
is worth while to know the extent of the mind's influence over the body,
because this knowledge is the first step toward obtaining bodily
efficiency through the mental control of bodily functions. And, finally,
a study of this bodily mechanism is of very great practical importance
in itself, for the body is the instrument through which the mind acts in
its relations with the world at large.
From a study of the bodily machine, we shall advance to a consideration
of the mental processes themselves, not after the usual manner of works
on psychology, but solely from the standpoint of practical utility and
for the establishment of a scientific concept of the mind capable of
everyday use.
[Sidenote: Fundamental Laws and Practical Methods]
The elucidation of every principle of mental operation will be
accompanied by illustrative material pointing out just how that
particular law may be employed for the attainment of specific practical
ends. There will be numerous illustrative instances and methods that can
be at once made use of by the merchant, the musician, the salesman, the
advertiser, the employer of labor, the business executive.
[Sidenote: Special Business Topics]
In this way this _Basic Course of Reading_ will lay a firm and broad
foundation, first, for an understanding of the methods and devices
whereby any man may acquire full control and direction of his mental
energies and may develop his resources to the last degree; second, for
an understanding of the psychological methods for success in any
specific professional pursuit in which he may be particularly
interested; and third, for an understanding of the methods of applying
psychological knowledge to the industrial problems of office, store and
factory.
The first of these--that is to say, instruction in methods for the
attainment of any goal consistent with native ability--will follow right
along as part of this _Basic Course of Reading._ The second and
third--that is to say, the study of special commercial and industrial
topics--are made the subject of special courses supplemental to this
_Basic Course_ and for which it can serve only as an introduction.
[Sidenote: A Step Beyond Collegiate Psychology]
In this _Basic Course of Reading_ we shall show you how you may acquire
perfect individual efficiency. And, most remarkable of all, we shall
show you how you may acquire it _without that effort to obtain it, that
straining of the will, that struggling with wasteful inclinations and
desires, that is itself the essence of inefficiency_.
The facts and principles set forth in this _Basic Course_ are new and
wonderful and inspiring. They have been established and attested by
world-wide and exhaustive scientific research and experiment.
[Sidenote: The Eternal Laws of Individual Achievement]
You may be a college graduate. You may have had the advantage of a
college course in psychology. But you have probably had no instruction
in the practical application of your knowledge of mental operations. So
far as we are aware, there are few universities in the world that
embrace in their curricula a course in "applied" psychology. For the
average college man this _Basic Course of Reading_ will be, therefore,
in the nature of a post-graduate course, teaching him how to make
practical use of the psychology he learned at college, and in addition
giving him facts about the mind unknown to the college psychology of a
few years ago.
In these books you will probe deeply into the normal human mind.
You will see also the fantastic and distorted shape of its
manifestations in disease.
You will learn the Eternal Laws of Individual Achievement.
[Sidenote: How to Master Our Methods]
And you will be taught how to apply them to your own business or
profession.
But mark this word of warning. To comprehend the teachings of this
_Basic Course_ well enough to put them into practice demands from you
careful study and reflection. It requires persistent application. Do not
attempt to browse through the pages that follow. They are worth all the
time that you can put upon them.
The mind is a complex mechanism. Each element is alone a fitting subject
for a lifetime's study. Do not lose sight of the whole in the study of
the parts.
All the books bear upon a central theme. They will lead you on step by
step. Gradually your conception of your relations to the world will
change. A new realization of power will come upon you. You will learn
that you are in a new sense the master of your fate. You will find these
books, like the petals of a flower, unfolding one by one until a great
and vital truth stands revealed in full-blown beauty.
To derive full benefit from the _Course_ it is necessary that you should
do more than merely understand each sentence as you go along. You must
grasp the underlying train of thought. You must perceive the continuity
of the argument.
It is necessary, therefore, that you do but a limited amount of reading
each day, taking ample time to reflect on what you have read. If any
book is not entirely clear to you at first, go over it again.
Persistence will enable any man to acquire a thorough comprehension of
our teachings and a profound mastery of our methods.
TWO LAWS OF SUCCESS-ACHIEVEMENT