The Mystic Will: A Method of Developing and Strengthening the Faculties of the Mind, through the Awakened Will, by a Simple, Scientific Process Possible to Any Person of Ordinary Intelligence

By Charles Godfrey Leland

The Mystic Will is a spiritual book by Charles Godfrey Leland. It explains a method of inducing the mystic power of the human mind, to bring about desired conditions and miracles into your life.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Good Press
• Release date: Nov 25, 2019
• ISBN: 4057664642523

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Charles Godfrey Leland

The Mystic Will

A Method of Developing and Strengthening the Faculties of the Mind, through the Awakened Will, by a Simple, Scientific Process Possible to Any Person of Ordinary Intelligence

Published by Good Press, 2019

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EAN 4057664642523

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It may be here interesting to consider some of the states of mind into which a person may be brought by hypnotism. When subject to the will of an operator the patient may believe anything—that he is a mouse or a girl, drunk or inspired. The same may result from self-hypnotism by artificial methods which appeal powerfully to the imagination. According to Dr. JAMES R. COCKE many of his patients could induce this by looking at any bright object, a bed of coals, or at smooth running water. It is, of course, to be understood that it is not merely by looking that hypnotism is induced. There must be will or determinate thought; but when once brought about it is easily repeated.

They have the ability, writes Dr. COCKE, to resist this state or bring it on at will. Many of them describe beautiful scenes from Nature, or some mighty cathedral with its lofty dome, or the faces of imaginary beings. This writer's own first experience of self-hypnotism was very remarkable. He had been told by a hypnotizer to keep the number twenty-six in his mind. He did so, and after hearing a ringing in his ears and then a strange roaring he felt that spirits were all round him—music sounding and a sensation as of expanding.

But self-hypnotizing, by the simple easy process of trusting to ordinary sleep, is better adapted to action delayed, or states of mind. These may be:

A desire to be at peace or perfectly calm. After a few repetitions it will be found that, though irritating accidents may countervene, the mind will recur more and more to calm.

To feel cheerful or merry.

To be in a brave, courageous, hearty or vigorous mood.

To work hard without feeling weary. This I have fully tested with success, and especially mention it for the benefit of students. All of my intimate friends can certify what I here assert.

To keep the faculty of quickness of perception alert, as, for instance, when going out to perceive more than usual in a crowd. A botanist or mineralogist may awaken the faculty with the hope of observing or finding with success.

To be susceptible to beauty, as, for instance, when visiting a scene or gallery. In such cases it means to derive Attention from Will. The habitually trained Forethought or Attention is here a great aid to perception.

To read or study keenly and observantly. This is a faculty which can be very much aided by forethought and self-suggestion.

To forgive and forget enemies and injuries. Allied to it is the forgetting and ignoring of all things which annoy, vex, harrass, tease or worry us in any way whatever. To expect perfect immunity in this respect from the unavoidable ills of life is absurd; but having paid great attention to the subject, and experimented largely on it, I cannot resist declaring that it seems to me in very truth that no remedy for earthly suffering was yet discovered equal to this. I generally put the wish into this form: I will forget and forgive all causes of enmity and anger, and should they arise I determine at once to cast them aside. It is a prayer, as it were, to the Will to stand by me, and truly the will is Deus in nobis to those who believe that God helps those who help themselves. For as we can get into the fearful state of constantly recalling all who have ever vexed or wronged us, or nursing the memory of what we hate or despise, until our minds are like sewers or charnel-houses of dead and poisonous things, so we can resolutely banish them, at first by forethought, then by suggestion, and finally by waking will. And verily there are few people living who would not be the better for such exercise. Many there are who say that they would fain forget and be serene, yet cannot. I do not believe this. We can all exorcise our devils—all of them—if we will.

To restrain irritability in our intercourse with others. It will not be quite sufficient as regards controlling the temper to merely will, or wish to subdue it. We must also will that when the temptation arises it may be preceded by forethought or followed by regret. As it often happens to a young soldier to be frightened or run away the first time he is under fire, and yet learn courage in the future, so the aspirant resolved to master his passions must not doubt because he finds that the first step slips. Apropos of which I would note that in all the books on Hypnotism that I have read their authors testify to a certain false quantity or amount of base alloy in the most thoroughly suggested patients. Something of modesty, something of a moral conscience always remains. Thus, as Dr. COCKE declares, Hypnotism has not succeeded in cases suffering from what are called imperative conceptions, or irresistible belief. Cases suffering from various imperative conceptions are, while possessing their reasons, either irresistibly led by certain impulses or they cannot rid themselves of erroneous ideas concerning themselves and others. This means, in fact, that they had been previously hypnotised to a definite conception which had become imperative. As in Witchcraft, it is a law that one sorcerer cannot undo the work of another without extraordinary pains; so in hypnotism it is hard to undo what is already established by a similar agent.

One can will to remember or recall anything forgotten. I will not be responsible that this will invariably succeed at the first time, but that it does often follow continued determination I know from experience. I believe that where an operator hypnotizes a subject it very often succeeds, if we may believe the instances recorded. And I am also inclined to believe that in many cases, though assuredly not in all, whatever is effected by one person upon another can also be brought about in one's self by patience in forethought, self-suggestion, and the continued will which they awaken.

We can revive by this process old well-nigh forgotten trains of thought. This is difficult but possible. It belongs to an advanced stage of experience or may be found in very susceptible subjects. I do not belong at all to the latter, but I have perfectly succeeded in continuing a dream; that is to say, I have woke up three times during a dream, and, being pleased with it, wished it to go on, then fallen asleep and it went on, like three successive chapters in a novel.

We can subdue the habit of worrying ourselves and others needlessly about every trifling or serious cause of irritation which enters our minds. There are many people who from a mere idle habit or self-indulgence and irrepressible loquacity make their own lives and those of others very miserable—as all my readers can confirm from experience. I once knew a man of great fortune, with many depending on him, who vented his ill-temper and petty annoyances on almost everyone to whom he spoke. He was so fully aware of this failing that he at once, in confessing it to a mutual friend, shed tears of regret. Yet he was a millionaire man of business, and had a strong will which might have been directed to a cure. All peevish, fretful and talkative, or even complaining people, should be induced to seriously study this subject.

We can cure ourselves of the habit of profanity or using vulgar language. No one doubts that a negro who believes in sorcery, if told that if he uttered an oath, Voodoo would fall upon him and cause him to waste away, would never swear again. Or that a South Sea Islander would not do