The Genie Within: Your Subconscious Mind (16 page)

A Dr. McDonald, a coroner, said (in an article that appeared in the
Los Angeles Times
about 30 years ago) he found, when he was looking for it, healed cancer areas in all of the cadavers he ever examined. This implies that we all have cancer cells in our bodies but our immune systems, when healthy and allowed to function properly, prevent their growth. Most of the time, fortunately, cancer cells grow only when the immune system is impaired.

A story from one of James Harriot’s books vividly shows the effect of chronic pain and stress. James Harriot was a veterinarian in Yorkshire, England. PBS aired a series for two years called “All Things Great and Small” based on these books.

James Harriot was calling on a miserly farmer. Harriot noticed an ewe that was in obvious pain. A cursory examination showed she had an infected uterus. The farmer
did not want to pay for treating the ewe because he thought she would not survive anyway. Harriot felt obliged to do something for the poor beast so he suggested that he give her some vitamins at no charge.

Harriot did not give the ewe vitamins, instead he gave her what he thought was enough Nembutal, or whatever chemical veterinarians use for euthanasia, to put her out of her misery. Weeks later he met the farmer at a local pub. The farmer told Harriot, “Those vitamins sure did the trick. The ewe slept for three days and when she woke up she was cured.”

Harriot thought deeply about the healing and concluded this: Every animal, including man, has the ability to cure itself if given the chance. This poor ewe was in so much pain and fear that her immune system and its curative powers shut down, allowing the infection to flourish. The injection put her to sleep for three days. Asleep, she felt no pain or fear. Without the pain and fear, her immune system took over and cured her naturally. Chronic tension and anxiety interfere with everyone’s immune system.

This is why deep relaxation and deep sleep are important. It gives your body an opportunity to regenerate and revitalize itself. Spending eight hours in bed does not necessarily mean you are getting proper sleep. Some people sleep eight hours but get up grouchy and complain of being tired. These people are not getting enough
deep, restful
sleep. They are not fully relaxing the inner core of muscles. These inner muscles are relaxed through your subconscious mind. People who reach deeper levels of sleep need less sleep than those who do not fully relax.

Reaction to Stress

Dr. Selye found that the reaction (the fight-or-flight response, or as he called it, the General Adaptation Syndrome) to stressful stimuli is the same for everyone. But, importantly,
everyone does not react to a given stressful stimulus in the same way.

Take the hypothetical examples of John and Alice who have similar jobs and work for the same boss. The boss is arrogant, grumpy, impersonal, and demanding. John cannot stand the boss and gets upset after every confrontation. Moreover, he gets upset every time he thinks of his job. John constantly complains about his boss and his job. After a year on this job, John has ulcers and high blood pressure.

Alice reacts differently. She analyses the situation and concludes her boss is acting from fear. He is afraid of losing
his
job. He is also having family problems and is probably afraid of losing his wife, or maybe of paying alimony. Once Alice understands this, she realizes that she is not the problem. Knowing this, she does not take his criticisms and grumpiness personally. Alice remains cheerful, productive, and a healthy employee.

To recap, no idea can remain secret in the subconscious mind. Ideas crystallize and must be expressed directly or indirectly.

METHODS OF RELIEVING STRESS

   
1.
    Use the Law of Reverse Effort. Go into alpha and repeat, “Whatever is causing this stress, now acts to relax me.”

   
2.
    Go into the alpha state and visualize a relaxing scene
.

   
3.
    Use the mental overlay method
.

          
a.
   Write on a piece of paper the thing that is stressing you
.

          
b.
   Close your eyes. Go into the alpha state. Think of a time when you felt joyful, wonderful, serene, and content. Project this image on your mental screen. Hold it about 30 seconds
.

          
c.
   Open your eyes and read what you wrote on the piece of paper
.

          
d.
   Repeat steps b. and c, two more times. Now when the thing that used to bug you comes up, you will feel those positive feelings
.

   
4.
    Go into the alpha state. If you had a bad experience, replay the experience in a positive way. If you offended someone by saying something you wish you had not said, go over the scene and say the right thing several times. Remember your subconscious mind does not know the difference between real and imagined experiences. This exercise will make it a positive experience, rather than a negative one
.

   
P.S.
       You may still want to apologize to the person you offended
.

   
Note:
    
Do these exercises while sitting in a comfortable chair. Do not do them while driving. Driving a car is okay while in the alpha state as long as you program yourself to drive carefully and alertly. Visualizing being on a tropical island watching swaying palms is not driving carefully and alertly
.

RESISTANCE

A law in physics states: “Any action has an opposite and equal reaction.” So to resist is to give the opposite thing power. To resist something that is untrue only puts you on the defensive. A simple example will make the point:

Someone calls you lazy and accuses you of being incompetent. You know you are not lazy or incompetent. When you say, “No, I am not!” you are offering resistance to something that does not exist. You are giving it power and you are putting yourself on the defensive. Now you have to prove you are not lazy and incompetent. You are now struggling against something that is difficult to prove.

On the other hand, when you answer with a simple truth, such as, “That is true.
You
think I am lazy and incompetent and you have a right to think that. But please tell me why you believe that?” Now the burden of proof is on the other person, and you have defused a potentially violent argument. How can the other person stay mad, or get mad, with an answer like that?

Put your energy on what you stand for and believe in. Do not give your energy to negative causes. I have not studied martial arts, but I believe one of the axioms is to not resist. A master in the arts does not resist; instead, the master uses an adversary’s energy/motion to his advantage.

It is said that Mother Teresa was asked to join an anti-war march. She responded, “No. I will not join your anti-war march but I will march if you have one for peace.” And from the Bible, “Resist not evil, but overcome evil with good.”

THE TENSE/RELAX
CONDITIONING EXERCISE

Dr. Edmund Jacobson introduced the idea of tensing and relaxing in 1938. Each set of muscles in turn is tensed as tight as possible and then relaxed. The purpose is to feel the difference between tension and deep relaxation, and to teach your muscles what you want them to do for you. You want them to relax completely.

Another change in this routine is that the word “sleep” is used. Sleep is not the correct word but there is no other word in the English language to use. In this case, the object is to lose consciousness but not go to sleep, i.e., not to go into the delta state. You will be in the alpha state but your conscious mind will be out to lunch. Your subconscious mind will accept suggestions much more readily because your conscious mind is not there to interfere. This phrase will also be added to the
routine: “In any emergency I am wide awake and alert.” This suggestion is really unnecessary because your subconscious mind would wake you if you smelled smoke, heard the baby cry, or whatever. The purpose of adding it in the routine is to remove any apprehension from your conscious mind.
⁴

THE TENSE/RELAX ROUTINE