The Genie Within: Your Subconscious Mind (5 page)

       
    Vasily Alexeev, a world-class Russian weightlifter, could not lift 500 pounds though he routinely lifted 495 pounds. In 1974, his coach played a trick on him to prove a point. He put 500 pounds on the bar and told Vasily the bar had 495 pounds on it. Thinking it was only 495 pounds, Vasily lifted the bar as usual. After Vasily was told he had lifted 500 pounds, he changed his belief and was able to do it in competition.

       
    A trained athlete lifting 500 pounds is not as impressive as a mother in panic lifting a car that has fallen on her son. How can she do it? Because in panic her conscious mind is put aside and does not tell her it is impossible. She has an adrenalin rush and just does it. I have only heard of such stories secondhand but a similar story appeared in the
Phoenix Gazette
. An incident was reported about a mechanic who lifted a car off two friends after it slipped off a tow bar. He also helped them out from under the car while holding it on his knees.

These are but a few examples that demonstrate the power in the subconscious mind, and this power is available in
your
subconscious mind.

CAVEATS

You will get results if you follow the rules and methods outlined in these lessons. You will achieve goals efficiently and faster than you thought possible. It is more than likely that you will not credit these lessons for your successes. One reason is that nothing dramatic happens during or after programming your subconscious mind. A chorus of angels or band of trumpets does not announce that your affirmations are working or that you have achieved your goals. It just happens—it happens naturally and without conscious effort.

If you look for signs, question your progress, or interfere in any way by using your conscious mind, you will likely stymie or kill your progress. Changes are subtle and effortless. You must toss out your Puritan ethic of hard work. For if you work hard at it, that is, with your conscious mind, your conscious effort will work against you. Your subconscious mind, your genie, works unconsciously and effortlessly. The less you strain, the more you relax and let it happen, the more
successful you will be. This will make more sense after the first three lessons. So read on, relax, and enjoy success!

STATES OF MIND

Using your subconscious mind effectively requires being in an altered state of mind. This altered state is natural, but it is different from your normal awake state of mind. The first proof of the need to use an altered state to access the subconscious mind, as far as I know, was demonstrated by the work of Elmer and Alyce Green at the Menninger Foundation from 1964 to 1973. The husband-wife duo studied individuals who did what seemed, at the time, superhuman feats. They studied, among others, Indian fakirs while they were buried alive for six days, laid on a bed of nails, or changed their heart rates and body temperatures. They studied Jack Schwarz, of Oregon, while he pierced himself through the arm with unsterilized metal rods. Schwarz controlled his bleeding, never became infected, and the wounds healed rapidly without leaving a mark. The Greens measured such things as body temperature, skin resistance, blood pressure, pulse, and brain waves.

These subjects had one thing in common while they performed these extraordinary feats:
they were in altered states of mind
.

There are four states of mind,
beta, alpha, theta
, and
delta
, and they are distinguished by a change in brain waves measured by an electrocephalograph.

The
beta state
is our normal awake state and is characterized by a brain wave frequency of 14 cps (cycles per second) to 100 cps. Not only is the frequency higher than other states, it is more erratic. This is because our
awake mind is busy. We are aware of many things that are going on around us. This awareness is essential for conducting our daily business and survival. Our attention constantly drifts. We are in the beta state most of our awake hours.

The
alpha state
is characterized by a brain wave frequency of 8 to 13 cps. You naturally go into the alpha state many times each day, but usually only fleetingly. Occasionally you may hover in this state. You would recognize it as daydreaming. Perhaps at one time or another you became bored, for example, standing in a slow line. You stared but your concentration was not on the thing you were staring at. Your mind was someplace else. You were in alpha. The alpha state is referred to as the “meditative” state—a state of relaxed, focused concentration. When you are in this state, you lose track of time. You may have stared at the wall for five minutes, but you think, incorrectly, you were staring at the wall for only a few seconds.

The
theta state
(4 to 7 cps) is similar to the alpha state but deeper and characterized by sudden intuitive insights. These insights are global. A classic example of global insight is comparing the way Beethoven and Mozart composed music. Beethoven composed linearly, measure
by measure, often going back and forth changing notes. Mozart said that a composition would come to him all at once and in entirety. All he had to do was to write it down on paper. That is the epitome of global thinking.

Last is the
delta state
(3 cps and lower.) This is the sleep state in which there is no consciousness. Dreaming occurs in the alpha and theta states.

THE FOUR STATES OF THE MIND

Getting back to the Green’s subjects who performed extraordinary feats, the one thing their subjects had in common when they were controlling involuntary body functions, was that they were in the alpha or theta states of mind. Thus, the alpha and theta brain wave states are the doorways to your subconscious mind. Your subconscious mind
will accept suggestions and commands readily when you are in the alpha and theta states of mind. Suggestions and commands to your subconscious mind are relatively ineffective when your mind is in the beta state where your conscious mind dominates.

ALPHA CONDITIONING

To use your subconscious mind effectively, you need to learn to go into the alpha state at will and stay there. Going into alpha is easy. You naturally go into it many times each day, albeit, usually only for seconds. It takes a little practice to go into the alpha or theta state at will and stay there. Exercises that teach you to go into these states are given after each lesson. The theta state is probably even more effective, but rather than referring to both the alpha and theta, I will simply refer to the alpha state from here on.

Now I am going to give you a very easy way to plant a suggestion in your subconscious mind while in the alpha state. It goes by two long names.

HYPNOPOMPIC AND
HYPNAGOGIC PERIODS