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M. COUE'S THEORY AND PRACTICE

OF AUTO-SUGGESTION

BY CAVENDISH MOXON.

THE present study is based upon the explanation of Suggestibility by Dr S. Ferenczi in terms of Freud's libido theory1. From this it is evident that suggestibility depends on the repressed libido. The affects connected with the parental complexes, being incapable of free discharge, undergo neurotic displacements until they can be transferred to a parent-substitute who shows signs of sympathy and healing power. Dr Ferenczi's paper was written before the present widespread popularity of the New Nancy School of auto-suggestion under the leadership of M. Emile Coué. At that time the method of suggestion by hypnosis prevailed, but M. Coué and his school dispense with hypnosis and claim that their method of induced auto-suggestion, being free from the objections raised against the older methods, is the best way of treating the symptoms of neurosis.

It is the purpose of the present paper (a) to state M. Coué's theory and practice of auto-suggestion in psycho-analytic terms; and (b) with an understanding of the mechanisms involved in the technique, to weigh the claims that are being made for its superiority as an almost universally applicable aid to psycho-physical health.

Mr Harry Brooks' popular manual contains a statement of the essentials of the theory and method written in a manner that M. Coué, in the Foreword, regards as "simple and clear2." The theory is based on the power of the unconscious, but the term is loosely used in a sense that seems chiefly to cover the psycho-analytic concept of the preconscious. The power of the unconscious is seen to consist in an acceptance of conscious thoughts and a consequent realization of them either in healthy or in unhealthy states of mind and body. It is significant that Prof. C. Baudouin in his more technical book on Suggestion and AutoSuggestion uses the vague term 'sub-conscious.' The acceptance of the psycho-analytic concept of the unconscious is incompatible with M. Coué's claim to heal all neurotics by a method which only attacks symptoms and pre-conscious 'outcroppings.' In harmony with the technique based on verbal formulae, M. Coué's theory makes pre-conscious products in 1 S. Ferenczi, Contributions to Psycho-Analysis, p. 30.

2 The Practice of Auto-suggestion. New York. Dodd, Mead & Co. 1922.

the form of verbal imaginations take the primary part in the causation of health and disease. What Prof. Baudouin calls the law of 'reversed effort' is thus stated by M. Coué: "When the Imagination and the Will are in conflict the Imagination invariably gains the day1."

Since the conflict here described is waged between pre-conscious or conscious verbal images and the repressive forces of the moral consciousness, M. Coué is satisfied when he has replaced a pre-conscious morbific thought by its opposite. Because M. Coué regards a good verbal autosuggestion as a cure for morbific thoughts, it seems possible for him to believe in a bad verbal auto-suggestion as their source, and to ignore the unconscious source of neurotic symptoms. In harmony with M. Coué's emphasis on words, Mr Brooks has much to say about the power of thought to modify the unconscious, and thereby the bodily health. The only obstacles to this exercise of verbal imagination appear to be the conscious attention and will, which cause doubts and fears that counteract the power of thought.

Mr Brooks sums up M. Coué's theory of suggestion in these words: "The whole process of Auto-suggestion consists of two steps: (a) The acceptation of an idea; (b) Its transformation into a reality. Both these operations are performed by the Unconscious. Whether the idea is originated in the mind of the subject or is presented from without by the agency of another person is a matter of indifference. In both cases it undergoes the same process: it is submitted to the Unconscious, accepted or rejected, and so either realized or ignored. Thus the distinction between Auto-suggestion and Hetero-suggestion is seen to be both arbitrary and superficial. In essentials all suggestion is auto-suggestion. The only distinction we need make is between spontaneous autosuggestion, which takes place independently of our will and choice, and induced auto-suggestion, in which we consciously select the ideas we wish to realize and purposely convey them to the Unconscious2."

This explanation is in harmony with Psycho-Analysis in so far as it asserts that, in Dr Ferenczi's words, "in hypnosis and suggestion the chief work is performed not by the hypnotist and suggestor, but by the person himself3," who was looked on by previous theorists as merely the object of the intrusive activity. While not denying the part in his method played by hetero-suggestion, M. Coué nevertheless seems to minimize. unduly its importance. In his reaction against the old view of the hypnotist as the active agent in causing a dissociation without which the a Ibid. p. 55.

1 Quoted by Harry Brooks. Ibid. p. 63.

3 Ferenczi. Ibid. p. 50

suggestion is impossible, M. Coué writes at times as if the method can wholly dispense with the transference of libido to an authority. In the Foreword to Mr Brooks' Manual M. Coué maintains that "the instructions given are amply sufficient to enable any one to practise auto-suggestion for him or herself, without seeking the help of any other person1." There is probably no auto-suggestion free from all hetero-suggestion, because no one can be wholly removed from the influence of the parents and their suggestive substitutes. It is at any rate clear that hetero-suggestion plays an essential part in M. Coué's method. Every person who uses his formulae must have some knowledge of the ability of M. Coué or his followers to remove the symptoms of ill-health. Both in the clinic at Nancy, in M. Coué's own manual and Mr Brooks' book, the personality of M. Coué and his healing powers are impressively manifest. The ignorant regard M. Coué as a worker of miracles: and Mr Brooks makes clear the resemblance to Christ when he writes of M. Coué's "great goodness of heart" that caused him to place his whole life at the service of others at any time, and to refuse any fee for his treatments (p. 41). Mr Brooks declares that this is a method demanding faith; and faith in the method cannot be had without faith in the authority who spreads the good news. There is clearly a transference of libido to a parentsubstitute as well as a verbal formula.

The two factors in the removal of symptoms are paralleled by the two factors at work in their production.

Dr

(1) Hetero-suggestibility or the capacity for transference. Ferenczi thinks this varies in proportion to the libido fixation upon the parents. The neurotic is therefore extremely sensitive to all authorities, human and divine, and in his loneliness he is ready to accept a new sympathetic parent-substitute to satisfy his hunger for love.

(2) Auto-suggestibility or the discovery by the repressed libido (connected with the parental and other complexes) of the maximum outlet compatible with conscious renunciation2. These two factors-the search for parent-substitutes and the creation of neurotic outlets for unsatisfied impulses are powerfully stimulated by the environment in the most highly civilized nations at the present time.

Among the strongest stimuli to fear may be mentioned:

(a) the economic dependence of a large majority of the people upon the will of a powerful minority, and

(b) the disintegration of the traditional creeds.

1 The Practice of Auto-suggestion, p. 7.

2 Cf. E. Jones. Papers on Psycho-Analysis, p. 325.

A transference of libido to human and divine parent-substitutes is thereby hindered; the masochistic tendency towards death1 is increased by the loss of sadistic and aggressive outlets; and the feeling of impotent inferiority is induced by the lack of proper narcissistic sublimations.

(c) The moral conscience, by constantly increasing prohibitions, tends to produce a morbid intensity of guilt and fear.

Knowing that the will-drill method of cure tends to increase the doubts and fears upon which the attention is fixed, M. Coué relies on the power of verbal imagination to avoid the conflict with the will and to attain the end he desires. The auto-suggestive technique is simple. The subject repeats morning and evening, when as nearly asleep as possible, the general formula, “Day by day, in every way, I am getting better and better." This may be supplemented by particular formulae for specially desired alterations in mental and bodily functions. As an aid to the effortless use of the formula, a string with 20 knots is passed through the hand to mark the 20 repetitions that are required to insure the impression of the words.

The emphasis laid on words and acts is most significant for the psycho-analytic understanding of this method and its popularity. When a woman consulted M. Coué, he asked her to make no arduous search for the repressed desires that made her speech "a flood of complaint." "Madame," he interrupted, "you think too much about your ailments, and in thinking of them you create fresh ones." The technique tends to revive the infantile use of magic words and gestures, which accompany the slightly qualified belief in the child's omnipotence. Mr Brooks seems to realize this when he follows M. Coué in advising "the infantile mode of repeating the formula" which "puts one in touch with deep levels of the Unconscious where the child-mind still survives" (p. 84). This certainly harmonizes better with the primitive processes evoked than Prof. Baudouin's advice to repeat the formula in the manner of adult piety with all the words separately stressed.

We conclude that what distinguishes this method from other forms of suggestion is not the absence of transferred object libido, but the subordination of this to a large increase in the expression of narcissistic libido. With the revival of infantile narcissism goes an indulgence of negative hallucinations such as mark the period before the development of the reality principle. The imagination is used to promote the belief that all is well and that pain and suffering will disappear.

It seems possible to state more exactly in terms of libido quantities, 1 Freud, Jenseits des Lust prinzips, p. 54.

the way in which the transference of parent libido makes possible the conscious increase of narcissism. On p. 82 of his recent work on Massenpsychologie und Ich Analyse Freud shows that falling in love exercises an important influence upon the ego-ideal and consequently upon the conduct. When the love-object takes the place of the ego-ideal, the lover ceases to criticize not only the loved object, but also his own deeds done for the beloved. Acts that the lover could not or would not do without this motive, now seem possible and lawful. A quantity of the lover's libido is released from the censorship of the ego-ideal when a person is found for its embodiment. So long as the ego-ideal was largely a personal imagination, the ego was in constant fear of losing it by unworthy acts: when the ego-ideal is transferred to another person, the ego needs a smaller quantity of sado-masochism to chasten and control the repressed desires. The first love objects in the family could only be loved with much renunciation of crude desire; the new love object may allow a direct outlet of genital sexuality in the lover. While the initiator of an auto-suggestive process does not allow an outlet for uninhabited adult sexuality, he does allow an outlet for infantile narcissistic omnipotence and inattention to evil. The traditional divine parent-substitutes in this way work wonders for their sons; the new substitutes who authorize auto-suggestion enable the followers of their instructions to work wonders for themselves. The hetero-suggestions of modern civilized society allow an abnormally small amount of positive libido to find direct and sublimated expression. Consequently too much force is consumed in the work of building defences against illegitimate love and hate; and neurotic symptoms are the almost universal result.

The initiator of auto-suggestion who receives the transferred objectlove is an authority who, unlike the childhood authorities, wills the power and the pleasure of his pupil, and therefore breaks his pupil's habit of masochistic renunciation, adopted as an expiation for rebellion in the past. The suggestor not only removes the quantity of libido used for masochistic and anxious barriers against narcissistic expression; he also draws off a part of the masochistic libido upon himself in the form of loyalty. For, as Dr Ferenczi remarks, in confirmation of Freud's view, "the hypnotic credulity and pliancy take their root in the masochistic component of the sexual instinct," which takes pleasure in obeying the parents1. By a reduction of the fear and the sado-masochism, which are the chief weapons in the neurotic war upon health and life, the symptoms tend, at least for a time, to disappear.

1 Freud, Jenseits des Lust prinzips, p. 68.

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