taken in connection with the Way of Living and Thinking prescribed in this book, you will find that it is just as efficacious in curing every other sort of trouble. Do not take any half-way measures in this matter of securing pure air while you sleep. Ventilate your bedroom thoroughly; so thoroughly that it will be practically the same as sleeping out of doors. Have a door or window open wide; have one open on each side of the room, if possible. If you cannot have a good draught of air across the room, pull the head of your bed close to the open window, so that the air from without may come fully into your face. No matter how cold or unpleasant the weather, have a window open, and open wide; and try to get a circulation of pure air through the room. Pile on the bedclothes, if necessary, to keep you warm; but have an unlimited supply of fresh air from out of doors. This is the first great requisite for healthy sleep.
The brain and nerve centers cannot be thoroughly vitalized if you sleep in "dead" or stagnant air; you must have the living atmosphere, vital with nature's Principle of Life. I repeat, do not make any compromise in this matter; ventilate your sleeping room completely, and see that there is a circulation of outdoor air through it while you sleep. You are not sleeping in a perfectly healthy way if you shut the doors and windows of your sleeping room, whether in winter or summer. Have fresh air. If you are where there is no fresh air, move. If your bedroom cannot be ventilated, get into another house.
Next in importance is the mental attitude in which you go to sleep. It is well to sleep intelligently, purposefully, knowing what you do it for. Lie down thinking that sleep is an infallible vitalizer, and go to sleep with a confident faith that your strength is to be renewed; that you will awake full of vitality and health. Put purpose into your sleep as you do into your eating; give the matter your attention for a few minutes, as you go to rest. Do not seek your couch with a discouraged or depressed feeling; go there joyously, to be made whole. Do not forget the exercise of gratitude in going to sleep; before you close your eyes, give thanks to God for having shown you the way to perfect health, and go to sleep with this grateful thought uppermost in your mind. A bedtime prayer of thanksgiving is a mighty good thing; it puts the Principle of Health within you into communication with its source, from which it is to receive new power while you are in the silence of unconsciousness.
You may see that the requirements for perfectly healthy sleep are not difficult. First, to see that you breathe pure air from out of doors while you sleep; and, second, to put the Within into touch with the Living Substance by a few minutes of grateful meditation as you go to bed. Observe these requirements, go to sleep in a thankful and confident frame of mind, and all will be well. If you have insomnia, do not let it worry you. While you lie awake, form your conception of health; meditate with thankfulness on the abundant life which is yours, breathe, and feel perfectly confident that you will sleep in due time; and you will. Insomnia, like every other ailment, must give way before the Principle of Health aroused to full constructive activity by the course of thought and action herein described.
The reader will now comprehend that it is not at all burdensome or disagreeable to perform the voluntary functions of life in a perfectly healthy way. The perfectly healthy way is the easiest, simplest, most natural, and most pleasant way. The cultivation of health is not a work of art, difficulty, or strenuous labor. You have only to lay aside artificial observances of every kind, and eat, drink, breathe, and sleep in the most natural and delightful way; and if you do this, thinking health and only health, you will certainly be well.
Chapter XVI.
Supplementary Instructions
In forming a conception of health, it is necessary to think of the manner in which you would live and work if you were perfectly well and very strong; to imagine yourself doing things in the way of a perfectly well and very strong person, until you have a fairly good conception of what you would be if you were well. Then take a mental and physical attitude in harmony with this conception; and do not depart from this attitude. You must unify yourself in thought with the thing you desire; and whatever state or condition you unify with yourself in thought will soon become unified with you in body. The scientific way is to sever relations with everything you do not want, and to enter into relations with everything you do want. Form a conception of perfect health, and relate yourself to this conception in word, act, and attitude.
Guard your speech; make every word harmonize with the conception of perfect health. Never complain; never say things like these: "I did not sleep well last night;" "I have a pain in my side;" "I do not feel at all well to-day," and so on. Say "I am looking forward to a good night's sleep to-night;" "I can see that I progress rapidly," and things of similar meaning. In so far as everything which is connected with disease is concerned, your way is to forget it; and in so far as everything which is connected with health is concerned, your way is to unify yourself with it in thought and speech.
This is the whole thing in a nutshell: make yourself one with Health in thought, word, and action; and do not connect yourself with sickness either by thought, word, or action.
Do not read "Doctor Books" or medical literature, or the literature of those whose theories conflict with those herein set forth; to do so will certainly undermine your faith in the Way of Living upon which you have entered, and cause you to again come into mental relations with disease. This book really gives you all that is required; nothing essential has been omitted, and practically all the superfluous has been eliminated. The Science of Being Well is an exact science, like arithmetic; nothing can be added to the fundamental principles, and if anything be taken from them, a failure will result. If you follow strictly the way of living prescribed in this book, you will be well; and you certainly CAN follow this way, both in thought and action.
Relate not only yourself, but so far as possible all others, in your thoughts, to perfect health. Do not sympathize with people when they complain, or even when they are sick and suffering. Turn their thoughts into a constructive channel if you can; do all you can for their relief, but do it with the health thought in your mind. Do not let people tell their woes and catalogue their symptoms to you; turn the conversation to some other subject, or excuse yourself and go. Better be considered an unfeeling person than to have the disease thought forced upon you. When you are in company of people whose conversational stock-in-trade is sickness and kindred matters, ignore what they say and fall to offering a mental prayer of gratitude for your perfect health; and if that does not enable you to shut out their thoughts, say good-by and leave them. No matter what they think or say; politeness does not require you to permit yourself to be poisoned by diseased or perverted thought. When we have a few more hundreds of thousands of enlightened thinkers who will not stay where people complain and talk sickness, the world will advance rapidly toward health. When you let people talk to you of sickness, you assist them to increase and multiply sickness.
What shall I do when I am in pain? Can one be in actual physical suffering and still think only thoughts of health?
Yes. Do not resist pain; recognize that it is a good thing. Pain is caused by an effort of the Principle of Health to overcome some unnatural condition; this you must know and feel. When you have a pain, think that a process of healing is going on in the affected part, and mentally assist and co-operate with it. Put yourself in full mental harmony with the power which is causing the pain; assist it; help it along. Do not hesitate, when necessary, to use hot fomentations and similar means to further the good work which is going on. If the pain is severe, lie down and give your mind to the work of quietly and easily co-operating with the force which is at work for your good. This is the time to exercise gratitude and faith; be thankful for the power of health which is causing the pain, and be certain that the pain will cease as soon as the good work is done. Fix your thoughts, with confidence, on the Principle of Health which is making such conditions within you that pain will soon be unnecessary. You will be surprised to find how easily you can conquer pain; and after you have lived for a time in this Scientific Way, pains and aches will be things unknown to you.
What shall I do when I am too weak for my work? Shall I drive myself beyond my strength, trusting in God to support me? Shall I go on, like the runner, expecting a "second wind"?
No;