An engineer has a technique and a process for building a bridge or an engine. Like the engineer, your mind also has a technique for governing,
controlling and directing your life. You must realize that methods and
techniques are primary.
In building the Golden Gate Bridge, the chief engineer understood mathematical principles, stresses and strains. Secondly, he had a picture of the
ideal bridge across the bay. The third step was his application of tried and
proven methods by which the principles were implemented until the
bridge took form and we drive on it. There also are techniques and methods by which your prayers are answered. If your prayer is answered,
there is a way in which it is answered and this is a scientific way. Nothing
happens by chance. This is a world of law and order. In this chapter you
will find practical techniques for the unfolding and nurture of your spiritual
life. Your prayers must not remain up in the air like a balloon. They must
go somewhere and accomplish something in your life.
When we come to analyze prayer we discover there are many different
approaches and methods. We will not consider in this book the formal, ritual prayers used in religious services. These have an important place in
group worship. We are immediately concerned with the methods of personal prayer as it is applied in your daily life and as it is used to help others.
Prayer is the formulation of an idea concerning something we wish to accomplish. Prayer is the soul’s sincere desire. Your desire is your prayer. It
comes out of your deepest needs and it reveals the things you want in
life. Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness; for they
shall be filled. That is really prayer, life’s hunger and thirst for peace, harmony, health, joy and all the other blessings of life.
This consists essentially in inducing the subconscious mind to take over
your request as handed it by the conscious mind. This passing-over is
best accomplished in the reverie-like state. Know that in your deeper
mind is infinite intelligence and Infinite Power. Just calmly think over what
you want; see it coming into fuller fruition from this moment forward. Be
like the little girl who had a very bad cough and a sore throat. She declared firmly and repeatedly: “It is passing away now. It is passing away
now.” It passed away in about an hour. Use this technique with complete
simplicity and naiveté.
If you were building a new home for yourself and your family, you know
that you would be intensely interested in regard to the blueprint for your
home; you would see to it that the builders conformed to the blueprint.
You would watch the material and select only the best wood, steel, in fact,
the best of everything. What about your mental home and your mental
blueprint for happiness and abundance? All your experiences and everything that enters into your life depend upon the nature of the mental
building blocks which you use in the construction of your mental home.
If your blueprint is full of mental patterns of fear, worry, anxiety or lack
and if you are despondent, doubtful and cynical, then the texture of the
mental material you are waving into your mind will come forth as more
toil, care, tension, anxiety and limitation of all kinds.
The most fundamental and the most far reaching activity in life is that
which you build into your mentality every waking hour. Your word is silent
and invisible; nevertheless, it is real.
You are building your mental home all the time, and your thought and
mental imagery represent your blueprint. Hour by hour, moment by moment, you can build radiant health, success and happiness by the
thoughts you think, the ideas which you harbor, the beliefs you accept
and the scenes that you rehearse in the hidden studio of your mind. This
stately mansion, upon the construction of which you are perpetually engaged, is your personality, your identity in this plane, your whole life story
on this earth.
Get a new blueprint; build silently by realizing peace, harmony, joy and
good will in the present moment. By dwelling upon these things, and
claiming them, your subconscious mind will accept your blueprint and
bring all these things to pass. By their fruits ye shall know them.
The term “science” means knowledge, which is coordinated, arranged and
systematized. Let us think of the science and art of true prayer as it deals
with the fundamental principles of life and the techniques and processes
by which they can be demonstrated in your life, as well as in the life of
every human being when he applies them faithfully. The art is your technique or process, and the science behind it is the definite response of creative mind to your mental picture or thought. Ask, and it shall be given
you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.
Matthew 7:7.
Here you are told you shall receive that for which you ask. It shall be
opened to you when you knock, and you shall find that for which you are
searching. This teaching implies the definiteness of mental and spiritual
laws. There is always a direct response from the Infinite Intelligence of your subconscious mind to your conscious thinking. If you ask for bread,
you will not receive a stone. You must ask believing, if you are to receive.
Your mind moves from the thought to the thing. Unless there is first an
image in the mind, it cannot move, for there would be nothing for it to
move toward. Your prayer, which is your mental act, must be accepted as
an image in your mind before the power from your subconscious will play
upon it and make it productive. You must reach a point of acceptance in
your mind, an unqualified and undisputed state of agreement.
This contemplation should be accompanied by a feeling of joy and restfulness in foreseeing the certain accomplishment of your desire. The sound
basis for the art and science of true prayer is your knowledge and complete confidence that the movement of your conscious mind will gain a
definite response from your subconscious mind, which is one with boundless wisdom and infinite power. By following this procedure, your prayers
will be answered.
The easiest and most obvious way to formulate an idea is to visualize it,
to see it in your mind’s eye as vividly as if it were alive. You can see with
the naked eye only what already exists in the external world; in a similar
way, that which you can visualize in your mind’s eye already exists in the
invisible realms of your mind. Any picture, which you have in your mind,
is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen.
What you form in your imagination is as real as any part of your body.
The idea and the thought are real and will one day appear in your objective world if you are faithful to your mental image.
This process of thinking forms impressions in your mind; these impressions in turn become manifested as facts and experiences in your life. The
builder visualizes the type of building he wants; he sees it as he desires it
to be completed. His imagery and thought processes become a plastic
mold from which the building will emerge – a beautiful or an ugly one, a
skyscraper or a very low one. His mental imagery is projected and is
drawn on paper. Eventually, the contractor and his workers gather the essential materials and the building progresses until it stands finished, conforming perfectly to the mental patterns of the architect.
I use the visualization technique prior to speaking from the platform. I
quiet the wheels of my mind in order that I may present to the subconscious mind my images of thought. Then, I picture the entire auditorium
and the seats filled with men and women; each one of them illumined and
inspired by the infinite healing presence. I see them as radiant, happy
and free.
Having first built up the idea in my imagination, I quietly sustain it there
as a mental picture while I imagine I hear men and women saying, “I am healed,” “I feel wonderful,” “I’ve had an instantaneous healing,” “I’m
transformed.” I keep this up for about ten minutes or more, knowing and
feeling that each person’s mind and body are saturated with love, wholeness, beauty and perfection. My awareness grows to the point where in
my mind I can actually hear the voices of the multitude proclaiming their
health and happiness; then I release the whole picture and go onto the
platform. Almost every Sunday some people stop and say that their
prayers were answered.
The Chinese say, “A picture is worth a thousand words.” William James,
the father of American psychology, stressed the fact that the subconscious
mind will bring to pass any picture held in the mind and backed by faith.
Act as though I am, and I will be.
A number of years ago I was in the Middle West lecturing in several
states, and I desired to have a permanent location in the general area
from which I could serve those who desired help. I traveled far, but the
desire did not leave my mind. One evening, while in a hotel in Spokane,
Washington, I relaxed completely on a couch, immobilized my attention,
and in a quiet, passive manner imagined that I was talking to a large audience, saying in effect, “I am glad to be here; I have prayed for the ideal
opportunity.” I saw in my mind’s eye the imaginary audience and I felt the
reality of it all. I played the role of the actor, dramatized this mental
movie, and felt satisfied that this picture was being conveyed to my subconscious mind, which would bring it to pass in its own way. The next
morning, on awakening, I felt a great sense of peace and satisfaction and
in a few days time I received a telegram asking me to take over an organization in the Midwest, which I did, and I enjoyed it immensely for several years.
The method outlined here appeals to many who have described it as “the
mental movie method.” I have received numerous letters from people who
listen to my radio talks and weekly public lectures, telling me of the wonderful results they get using this technique in the sale of their property. I
suggest to those who have homes or property for sale that they satisfy
themselves in their own mind that their price is right. Then, I claim that
the Infinite Intelligence is attracting to them the buyer who really wants
to have the property and who will love it and prosper in it. After having
done this I suggest that they quiet their mind, relax, let go and get into a
drowsy, sleepy state, which reduces all mental effort to a minimum. Then,
they are to picture the check in their hands, rejoice in the check, give
thanks for the check and go off to sleep feeling the naturalness of the
whole mental movie created in their own mind. They must act as though
it were an objective reality and the subconscious mind will take it as an
impression and through the deeper currents of the mind, the buyer and
the seller are brought together. A mental picture held in the mind, backed by faith, will come to pass.
Charles Baudoin was a professor at the Rousseau Institute in France. He
was a brilliant psychotherapist and a research director of the New Nancy
School of Healing, who in 1910 taught that the best way to impress the
subconscious mind was to enter into a drowsy, sleepy state, or a state
akin to sleep in which all effort was reduced to a minimum. Then in a quiet, passive, receptive way, by reflection, he would convey the idea to the
subconscious. The following is his formula: “A very simple way of securing
this (impregnation of the subconscious mind) is to condense the idea,
which is to be the object of suggestion, to sum it up in a brief phase,
which can be readily graven on the memory and to repeat it over and
over again as a lullaby.”
Some years ago, a young lady in Los Angeles was engaged in a prolonged
bitter family lawsuit over a will. Her husband had bequeathed his entire
estate to her, and his sons and daughters by a previous marriage were
bitterly fighting to break the will. The Baudoin technique was outlined to
her, and this is what she did. She relaxed her body in an armchair, entered into the sleepy state and, as suggested, condensed the idea of her
need into a phrase consisting of six words easily graven on the memory.
“It is finished in divine order.” The significance to her of these words
meant that Infinite Intelligence operating through the laws of her subconscious mind would bring about a harmonious adjustment through the
principle of harmony. She continued this procedure every night for about
ten nights. After she got into a sleepy state, she would affirm slowly, quietly and feelingly the statement: “It is finished in divine order,” over and
over again, feeling a sense of inner peace and an all-pervading tranquility; then she went off into her deep normal sleep. On the morning of the
eleventh day, following the use of the above technique, she awakened
with a sense of well-being, a conviction that it was finished. Her attorney
called her the same day saying that the opposing attorney and his clients
were willing to settle. A harmonious agreement was reached and litigation
was discontinued.