Page 211 - Napoleon Hill Think and Grow Rich Full Book | Success Learned

actually feeling ill.

Try this on an acquaintance if you doubt that it will make him uncomfortable,
but do not carry the experiment too far. There is a certain religious sect whose
members take vengeance upon their enemies by the "hexing" method. They call it
"placing a spell" on the victim.

There is overwhelming evidence that disease sometimes begins in the form of
negative thought impulse. Such an impulse may be passed from one mind to an-
other, by suggestion, or created by an individual in his own mind.

A man who was blessed with more wisdom than this incident might indicate,
once said "When anyone asks me how I feel, I always want to answer by knocking
him down."

Doctors send patients into new climates for their health, because a change of
"mental attitude" is necessary. The seed of fear of ill health lives in every human
mind. Worry, fear, discouragement, disappointment in love and business affairs,
cause this seed to germinate and grow. The recent business depression kept the
doctors on the run, because every form of negative thinking may cause ill health.

Disappointments in business and in love stand at the head of the list of causes
of fear of ill health. A young man suffered a disappointment in love which sent
him to a hospital. For months he hovered between life and death. A specialist
in suggestive therapeutics was called in. The specialist changed nurses, placing
him in charge of a very charming young woman who began (by pre-arrangement
with the doctor) to make love to him the first day of her arrival on the job. Within
three weeks the patient was discharged from the hospital, still suffering, but with
an entirely different malady. HE WAS IN LOVE AGAIN. The remedy was a hoax,
but the patient and the nurse were later married. Both are in good health at the
time of this writing.

SYMPTOMS OF THE FEAR OF ILL HEALTH

The symptoms of this almost universal fear are:

AUTO-SUGGESTION. The habit of negative use of self-suggestion by looking for,
and expecting to find the symptoms of all kinds of disease. "Enjoying" imaginary
illness and speaking of it as being real. The habit of trying all "fads" and "isms"
recommended by others as having therapeutic value. Talking to others of opera-
tions, accidents and other forms of illness.

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NAPOLEON HILL THINK AND GROW RICH