of health and makes an effort of the will to impress it on the
Unconscious. This effort restores him to full wakefulness and so
evokes the customary association--disease. Consequently, he finds
himself contemplating the exact opposite of what he desired. He
summons his will again and recalls the healthful thought, but since he
is now wider awake than ever, association is even more rapid and
powerful than before. The disease-thought is now in full possession of
his mind and all the efforts of his will fail to dislodge it. Indeed
the harder he struggles the more fully the evil thought possesses him.

This gives us a glimpse of the new and startling discovery to which
Coue's uniform success is due; namely, that when the will is in
conflict with an idea, the idea invariably gains the day. This is
true, of course, not only of Induced Autosuggestion, but also of the
spontaneous suggestions which occur in daily life. A few examples will
make this clear.

Most of us know how, when we have some difficult duty to perform, a
chance word of discouragement will dwell in the mind, eating away our
self-confidence and attuning our minds to failure. All the efforts of
our will fail to throw it off; indeed, the more we struggle against it
the more we become obsessed with it.

Very similar to this is the state of mind of the person suffering from
stage-fright. He is obsessed with ideas of failure and all the efforts
of his will are powerless to overcome them. Indeed, it is the state of
effort and tension which makes his discomfiture so complete.

Sport offers many examples of the working of this law.

A tennis-player is engaged to play in an important match. He wishes,
of course, to win, but fears that he will lose. Even before the day of
the game his fears begin to realise themselves. He is nervy and "out
of sorts." In fact, the Unconscious is creating the conditions best
suited to realise the thought in his mind--failure. When the game
begins his skill seems to have deserted him. He summons the resources
of his will and tries to compel himself to play well, straining every
nerve to recapture the old dexterity. But all his efforts only make
him play worse and worse. The harder he tries the more signally he
fails. The energy he calls up obeys not his will but the idea in his
mind, not the desire to win but the dominant thought of failure.

The fatal attraction of the bunker for the nervous golfer is due to the
sa