The Sedalia weekly bazoo. [volume] (Sedalia, Mo.) 187?-1904, 1889-01-29
HOW TO iizUUCE SLEEP.
Sieep-Pursuing Efforts That Are Usually
Crowned With Success.

Crowned With Success.
Although the circumstances under
which sleep refuses 10 be wooed differ,
and the method which succeeds when
one first wakens from sleep may not
be successful when one has become
wide awake, still the science Of NOR
phetics is so well developed That We
now need TO make much classification.
OF course writer's do not stop TO dis
cuss the familiar methods. such as
common counting and repeating Of
poetry. The trouble with this is that
it car be done with so much ease. with
such Inconsistencies of effort that it
does not sufficiently occupy the mind
and withdraw it from the disturbing
currents of serious thought that will
persist in coming when one most wishes
to drive them away One can keep re-
peating a familiar hymn, or can count
a hundred with SO little effort that it
hardly interrupts or interferes with
the persistent worries of the day or
the cares Of society or business. Be
him forget his counting.
But let the unfortunate man try a
variation of his usual method which
will compel him to give all his atten-
suing effort. Instead OF counting
straight on let him frequently inter-
rupt it by something that requires
constant attention. For example,
whenever the Secen comes, OF any
multiple Of screen, let him repeat some
selected word, like independent"
Then Seren, fourteen, Serehteen. tsCenty-
screen, serenity. will all be ''independ-
ent," or. if you please. "one independ-
ent." 1.-TWO independent" ''independ-
ent-teen," etc. IL one makes a mistake,
and neglects the substitution, let him
begin all over again. Under this
nothing else. and more than one per-
son has found this method of great
service against insomnia.
Another method which others have
rents of thought which one has when
asleep; that is. to start his
dream before he falls asleep.
If one wakes with an unfinished
dream in his mind let him try to go to
sleep again by catching up the thread
of the dream and dwelling ON it. Say
ing the dream over 10 one self again
and again would put one into the con-
duced. Or, one may even more DELHI
erately and formally make his dreams
his somnolent servant by choosing
some dream that l. Il favorite with
him. which he often repeats in sleep,
and start it agOing when he finds it
difficult TO compose his mind TO slum-
Der. One writer mentions favorite
dream of his, which was at first of
a nightmare sort, and which used to
waken him. bat which he has got now
to understand 50 well that IL scarcely
disturbs him. and which he uses to put
him to sleep, very much as the ashes
of an extinct volcano fertiiize the vine
yards on the mountain side.
The theory in either case Is substan-
tally the same. 10 occupy the mind
with something foreign tO the cares of
the waking hours, something sufficient
to occupy it. either with the thoughts
of sleep, as distinct from those OF the
waking hours. or with a monotony Of
real effort which shuts out the ankle
ties of the day. The advantage would
seem to be with a method OF the sort
used in the modified counting. because
the other method cuitivates dreams.
1t is the beau ideal Of sleep to sleep
without remembering any dreams. Ii
one thinks of his dreams. or tells his
dreams, he will always have dreams to
tell. When he ceases TO think of his
dreams after he awakes he will often
cease to dream. Certainly any method
which depends on cuitivating dreams
must have an inherent disadvantage,
because il depends upon and produces
one of the chief disturbances of sleep.
n. Y. Independent.