The Roanoke daily times. (Roanoke, Va.) 1895-1897, 1896-10-15
POLLING INSOMNIA.
Some Schemes Which May Work When
Others Fail.

~
| summer hotel one evening during the last
| week. 81 have also tried another recipe
given in the Boston Transcript. Both
are good, and in majority of cases, per-
haps, either would prov defective. But
sometimes they will fail, as 1 have dis
| covered by personal experience. To meet
such stubborn cases of sleeplessness
have II suggestion Of my own to offer
| which, when carried out in connection
with either of these recipes, or, .better
still, both of them combined. will cure
the most aggravated case of sleepless.
ness.
1.-The Tribune's method was, in brief.
to treat the brain as if it were roll top
desk In IL majority of cases sleepless-
ness is due to the abnormal activity of
the brain. After you 90 to bed you be-
gin to speculate over Smiths ability to
pay you his note when it falls due, or
your own solvency when your paper held
by Brown natures. From abstract
speculation you speedily pass to nervous
worry, not only in regard to Smith and
Brown, but in regard to the business of
the day, and the things that may or may
not happen tomorrow. The more you
think the more fevcrish and wakeful you
become, and the result Is you get no rest
full sleep, but rise the next morning more
worried mentally and physically than
when you went to bed.
"Now, the remedy for this suggestion
in the Tribune was simply to stop think.
ing. Whenever thought darts out of
the brain throw it back and close the lid
on it, SO to speak OF course it will try
to get out again, but it must be put back
again promptly. BY thus refusing to en-
terrain any thought for half an hour,
you will be able to sleep AS said,
have tried this remedy, and it has
worked-sometimes But it is often inn
possible not to think. The very attempt
not t" think becomes IL prolific subject oe
thought, and induces the very nervous
unrest you are striving to overcome.
The Boston transcripts remedy is
really taken from DR.. Calls book on
Power Through Reposc. 1t is based on
the same principle of inducing sleep by
the suspension of mental ractivity. But
it aims to bring about this result by re-
laNing the physical tension of the body
Most people whose minds are very active
during the day are unconsciously keyed
up to II high physical tension. And when
they got bed it doesn't occur to them to
relax that tension. Every muscle is as
tight as drum and is throbbing with
activity. and while that is the case il q
impossible to sleep, even if you should
cease to think altogether. So the Tran
SCIlpJ = IL us IOllOWS:
begin at your toes to relax: loosen all
your joints and muscles, unbind YOUR
fingers, shake your wrists loose, take the
cure and strain out of your neck; go all
to pieces, in fact, and see how the days
fatigue seems to slip off from YOU, and
the gentle mantle of rest and oblivion to
Unfold you like IA garment.
81 have tried this method and found it
effective. But it won't work unless YOU
can batter down the hatchways of your
brain SO that worrying thoughts will not
pop out. And here is where my1susgcs-
ton comes in. Generally speaking, YOU
must think about something The brain
is not absolutely ut rest even when YOU
are asleep. Very well. The thing to do
then is to initiate as far as possible the
unconscious thinking of Sleep and the
first thing you know you won't know
anything, for you will be asleep. That
is my method, and it works like charm.
First of all relax my muscles so that.I
am in absolute physical rest, and then
instead of thinking of things in my life
which have the power to worry me,
conjure up impossible, weird and dreamy
situations, to think about which induces
| no worry or anxiety and in n few minutes
am peacefully slumbering
"Thus far | have rung the changes on
two recipes which have been prolific in
| restful sleep-inducing trains of thought.
But anyone who has the least imagna-
ton can conjure up dozens of such ideal
worlds. Sometimes when | 90 to bed and
| become conscious that / am going to be
, harrassed by thoughts relating to bust
ness, suppose myself to be in receipt of
an income of $4,000 or $50, 600 per day.
which | inherited on condition that |
should spend it all each day Nonsense
| cal, you say? OF course it is, but that
| is just its merit. 1t is so utterly impossi-
bic and unreal that | can't get anxious
over it,while at the same time there is an
| intellectual rest and humorous situations
| that would arise out of such state of
affairs. For instance, the other night I
imagined myself at 11:30 O'Clock with
| $4,000 of my daily income still unspent
and no available way of spending it. If
did not get rid of it by 12 O'Clock I
would lose my fortune, and so started
to devise some way of spending $4,000
in half an hour. don't know how I
finally did it, for in the effort I promptly
| fell into dreamless slecep.
My other method is to imagine that I
nave discovered new law of matter
which would enable me to TRANSPORT
myself bodily from New York to London
IN ten or fifteen minutes let myself
think of the surprises that the exercise
OF such power would occasion when, for
| instance, I..would visit the London cor
respondent of the Tribune some day and
| give MN copy of that days issue of the
tribune. You can realize at once the I'M
| bounded possibilities of such a line of
Thought haven't yet began to exhaust
them, for | always 90 to sleep before l
have elaborated any one situation.
There may be some people so satur