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CHAPTER XX

THE HYPNOIDAL STATE AND RESERVE ENERGY

            WE have pointed out that a dissociated, subconscious system reacts reflexly with an energy uncontrolled and unrestrained by other systems. Associated systems, on the other hand, control, regulate and inhibit one another, with a consequent saving of neuron energy. We have further pointed out that in a group of associated systems each component system becomes less accessible to external stimulation, as far as reaction is concerned,—it responds less readily with a discharge of energy. The external stimulus must rise above the ordinary stimulus to set the system into activity. In proportion as the complexity of the group of systems grows, the threshold to which the group reacts keeps on rising, and may, in fact, even amount to a total inhibition.

            This principle of rise of threshold and of total inhibition due to group-complexity is well illustrated by the remarkable experiments carried on in Professor Pavlow’s laboratory.

            When a stimulus is associated with that of the conditional reflex, the result is not an increase, not an indifference to, but a total inhibition of, the conditional reflex. Vasiliev, working in Pavlow’s laboratory, associated the sound of a metronome with the conditional reflex of a scratch stimulus. He finds that the process of inhibition runs in three phases for intense associated stimuli and in two phases for weak ones.

            Savadsky has modified the conclusions of the previous investigators, but he affirms the fact that an intense stimulus, an intense sound, completely annihilates the secretion due to scratch-stimulation, while a weak stimulus, a weak sound, produces a lesser effect. He finds that the external stimulus disturbs or inhibits the condition of the nerve centers, inhibits the condition which is predominant at that moment, stimulating the inhibitory stage and inhibiting the excitatory stage; in other words, inhibiting whatever process is at that moment taking place.

            The following table, showing the inhibitory influence of intense stimulations associated with the conditional reflex, may serve as an illustration. The conditional reflex is formed from a scratch-stimulus, intense whistle, or intense sound of bell as simultaneous extraneous stimulation.

            In summarizing the work of previous investigators in Pavlow’s laboratory, Orbeli says: “Vasiliev and Mishtovt have shown that any phenomenon indifferent in itself may not only become a source of a new conditional reflex, but may become a special inhibitory agent in relation to the existing conditional reflexes, it is only requisite that the phenomenon should be repeatedly associated with the conditional reflex in such cases when the latter is not reinforced, that is, when not accompanied by the unconditional reflex. If for instance, phenomenon A coincides in time with the unconditional reflex of the salivary gland, the phenomenon A becomes a source of conditional salivo-secretory reflex. If, however, in cases when A comes separately without the unconditional reflex, a new phenomenon B is associated with A, B gradually becomes a source of inhibition of the conditional reflex. The relation formed is such that J phenomenon by itself calls out a secretion of saliva, while in association with B does not call out any saliva; that is, B inhibits the action of A. That phenomenon is termed in Pavlow’s laboratory “conditional inhibition.” B is the conditional inhibition in relation to the conditional reflex on A. This quality of the nervous system to work out special cases of inhibition makes the conditional reflexes an extremely delicate and perfect index of reactions of the organism to its external environment. The animal reacts only to those phenomena which really coincide with that or other specific stimulation and serve as signals of the latter. When, however, an extraneous stimulus becomes associated, a stimulus which serves as a signal of unreality of the nervous phenomenon, the reaction becomes arrested and the organism thus rids itself of fruitless labor.”

            On the strength of his own experiments performed on the visual reflexes of the dog, Orbeli comes to the same conclusion with Vasiliev and Mishtovt, Babkin and Savadski, “that every phenomenon which coincides with the conditional reflexes in all cases when the latter is not accompanied with the unconditional reflex becomes an inhibition in relation to that same conditional reflex.”

            Similarly, in the experiments now carried on in my laboratory, I find that when a galvanic deflection is brought about by a specific stimulation of painful character, the co-existence of another stimulation is apt to decrease the magnitude of the galvanic reflex.

            The more numerous the components of a system become, the more the given group of systems grows in complexity, the longer becomes its latent period of stimulation, the higher rises its threshold, the greater, we may say, is the inhibition of its activity. We may say that the inertia of a group increases with its mass. To set into activity a complex system, a greater stimulus is requisite than the one necessary to set into function any of the individual components. The minimum threshold of the system must at least be the maximum threshold of one of its constituents. As Sherrington puts it: “Yet it is also clear that the threshold for any whole arc cannot be lower than the highest individual threshold in it. Similarly, an additive influence of the threshold will make the reflex chain, consisting of several neurons, offer caeteris paribus higher resistance than a chain of fewer neurons. It is in accord with the rule that the reflex chain which conducts to parts segmentally distant requires generally intenser stimulation to excite them than do merely local arcs.”

            All other conditions remaining the same, the arousal of a complex system requires also an increase of time. The higher and more complex the nervous and mental processes are, the greater are their reaction times. With the complexity of the group of associated systems belonging physiologically to different and distant parts of the cerebral system, the initial stimulation or stimulus-threshold becomes greater and the time of stimulation or latent period becomes longer. In other words, the threshold of the group rises with the increase of associative components belonging to different spheres of sensory regions with their concomitant presentative and representative elements, forming the synthesis of the organized group.

            A great number of associations are formed in the course of life-adjustments, with the result that the thresholds of some or even of many systems may become inaccessible to the ordinary stimuli of the customary environment. The life reactions of the individual may thus become limited and narrowed down to a contracted sphere of activity in response to a limited number of stimulations. Consciousness and life interests become narrowed, contracted, giving rise to various forms of psychopathic dissociations and affections with their anaesthesias, motor paralyses and abulias, with their inhibitions of functions of various systems in the domain of sensation, emotion, intellect, and will.

            This rise of threshold, and the concomitant, systemic, mental paralysis with its consequent limitation of response and reaction to the external environment, should, however, be regarded as forming but one side of the psychopathic affections. The inaccessible regions lie fallow and await the favorable moment for the manifestation of their riches and fertility. The inactive systems, being in their resting, anabolic stage, become surcharged with latent energy awaiting the appropriate stimulus effectual in the liberation of the dormant energy. This subconscious, dormant, reserve energy is of the utmost consequence to the individual in the critical moments of his struggle for life. In the struggle for life such a surplus of energy is a great advantage to the organism. Those organisms have a better chance for survival that have laid by for a rainy day; the chance of survival becomes greater as the stored-up energy is greater. This principle of reserve energy was set forth by Professor James and also by me in my various works.

            The late Charles S. Minot, the great American histologist, points out from another standpoint, this reserve energy present in the organism, a reserve energy of growth called forth under special emergencies of life.

            “How many of you have thought what the lesson of the skin is in regard to the power of growth? Spring is coming; we shall soon be taking to our boats, rowing or canoeing, and the first day we do so, doubtless, we shall have blisters upon our hands, and the outer part of the skin, raised by the blister, will probably fall off and be lost altogether. The softer, underlying skin will be exposed, will be sensitive and uncomfortable for a while, but soon the cells behind the surface will assume a horny character, the cells underneath will grow and multiply, and presently the wound will be healed over. Did you ever stop to think that that means there is a reserve power of growth in the skin all the time, always ready to act, to come forward, waiting only for the chance, and that there is besides something which keeps it in, which holds it back, which stops it? We call this stopping physiological function—inhibition.”

            By a striking series of instructive facts, Dr. Meltzer points out that “all organs of the body are built on the plan of superabundance of structure and energy.” Like Minot, Meltzer refers to the significant fact that most of our active organs possess a great surplus of functioning cells. This surplus is requisite for the safety of the individual.

            The principle of reserve energy is of the utmost importance to abnormal psychology. The principle is based on a broad generalization of facts,—psychological, physiological and biological,—namely, that far less energy is utilized by the individual than there is actually at his disposal. A comparatively small fraction of the total amount of energy, possessed by the organism, is used in its relation with the ordinary stimuli of its environment.

            The energy in use may be regarded as the kinetic or circulating energy, while the energy stored away is the reserve energy. There must always be a reserve supply of energy requisite for unusual reactions in emergency cases. Those organisms survive which have the greatest amount of reserve energy, just as those countries are strong and victorious in the world-market which possess the largest amount of reserve capital to draw upon in critical periods.

            As life becomes more complex, inhibitions increase; the thresholds of stimulations of a complex system rise in proportion to its complexity. With the rise of evolution there is a tendency to increase of inhibitions, with a consequent lock-up of energy which becomes reserve. Now there are occasions in the life of the individual, under the influence of training and emotional trauma, when the inhibitions become unusually intense and tend to smother the personality, which becomes weakened, impoverished in its reactions and is unable to respond freely to the stimuli of its environment. The inhibited system becomes inactive and may be regarded as dissociated from the cycle of life.

            In case of an emotional trauma there is often a breach in the continuity of association. The affected system becomes dissociated from the rest of the personality and is like a splinter in the flesh of the individuality. Its own threshold, when tapped, may be very low, but it is not directly accessible through the mediacy of other systems; hence its threshold appears unusually or pathologically high. When the inhibitions are very high they must be removed. This removal of inhibitions brings about an access to the accumulated energy of the inhibited systems. In case of disjunction or break of continuity we must stimulate the dormant reserve, energy of the systems, and thus assist the process of repair and bridge the breach of associative continuity. A new, fresh, active life opens to the patient. He becomes a “reformed” personality, free and cheerful, with an over-flow of energy.

            The hypnoidal state is essentially a rest-state characterized by anabolic activity. There is a restitution of spent energy; inhibitions become removed, and access is gained to “dormant” systems or complexes. The awakened “dormant” complex systems bring with them a new feeling-tone, a fresh emotional energy resulting in an almost complete transformation of personality.

            As an illustration of the transformation effected, I cake at random the following extracts from some of the letters written to me by patients who have experienced this welling up of reserve energy: “Indeed, were I to fill this entire sheet with expressions of the gratitude which wells up from my inmost heart it would be only a beginning of what I feel. Surely the darkness of the world has been dispelled since this new light has illuminated my soul, and I feel that this wondrous light will never fail me. It were vain to attempt to thank you for this wonderful transformation.”

            A letter from a patient reads: “You will be glad to know that all is well with me. Life is one happy day. I am a marvel to my friends in the way of happiness and cheer. I have to confess that I feel almost wicked to be so happy.”

            Another letter runs as follows: “Next to the gladness in my own restoration, I am rejoiced at the wonderful transformation that has come to my dear friend T. from your treatment. She writes me most enthusiastically of her steady and sure progress toward the goal of perfect health, of her strength to take up the home duties which had been so burdensome and which she now finds a delight in the doing of them; and of her husband’s and friends’ joy in the transformation that has been wrought in her.”

            The following extract from a letter, written to me by a patient, an experienced English surgeon, whose case was severe and chronic, dating from early childhood, is extremely valuable, both on account of his medical training and mental abilities which make him an excellent judge as to the fundamental change and cure effected:

            “It is now exactly two years since I was undergoing treatment at your kindly and sympathetic hands. I remember that you once told me that the seed sown by you would probably take this length of time to come to full fruition. Therefore, it may not be without interest to you to receive a supplement to many other letters in which I will endeavor to summarise my progress,—for the last time.

            “I have no longer even the least lingering doubt that you can count me among your most brilliantly successful cures. I say this after many,—too many heart searchings which are probably characteristic of my somewhat doubting temperament. At first, I was disappointed with the whole business: I suppose I looked for strange and dramatic events to occur which would change my whole personality and temperament in a short time. Nothing so exciting happened: I left Portsmouth still feeling that I owned the same name, and very much the same ‘ego’ that I arrived with. I was unaware that any profound psychological operation had taken place. To be candid, I did not think it had,—the beginnings, no doubt, were there,—but no more. But now when I carry my mind back to the type of obsession which used to assail me—Is there any change? Good God! I behold a miracle, although it has come about so silently that I can only realize the difference by comparing the present with the past.

            “In conclusion I can only send you my undying and inexpressible gratitude . . . You have saved me from what, I honestly believe, would have one day resulted in deliberate suicide which I often contemplated as the one solution for my trouble. . . ."

            These extracts are typical of many others, and clearly show the enjoyment of new strength and powers until now unknown to the patient. Fresh reservoirs of reserve energy have been tapped and have become available in an hour of dire need. The patient has light and strength where there were darkness and depression. We are confronted here with the important phenomenon of liberation of dormant, reserve energy. The patient feels the flood of fresh energies as a “marvelous transformation,” as a “new light,” as a “new life,” as a something “worth far more than life itself.”

            The hypnoidal state helps us to reach the inaccessible regions of dormant, reserve energy, helps to break down inhibitions, to liberate reserve energies and to repair the breaches of mental life. The painful systems become dissociated, disintegrated and again transformed, reformed, and redintegrated into new systems full of energy and joy of life. The whole process is one of disintegration and reintegration with the awakening of dormant, reserve energy.

            The essential condition of the psychopathic, of the neurasthenic, or the psychoasthenic, of all the various forms of recurrent mental states, is just that need of putting forth energy in response to claims of life, in response to stimuli from the external environment. The creditors’ claims cannot be satisfied and the individual goes into insolvency, in spite of the riches of which he is the owner, but not the master. He starves in the midst of locked-up plenty of which he is the rightful possessor. In other words, psychopathic patients cannot use their reserve energy at the critical moments of life. Excluded, by an uncontrollable and intensifying fear instinct, from the enjoyment of what Aristotle and the ancient Greeks regarded as the real happiness of man namely, “the energy of exercising the soul according to reason,” excluded from the enjoyment of self-activity and from the normal exercise of powers and functions of the organism as a whole, the patient resorts to sex, drink, drugs and other stimulations which may temporarily arouse him, calling forth fresh reserves of the ebbing, vital energy. Such stimulations by the pathological processes which they bring about further intensify the self-impulse, increasing the terrors of the fear instinct, finally resulting in complete exhaustion and prostration, with all the accompanying psychopathic symptoms. Closed against the voluntary control of the psychopathic individual, the energy, the systems, dissociated by the great rise of thresholds, can be awakened to spontaneous activity by some accidentally occurring, appropriate stimulation. We find, therefore, in psychopathics a diminution, a loss, an inhibition of voluntary activity and a concomitant intensification of automatic reactions. Psychopathic states are characterized by paresis or paralysis of will and by predominance of automatism, by recurrent mental-states, or by recurrent psycho-physiological processes characteristic of the psycho-biological types of recurrent moments consciousness.¹

            We find in psychopathic states a weakening or even paralysis of the higher voluntary functions and an overaction of the lower automatic functions. The weakening or paralysis of the higher psychic functions in psychopathic states is not due to deterioration, but to dissociation, to the rise of thresholds and to the lock-up of surplus reserve energy.

            The value of the hypnoidal state for the treatment of psychopathic affections is in the lowering of the high thresholds, and in the formation of associations with utilization of accumulated stored-up energy requisite for the restoration of the higher psychic functions, for the exercise of the voluntary and personal control over the dissociated, automatically or subconsciously functioning groups of systems. The hypnoidal state is essentially a primitive rest-state and has been utilized almost from the very origin of animal life for the repair and restoration of worn-out organs and impaired functions. Unlike the waking state, the hypnoidal state does not present any special adaptations to the external environment. The only use of the hypnoidal state is repair of impaired functions and utilization of fresh energies. We can still use the hypnoidal state for the same purpose.

            The rigidity of group associations, requisite in the struggle for existence, gives way in the hypnoidal state. In the subwaking state there is a reduction, a redistribution and fall of thresholds, with a consequent potential reformation and recombination of systems into new groups and aggregates. The hypnoidal states may be taken to represent an indifferent or neutral, mental, psycho-physiological equilibrium. We can utilize this primitive state to bring about a more favorable change in the disturbed equilbrium of the narrowed, dissociated, impoverished, enfeebled and full of automatism, degraded, waking life.

            The overacting dissociated systems with their automatic reflex reactions may form associations with other systems, and thus become inhibited as well as controlled in their function by the voluntary activity of personal consciousness, while the inhibited systems with their raised thresholds and accumulated reserve energy are set into function. It is, therefore, possible to bring about a greater vigor of personal activity, a more efficient control of reactions to stimulations, a better adjustment of the organism to the conditions of its environment. It is by means of such readjustment of disturbed psycho-physiological reactions that psychopathic affections are restored to normal functioning, and thus get cured in the subconscious, subwaking, hypnoidal state.

            The pathology of psychopathic maladies is essentially a morbid state of the impulse of self-preservation with its accompanying fear instinct. We cannot help agreeing with Mosso that “fear is a disease to be cured.” Psychopathic maladies are curable and preventable. The practical aim of Psychopathology is the complete eradication and prevention of psychopathic diseases.

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¹ See The Foundations, Part II, Chapter II.

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