Book Report: Science of Breath by Yogi Ramacharaka (William Walker Atkinson) (C) 1904

 Background Information: The Publisher, The Yogi Publication Society is a press started by William Walker Atkinson at the turn of the 20tdh century to promote his writings on "New Thought," which was the New Age movement of the time. Atkinson himself was quite a character. He was a prolific writer, with over 150 books to his credit, often under any of several pen names. He rose to prominence at the beginning of the 20th century, but seems to have become forgotten in the following decades, though he and the Yogi Publication books are experiencing a new renaissance at the beginning of the 21 century.
Many of the books were written by Atkinson, but they also published other prominent metaphysical works by other authors. The company has changed hands a number of times, so many that the original history was lost to the current owners, but the books are still in print, and still inspiring spiritual seekers.
The author of this book, Yogi Ramacharaka, was one of William Walker Atkinson's many pen names.

This little book (88 pages) is a classic! Despite being over 100 years old, the breathing exercises it offers are easy to practice and very practical. Beginning at the beginning, it thoroughly discusses the western concept of breath and the Eastern concept and why they're important. Of course there's a discussion of Prana, the Hindu word for the metaphysical energy (AKA Chi, or Ki) that is cultivated both through breath and also through meditation, All these chapters are concise and short and they're followed by both basic and additional exercises.
Specifically, you'll discover the Complete Yogi Breath, The Seven Yogi Developing Exercises, Seven Minor Yogi Exercises, Vibrational Breathing, and some other things you can practice as well. There are techniques to use breath and imagery to empower your meditation, health and visualization. 

No New Thought book would be complete without some psychic phenomena exercises and this book includes those as well, so if you want some basic practiced in Thought Projection, Psychic Healing, Charging your Aura and discovering your higher self, that's included too.

Breathing practice is often taught as part of Yoga or Meditation teaching, but it can be practiced all by itself to improve your health and concentration. The book is over 100 years old, so it's no longer protected by copyright. As such, there are a lot of versions available published by a lot of different sources, from the blue hardcover published by Yogi Publication Society, to various paperback versions and even downloadable PDFs that can be found on line. It's well worth a read, and a practical addition to anyone's metaphysical or physical culture book collection.

Book Report: Secret Mental Power: Miracle of Mind Magic by Frank Rudolph Young (c)1973

Secret Mental Power: Miracle of Mind Magic by Frank Rudolph Young (c)1973

Background Information: Frank Rudolph Young ("F.R.Y.") is a bit of a cult figure, an author who wrote a number of books on health practices, psychic powers and self-development. Many were published in hardcover by Parker Publishing. What distinguishes Young's books stylistically is the hyperbole. He must have been a naturally intense individual and he really tries to impart that, while presenting his material as mysterious and exotic. It makes the books a lot of fun to read!
Trying to find reliable biographical material is a bit difficult, partially since he seems to have presented several different stories about himself. The Legend is that he and his other family members traveled the world, ferreting out mystical secrets of longevity and occult powers.
According to some diligent researchers on the internet, he was born in Panama in 1911 and lived in Chicago (Chicago was a major center of the "New Thought" movement). He may have been a dentist, a chiropractor, and a body builder. From his published works it's safe to assume he was an avid yoga practitioner, at least.
You can find much more research here: https://history.stackexchange.com/questions/64281/what-biographical-information-do-we-know-about-author-frank-rudolph-young

The kind of "magic" the author discusses in this book are powerful, practical, mental habits of reasoning, decision making, projecting confidence, making friends, pain control, improving one's health, and so forth. Each skill gets at least a chapter of it's own, with a lively discussion, clearly defined how-to instructions and further hints and a few "testimonial" type stories. He writes with incredible enthusiasm and encouragement as you'd expect from a pop-psychology book of the 60s.

His approach to achieving success lies in combining logical methodologies with a powerful emotional intensity, and you'll find variations of this idea in all of his books, and he usually has a specific exercise to develop it and a specific bit of hyperbolic terminology. In this book he calls the practice of developing the required intensity the Miracle Mind Magic Stimulator, which consists of visualizing your goal with increasing detail to the point of being "savagely real." The subsequent exercises for decision making, confidence, making friends and so forth mostly all employ the Miracle Mind Magic Stimulator in some way. (in other books of his, you'll find the same or similar techniques with different names).

One of the interesting principles of this book are what he considers the use of the conscious mind to make the changes you want to, rather than the subconscious because he feels you're more resent and able to make needed decisions. I suppose this puts him more in the camp of the New Thoughtists who felt one could overcome all obstacles with will power.

Despite the over-the-top style, it's really a very practical book for improving emotional self control, achieving goals, dealing with others and more. Not all of it may be the best or most current approach, but he puts forth a workable approach. And I've noticed that somebody must be making good use of FRY's books. He seems to have a growing fan base on line, and while I used to be able to pick up his hardcovers for about 6 bucks, some of them are now going for ten times that.

Book Report: The Practice of Auto Suggestion by C. Harry Brooks (C) 1922

The Practice of Auto Suggestion by C. Harry Brooks (C) 1922

Background information: Taken from the foreword of the book written by Emil Coué:
"The materials for this little book were collected by Mr. Brooks during a visit he paid me in the summer of 1921. He was, I think, the first Englishman to come to Nancy with the express purpose of studying my method of conscious autosuggestion. In the course of daily visits extending over some weeks, by attending my consultations, and by private conversations with myself, he obtained a full mastery of the method, and we threshed out a good deal of the theory on which it rests.

The results of this study are contained in the following pages. Mr. Brooks has skilfully seized on the essentials and put them forward in a manner that seems to me both simple and clear. The instructions given are amply sufficient to enable anyone to practise autosuggestion for him or herself, without seeking the help of any other person." 

This book is a bigger, deeper dive into the famous methodology of Emil Coué's practice of autosuggestion. At the turn of the 20th century, Emil Coué, a medical practitioner and adherent of the Nancy school of hypnosis became famous for his use of affirmations to help his clients achieve the changes they wanted in their health. to his credit, Coué, had a very deep understanding of the psychology that motivates people, and developed a very workable method of using affirmations, that was claimed to have had great success with hundreds of people.
(See Coué's booklet here: https://successworkhypnosis.blogspot.com/2021/10/book-report-self-mastery-through.html)

Brooks seems to have had great faith in Coué's methods, and this book attempts to capture as much of the science of auto-suggestion as he could, even describing an average day at the clinic. He includes more techniques and applications including pain management, healing of physical issues, using affirmations with children and more. 

As with Coué's writings, there's a strong emphasis on NOT using will power, but instead, guiding the imagination to the desired goal. As brooks says, "Autosuggestion succeeds by avoiding conflict. 'Resist not evil, but overcome it with good.'" 

There are more psychological discussion about the ways suggestions, imagination, will power and the subconscious interact, and the techniques to best utilize them. 

Interestingly, Brooks compares Coué's approach to that of Charles Baudoin, a well known psychological researcher of the period who was also strongly interested in the curative powers of affirmations for his psychiatric patients, but had a different, more forceful approach. (I have not yet read anything by Baudoin, but apparently he had a lot of unique insights into psychology). 

For hypnotists, fans of affirmations and auto-suggestions and people interested in making persuasive suggestions, this will offer more great insights into making those suggestions work.

Interestingly, this books seems to be extensively available on the web in various downloadable forms on the web, possibly more than any of the other books I've reported on.