Hypnotic Scripts


Asthma

Now, for years you've been stricken with a disease which you have labeled
asthma. The interesting part about asthma is that asthma really is not a
disease at all; asthma is merely the symptom. Asthma is caused by the
constriction of the bronchi and this is in turn caused by little messages
that are sent from the subconscious mind from the thalamus area of the
brain down to the muscles the surround the bronchi and they tell the
muscles to constrict. The muscles constrict, the bronchi constrict and the
bronchial's constrict and the individual has difficulty breathing out.
Usually, a person with a symptom of asthma can breathe in, but when they
breathe out they wheeze, they make a noise. This noise was called, or
named by Freud as a cry for help. It represents the time in an
individual's life in which they were very, very frightened, so frightened
they don't want to remember that incident at all. They cried out for help,
they thought that they were really going to die or something terrible was
going to happen and they cried out for help and nobody came. Well, they
lived through the incident all right, but in the process, they repressed
into the deepest part of their subconscious mind this incident, this
incident where there was a cry for help. Sometimes, this happens in an
operation; sometimes it happens at the time of war. It can happen almost
anytime, but it's generally a time where the individual feels very, very
threatened, very, very threatened. They cry for help and none is answering
the cry. And so they keep right on crying for help by wheezing because the
wheeze in merely a symptom of the underlying problems still deeply
implanted in the subconscious mind. Therefore, still giving rise, still
giving rise to nervous energy that goes down the nerves to the muscles and
keeps the bronchi and bronchial's constricted. Now, there is still another
reason for this cry for help because this cry for help is reassuring to
the patient, even though no help has come, and if nothing else, it does
remind the patient of one thing, that is, that the patient is still alive.
After all, if he can hear himself breathe, he knows he's breathing and he
knows he's alive.


It has still a third function. That third function is this: It punishes
the patient so that if the patient feels guilty in any way about the
incident that happened, it served as a means of self-punishment. And so,
therefore, we have three things that the asthmatic wheeze does do for the
patient. It summons help in a situation where help seems to be desperately
needed; it reassures the patient that he is still breathing because he can
hear himself breathe, and it punishes the patient in case the patient has
guilt feelings about the situation. Now one or more applies to you. Only
the deepest part of your subconscious knows exactly how much each of these
reasons applies to you for you have repressed into that subconscious mind
this particular incident.


But you're going to get rid of asthma completely and we're going to see it
that you do because we're going to eliminate the need for these three
things. First of all, you don't need to punish yourself anymore. Whatever
you felt you may have done, caused a divorce, killed somebody, maybe you
just wished somebody would die and they did, whatever you did, it's
fantasy, but regardless of that, whenever you feel guilty, you certainly
don't need asthma any more to punish yourself because you really don't
need those feelings in the first place. It's God's domain to punish us if
He thinks we need it and He'll handle it, and when we try to take it over
then what we really are doing is interfering with God's work.


Now, secondly, regardless of when you may have thought you did or that you
were going to die or that you were very, very sick or that something
happened which frightened you completely, you are breathing all right now,
and you're going to breathe better and better and better and you don't
have to hear yourself breathe in order to know that you re still
breathing. No longer do you need to listen to that to know that you re
still breathing. You are still breathing and that's all there is to it.


Now, thirdly, the cry for help itself, regardless of how severe that
incident may have seemed to you at the time, regardless of how severe that
incident may have seemed to you at that moment, that moment was yesterday.
It's gone. You're not in danger now. The danger is over and you don't need
to cry for help anymore. And so, your reasons, your needs to wheeze, your
needs to utilize the symptom of asthma is rapidly disappearing so that
very soon you re going to dilate those bronchi and bronchial's, you're
going to relax and let them open up w-i-d-e, very w-i-d-e and breathe
deeply, all the way in and all the way out. Breathe all the way in, feel
your lungs open up and fill with air better than you ever have before as
you let all the air out easily and comfortably and all the muscles
surrounding the bronchi and bronchial's and lungs. Let go, and let
yourself relax completely and with certainty. And you breathe deeper and
deeper, on and on, one breath after the next, more and more comfortably
with every moment that passes, reassuring yourself that already the asthma
is leaving you, being replaced by confidence, great breathing, more and
more normal with every day that passes.


Now, I want you to sink into a very deep and relaxing sleep and breathe
deeply for the next few moments, allowing this feeling of being free, free
from tension, nervousness and asthma, allowing that feeling of freedom to
circulate throughout your entire mind and body, making you sound in mind,
sound in body, sound in spirit and sound in health and I'm going to give
you those few moments of silence ... begin ... now ...