Maxwell Maltz - Psycho-Cybernetics

PSYCHO-

CYBERNETICS,

A New Way to Get More

Living Out of Life

BY

MAXWELL

MALTZ, M.D.,F.I.C.S.

FOREWORD:

The Secret of Using This Book to Change Your Life 1. The Self Image-Your Key to a Better Life 2. Discovering the Success Mechanism Within You 3. ImaginationThe First Key to Your Success Mechanism

4. Dehypnotize Yourself from False Beliefs 5. How to Utilize the Power of Rational Thinking 6. Relax and Let Your Success Mechanism Work for You

7. You Can Acquire the Habit of Happiness 8. Ingredients of the Success-Type Personality and How to Acquire Them 9. The Failure MechanismHow to Make it Work for You, Instead of Against You 10. How to Remove Emotional Scars and Give Yourself "An Emotional Face Lift"

11. How to Unlock Your Real Personality 12. Do-It-Yourself Tranquilizers That Bring Peace of Mind

13. How to Turn a Crisis into a Creative Opportunity 14. How to Get "That Winning Feeling"

15. More Years of Life and More Life in Your Years

"Dr. Maltz's discovery

of Psycho-Cybernetics

is an important and valuable

contribution to man's knowledge

of himself and to his ability

to improve himself,"

LEWIS GRUBER,

Chairman of the Board,

P. Lorillard & Co.

THE AUTHOR

Dr. Maxwell Maltz, M.D., F.I.C.S., received his baccalaureate in science from Columbia University and his doctorate in medicine at its College of Physicians and Surgeons. One of the world's most widely known and highly regarded plastic surgeons, he lectured at the University of Amsterdam, the University of Paris, and the University of Rome. He was Professor of Plastic Surgery at the University of Nicaragua and the University of El Sal-vador. He died in 1975. One of his many books includes The Magic of Believing, also available as a POCKET BOOK edition.

Books by Maxwell Maltz Creative Living for Today The Magic Power of Self-image Psychology Psycho-Cybernetics

Psycho-Cybernetic Principles for Creative Living Thoughts to Live By

Published by POCKET BOOKS

PSYCHO-

CYBERNETICS

by

Maxwell Maltz

M.D., F.I.C.S.

A KANGAROO BOOK

PUBLISHED BY POCKET BOOKS NEW YORK

POCKET BOOKS, a Simon & Schuster division of GULF & WESTERN CORPORATION

1230 Avenue of the Americas, N e w York, N.Y. 10020

Copyright 1960 by Prentice-Hall, Inc.

Published by arrangement with Prentice-Hall, Inc.

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.

For information address Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, N.J. 07632

ISBN: 0-671-80628-9

First Pocket Books printing May, 1969

33rd printing

Trademarks registered in the United States and other countries.

Printed in the U.S.A.

Preface:

The Secret of Using This Book To Change Your Life

DISCOVERY of the "self-image" represents a breakthrough in psychology and the field of creative personality.

The significance of the self-image has been recognized for more than a decade. Yet there has been little written about it. Curiously enough, this is not because "self-image psychology" has not worked, but because it has worked so amazingly well. As one of my colleagues expressed it, "I am reluctant to publish my findings, especially for the lay public, because if I presented some of my case histories and described the rather amazing and spectacular improvements in personality, I would be accused of exaggerating, or trying to start a cult, or both."

I, too, felt the same sort of reluctance. Any book I might write on the subject would be sure to be regarded as somewhat unorthodox by some of my colleagues for several reasons. In the first place, it is somewhat unorthodox for a plastic surgeon to write -a book on psychology.

In the second place, it will probably be regarded in some quarters as even more unorthodox to go outside the tight little dogmathe "closed system" of the "science of psychology"and seek answers concerning human behavior in the fields of physics, anatomy and the new science of Cybernetics.

My answer is that any good plastic surgeon is and must be a psychologist, whether he would have it so or not.

When you change a man's face you almost invariably change his future. Change his physical image and nearly v

vi PREFACE

always you change the manhis personality, his behavior

and sometimes even his basic talents and abilities.

BEAUTY IS MORE THAN SKIN DEEP

A plastic surgeon does not simply alter a man's face. He alters the man's inner self. The incisions he makes are more than skin deep. They frequently cut deep into the psyche as well. I decided a long time ago that this is an awesome responsibility and that I owe it to my patients and to myself to know something about what I am doing.

No responsible M.D. would attempt to perform extensive plastic surgery without specialized knowledge and training. Just so, I feel that if changing a man's face is going to change the inner man as well, I have a responsibility to acquire specialized knowledge in that field, also.

FAILURES THAT LED TO SUCCESS

In a previous book, written some 20 years ago (New Faces New Futures) I published a more or less collection of case histories where plastic surgery, and particularly facial plastic surgery, had opened the door to a new life for many people. That book told of the amazing changes that often occur quite suddenly and dramatically in a person's personality when you change his face. I was elated at my successes in this respect. But, like Sir Humphry Davy, I learned more from my failures than from my successes.

Some patients showed no change in personality after surgery. In most cases a person who had a conspicuously ugly face, or some "freakish" feature corrected by surgery, experienced an almost immediate (usually within 21

days) rise in self-esteem, self-confidence. But in some cases, the patient continued to feel inadequate and experienced feelings of inferiority. In short, these "failures" continued to feel, act and behave just as if they still had an ugly face.

PREFACE vii

This indicated to me that reconstruction of the physical image itself was not "the" real key to changes in personality. There was something else which was usually influenced by facial surgery, but sometimes not. When this

"something else" was reconstructed, the person himself changed. When this "something else" was not reconstructed the person himself remained the same, although his physical features might be radically different.

THE FACE OF PERSONALITY

It was as if personality itself had a "face." This non-physical "face of personality" seemed to be the real key to personality change. If it remained scarred, distorted,

"ugly," or inferior, the person himself acted out this role in his behavior regardless of the changes in physical appearance. If this "face of personality" could be reconstructed, if old emotional scars could be removed; then the person himself changed, even without facial plastic surgery. Once I began to explore this area, I found more and more phenomena which confirmed the fact that the

"self-image," the individual's mental and spiritual concept or "picture" of himself, was the real key to personal-'

ity and behavior. More about this in the first chapter.

TRUTH IS WHERE YOU FIND IT

I have always believed in going wherever it may be necessary to find truth, even if international boundaries must be crossed. When I decided to become a plastic surgeon years ago, German doctors were far ahead of the rest of the world in this field. So I went to Germany.