Hypnotic Scripts


Depression: That Was Yesterday

As you continue to drift and float, all other sounds fade away into the
distance. You pay attention only to the sound of my voice. I want three
points about depression to become firmly established in your mind. For
that is what we are going to discuss, and each point about depression is
the absolute truth to you. Now the first point is, that you have a right
to be here. You are as good as anyone. You are a child of the universe, no
less than the trees or the stars. You have a right to be here, and whether
or not it is clear to you, the universe is unfolding the way it should be.
Therefore, you can accept that there is a universal plan, greater than any
man, greater than any one of us, and so, you can be at peace with
yourself. You can be at peace with yourself if you want to be ... and that
comes to the second point.


For in that plan that affects everyone in this universe, outside of
natural disasters, all depression is subconsciously self-inflicted. That
is the second point. All depression is subconsciously self-inflicted. Now,
each emotion of the mind is reflected in the electro-chemical balance of
the brain. Prolonged feelings of depression can cause chemical imbalance
that, most times, corrects itself. With my clinical experience, I can
usually tell who will respond successfully if I place them on medication
right away, and who can respond successfully without it. In either case,
you will be successful in conquering depression. When you do feel well
again, you may do so for only a matter of minutes or hours, and then
depression may return, and it may be another several days or even weeks
before you again feel well. There may be a half dozen of such ups and
downs before the symptoms are gone for good.


Now the third point has to do with time and the absolute necessity to
live, not just in the present, but the moment of here and now. The third
absolute truth has to do with the necessity to live each moment of the
here and now. For example, yesterday you were depressed but today is a new
day. Every day is a fresh beginning. Every day is a fresh beginning, and
every morning is a world made new. Today is our most important day.
Yesterday is gone. We cannot live in the past, else we cannot go forward,
because living in the past dulls the keen edge of our imagination. The
past, even yesterday, can be of value only as we glean lessons and profits
from our experiences. For as Longfellow wrote, "Nor deem the irrevocable
past as wholly wasted, as wholly vain, if rising on its wrecks, at last,
to something nobler we attain." Have you ever felt circumstances crowding
in upon you because of failure and disappointment and depression and said,
"If I can only get a break, an opportunity to start all over again?" Well,
then, remember what Walter Mallone wrote about opportunity - "They do me
wrong who say I come no more, when once I knock and fail to find you in,
for every day, I stand outside your door and bid you wake and rise, to
fight again. Though deep in mire, ring not your hands and weep. I lend my
aid to those who say, 'I can'. No shame-faced outcast ever sank so deep,
but yet, might rise again and be a man." Yesterday, the sun sank behind
the horizon at the close of the day. The sky was overcast, no stars
appeared within the firmament, and you were downcast, depressed, because
the day had brought only frustration. Today, you awaken with the sunlight
pouring in through the window, a new day is at hand, a new opportunity to
build upon the lessons learned from yesterday's failures. Now, each of us
is here to accomplish something, some particular phase of the universal
plan that is greater than man, greater than each and every one of us. This
universal plan or life force goes on whether we like it or not. When we
face life as a whole, and try to realize that every experience is leading
us towards fulfillment of that plan, when we take each day and endeavor to
make the most of it, then, things come out alright. Someone has said we
must listen for life to happen, listen expectantly. Now, you have not been
listening expectantly. You really have not been listening at all. You have
been concentrating on your problems and as long as you concentrate on a
problem, then you have a problem, because you are what you concentrate
your mind upon.


You are what you are greatly concerned with. Now, when you let go of that
concern, when you let go of that problem, by changing your thinking, when
you say, "To heck with the problem!" then you begin to see the solution to
your problem, because your mind is free, and therefore, when your mind is
free, you can utilize it to be effective to make it work. You must say
from now on, "I let go of my depression. I develop and maintain a happy
disposition each day. Each day I reject the negative and see the positive
in all things." Because the only reason that you have been staying
depressed is that you have not learned yet how to deal with your negative
thoughts, to allow in the positive thoughts of truth and love and hope.
Every day is a challenge, a new opportunity to prove yourself in reality,
to be a believer in truth, and love and hope, that you do not need to feel
helpless and hopeless, that you can separate off and distinguish the vast
difference between those events in your life and your reaction to them,
for they are vastly different. They are not the same at all and you must
separate off from those events in your life and your reaction to them. The
problem is not whether you need a new job, whether your wife or your
husband has gone or left, or that someone else did right or wrong, or that
you did right or wrong, or the terrible things that occurred in your life.
It is not any of those things at all. It is your reaction to them. It is
the sentences you say in your head, such as, "Oh, my husband is gone! I
cannot live without him!" Or, "I've got a terrible pain in my back! I'll
never live a normal life again!"


That is really the problem for when you give yourself those negative
thoughts, then you are bound to feel depressed so you have to learn how to
turn those sentences around, turn them around completely: "OK, so I made a
mistake, but I won't again" Or, "OK, so my wife died and I miss her but I
can start over with a new life." Whatever it is that you say to yourself
about those past things makes you depressed because you have not learned
to turn them around and when you are depressed, when you are in this frame
of mind, you are dead! That is death! Remember Lot's wife was told, "Don't
look back for you will turn into a pillar of salt!" But, she just had to
look back. Now, you must not look back. You are through looking back. You
can only live the very moment you are living, and you can live that to the
fullest, and enjoy it by the proper thinking. Hasn't there ever been a
desire, an urge, to accomplish something you never attained? Think about
that. Take each day as it comes, and enjoy the sunshine, the song of the
birds, the laughter of the children. See all those positive things.


Let each day crowd out yesterday's sorrows completely. Remember that "he
that climbs the ladder must begin at the first rung" - Robert Scott said
that. The Chinese say, "A thousand miles journey begins with one step." As
we seek higher and wider vision, each new day becomes the next rung
upwards, a new opportunity to rise above yesterday's sorrows,
frustrations, depressions and failures, to a world made new, so that the
Oriental poet urges us: "Look well, therefore, to this day." Look well, to
this day.


Now, in your mind's eye, I want you to visualize a sign, a sign, hanging
right in front of you, and that sign has three words on it, and the words
are: That was yesterday. That was yesterday, when things didn't go right.
That was yesterday, when you failed to turn your negative thoughts around.
That was yesterday when you gave up hope. That was yesterday, when you
didn't decide to start over, like you should have, and that was yesterday,
when you were only thinking of yourself, instead of the happiness of
others, and what you could do for them. That was yesterday, when you made
a mistake. That was yesterday, when you know you said the wrong thing.
That was yesterday, when you know you did the wrong thing. That was
yesterday. That was yesterday, when you hated yourself, but every day is a
fresh beginning, and every morning is a world made new, and the past is
not wholly wasted. It is not in vain, rising on its wrecks at last, there
is something nobler you will attain. By replacing negative thoughts with
positive thoughts, every new moment is a new opportunity, and as you
accept this truth, you feel the warmth of truth and love and hope course
through your heart, you relax completely, confident that there IS a plan
for you, and that, even though you can't understand, you must go through
these learning experiences that you are going through, in order to satisfy
that plan. You are, nevertheless, perfectly willing to go through whatever
experiences you need to go through, so that you can allow yourself to be
the master of your own fate, to be in control of your own feelings, for
this dawn of a new day only comes after the night. You cannot have a
mountain without valleys, otherwise, everything is all a plateau.


The brightness of the sun would mean nothing, except by comparison to the
darkness of the night. It's only by contrast that we can understand life,
and so, instead of reacting adversely to the problems and frustrations of
yesterday, you hang on them that sign. That sign that says, That was
yesterday - you see the sign in your mind's eye. You lift those problems
from your shoulders and hang them upon that sign and leave them there,
because, as a result of the faithful practice of your self-hypnosis, and
the learning to control your thinking in a positive way, every day, as a
fresh beginning, and every morning is the world made new, and this is a
new day for you, and a new morning - a day without depression, a day
without frustration, a day without failure, a day in which you are more
effective in every single area of your life, than you have ever been
before, and why? Because you have let go of your problems. You have
stopped letting them handle you. You are handling it, by turning those
negative thoughts around, because it is not the events of your life that
are affecting you. It is your reaction to them, and you are through
letting negative thoughts create negative reactions to the experiences of
your life, which depress you and run you ragged, run your every moment,
every moment of your life. You are going to learn to relax comfortably, in
the knowledge that you can and will do your part and will continue to do
your part.