Don't Stress Beyond Endurance

In this book I have included only a sub-set of all the exercises in Reichian therapy. The material I present here can be done alone or with a helper.

In doing these exercise the principle is:

ALWAYS TOO SLOWLY.

If you go slowly, the worst that can happen is that your progress is less rapid than it might have been. If you go too fast you might accidentally go beyond your endurance.

Here Are The Rules For The Initiate

When I Say An Exercise Is Powerful, Believe Me

Some exercises seem very easy. Some exercises sound so simple that it is hard to understand how they might even do anything. But the author has 35 years of experience with these exercises and their effects. When I say an exercise is powerful I mean it. Trust me.

Don't Do Any Exercise For An Extended Period Of Time

15 minutes is the maximum time for any exercise. Twice a week is the maximum frequency (except for the daily exercises presented later). To repeat, wait at least two days between workouts. That is, if you do it on Monday, do not do it again before Thursday. One time per week is fine, twice per week may be OK, more than two times per week is too much.

Pay attention to your behavior, emotions and dreams. As you do this work your behavior will change organically and naturally. It is not like therapy where you are working on a particular problem or behavior. It is a character change, a general change in you as a being.

During the process, particular behaviors can get out of hand. By that I mean that the behavior can become counter-productive to your life. An easy example is anger. If sex was the great taboo 100 years ago, now the great taboo is anger. But anger is the creative emotion. It is only because you do not like some condition, it is only because some condition angers you, that you are moved to change it. Anger is good — when used for production. Anger is bad — when used for destruction.

You may be too weak or too strong on the anger side. The Reichian work will free your anger as it will free everything else. But if the anger is getting out of hand it can wreck marriages, friendships, or jobs. Then it is too strong (it is destructive) and so you need to stop the exercises, perhaps even the daily ones, until things quiet down, until you get your angry behavior under control. Even if that takes a year, it is all right. However long it takes to get counter-productive behaviors under control, is the right amount of time.

If you find that emotion of any type is getting too strong, stop the exercises entirely until your emotions settle down.

I MEAN IT.

These exercises can increase any of the over 550 emotions listed in the English language. When I speak of emotion most people think only of things like anxiety, anger, and depression.

I MEAN ANY.

You can become too elated, too needy, too suspicious. Any emotion or set of emotions can start to get out of hand. Watch your emotional tone and do not let it or them get out of hand.

These exercises work mainly through the dreams. Some bad dreams are OK. They are not unexpected. But if you find your sleep is severely disturbed or your dreams too frequently disturbing, stop the exercises for at least one week more than the time it takes for the sleep and/or the dreams to return to normal.

Footnote 5. Averill, J. (1980) A Constructivist View of Emotion. In R. Plutchik & H. Hellerman. (Eds.) Theories of emotion (pp. 305-339) New York: Academic Press.

On any given learning session, if your emotions become too strong stop the session at that point.

DON'T PUSH! ALWAYS TOO SLOWLY.

Stopping when your emotions get too strong will not cause any damage but continuing on can cause damage. The issue will still be present and it will arise again or be fixed by the dreams.

Your Daily Exercises Add To Your Weekly Session

The daily exercises are not meaningless. If they were, I would not give them to you as a daily routine. The daily exercises are doing a lot all by themselves. When you add more exercises to your daily exercises you are doing that much more. If you find that it is necessary to stop the weekly exercise session, it might also be prudent to stop the daily exercises until things inside you quiet down.

An exercise that may seem to do nothing at one point in your work may be too strong at another point in your work.

For this warning, I think an actual example will help. There is an exercise called "the passive session." The exercise could not appear simpler. For some people this seemingly simple exercise is too strong even the first time. Many people have so much control that they do not let the sensing of the body get beyond a low level. In such a case, and if you are one of those controlled people, it might appear that the exercise had no effect. That is not true, but it will seem that way. But then, later after lots of time has been spent in the Reichian exercises, this same exercise can be so powerful that it leaves you shaken for weeks.

Even when I give you a time for the exercise (the passive session is usually done for one full hour) if you find it is having too strong an effect, stop early. Times given are a maximum not a requirement.

DON'T EXCEED MAXIMUM TIMES EVEN IF YOU THINK YOU CAN.

Character change is not a race. Sorry, but there are no medals for outstanding performance in changing character problems. There are, however, penalties for trying to move too fast.

I have already said that two sessions per week is the maximum. I have also said that if things start to get too strong or too rapid then you should stop the exercises until things quiet down. There is another way to consider this.

Your body and brain are like the thermostat in your home or office. As the thermostat keeps the temperature constant, so your body and brain keep their way-of-being constant. Your subconscious fights desperately not to change. That is the way we are built. Whether by God or by evolution, that is what we are. We fight change just because we are what we are.

Now with the Reichian exercises, you are going to try to change that. But your being resists the change. Please don't pretend to yourself that you are more enlightened or a more evolved person. You are still human and you are still subject to the nature of the human bei ng. Remember this work is psychotherapy. You have spent your life up till now developing the character you have; changing it will not happen quickly and it should not happen quickly.

This is not a race. This is not to see how much you can do in a short time compared to your fantasy of the ideal or the speed of your friend. Each and every one of us has our own personal devils. Some devils are on the surface, they are obvious. But the important devils are well hidden. When you find a hidden devil, back up. Give it time. Don't push yourself.

No system is right for everyone. The best single guide you have for doing these exercises and proceeding from one area to another is your own reaction. It is OK if you seem to have no reaction, just keep with it. Different people respond at different speeds.

But if you seem to be going in the wrong direction (that is, it is making your life less productive rather than more productive) then probably these exercises are not the right ones for you. There are other ways to self-improvement. Your obligation to yourself and to your life is to find the best path for you.