Now the point I want to make is this: Adler had been hypnotized by a false belief about himself. Not figura­tively, but literally and actually hypnotized. Remember that we said in the last chapter that the power of hypnosis is the power of belief. Let me repeat here Dr. Barber's explanation of the "power" of hypnosis: "We found that hypnotic subjects are able to do surprising things only when convinced that the hypnotist's words are true state­ments. . . . When the hypnotist has guided the subject to the point where he is convinced that the hypnotist's words are true statements, the subject then behaves differently because he thinks and believes differently."
The important thing for you to remember is that it does not matter in the least how you got the idea or where it came from. You may never have met a professional hyp­notist. You may have never been formally hypnotized. But if you have accepted an idea—from yourself, your teachers, your parents, friends, advertisements—or from any other source, and further, if you are firmly convinced that idea is true, it has the same power over you as the hypnotist's words have over the hypnotized subject.
Scientific research has shown that Dr. Adler's experience was not "one in a million," but typical of practically all students who make poor grades. In Chapter One we told of how Prescott Lecky had brought about almost miracu­lous improvement in the grades of school children by showing them how to change their self-image. After thou­sands of experiments and many years of research Lecky concluded that poor grades in school are, in almost every case, due in some degree to the student's "self-concep­tion" and "self-definition." These students had been liter­ally hypnotized by such ideas as "I am dumb," "I have a weak personality," "I am poor in arithmetic," "I am a naturally poor speller," "I am ugly," "I do not have a mechanical type mind," etc. With such self-definitions, the student had to make poor grades in order to be true to himself. Unconsciously, making poor grades became a • "moral issue" with him. It would be as "wrong," from his own viewpoint, for him to make good grades, as it would be to steal if he defines himself as an honest person.