Mental Second-Wind : Part 2

How to Use Your Mind
by Harry D. Kitson, Ph.D.

(Page 15 of 17)

Let us now examine the bodily conditions to see what fatigue is objectively. "Physiologically it has been demonstrated that fatigue is accompanied by three sorts of changes. First, poisons accumulate in the blood and affect the action of the nervous system, as has been shown by direct analysis. Mosso ... selected two dogs as nearly alike as possible. One he kept tied all day; the other, he exercised until by night it was thoroughly tired. Then he transfused the blood of the tired animal into the veins of the rested one and produced in him all the signs of fatigue that were shown by the other. There can be no doubt that the waste products of the body accumulate in the blood and interfere with the action of the nerve cells and muscles. It is probable that these accumulations come as a result of mental as well as of physical work.

"A second change in fatigue has been found in the cell body of the neurone. Hodge showed that the size of the nucleus of the cell in the spinal cord of a bee diminished nearly 75 per cent, as a result of the day's activity, and that the nucleus became much less solid. A third change that has been demonstrated as a result of muscular work is the accumulation of waste products in the muscle tissue. Fatigued muscles contain considerable percentages of these products. That they are important factors in the fatigue process has been shown by washing them from a fatigued muscle. As a result the muscle gains new capacity for work. The experiments are performed on the muscles of a frog that have been cut from the body and fatigued by electrical stimulation. When they will no longer respond, their sensitivity may be renewed by washing them in dilute alcohol or in a weak salt solution that will dissolve the products of fatigue. It is probable that these products stimulate the sense-organs in the muscles and thus give some of the sensations of fatigue. Of these physical effects of fatigue, the accumulation of waste products in the blood and the effects upon the nerve cells are probably common both to mental and physical fatigue. The effect upon the muscles plays a part in mental fatigue only so far as all mental work involves some muscular activity."

By this time you must be convinced that the subject of fatigue is exceedingly complicated; that its effects are manifested differently in mind and body. In relieving fatigue the first step to be taken is to rest properly. Man cannot work incessantly; he must rest sometimes, and it is just as important to know how to rest efficiently as to know how to work efficiently. By this is not meant that one should rest as soon as fatigue begins to be felt. Quite the reverse. Keep on working all the harder if you wish the second-wind to appear. Perhaps two hours will exhaust your first supply of energy and will leave you greatly fatigued. Do not give up at this time, however. Push yourself farther in order to uncover the second layer of energy. Before entering upon this, however, it will be possible to secure some advantage by resting for about fifteen minutes. Do not rest longer than this, or you may lose the momentum already secured and your two hours will have gone for naught. If one indulges in too long a rest, the energy seems to run down and more effort is required to work it up again than was originally expended. It is also important to observe the proper mental conditions during rest. Do not spend the fifteen minutes in getting interested in some other object; for that will leave distracting ideas in the mind which will persist when you resume work. Make the rest a time of physical and mental relief. Move cramped muscles, rest your eyes and let your thoughts idly wander; then come back to work in ten or fifteen minutes and you will be amazed at the refreshed feeling with which you do your work and at the accession of new energy that will come to you. Keep on at this new plane and your work will take on all the attributes of the second-wind level of efficiency.

Besides planning intelligent rests, you may also adjust yourself to fatigue by arranging your daily program so as to do your hardest work when you are fresh, and your easiest when your efficiency is low. In other words, you are a human dynamo, and should adjust yourself to the different loads you carry. When carrying a heavy load, employ your best energies, but when carrying only a light load, exert a proportionate amount of energy. Every student has tasks of a routine nature which do not require a high degree of energy, such as copying material. Plan to perform such work when your stock of energy is lowest.

One of the best ways to insure the attainment of a higher plane of mental efficiency is to assume an attitude of interestedness. This is an emotional state and we have seen that emotion calls forth great energy.

A final aid in promoting increase of energy is that gained through stimulating ideas. Other things being equal, the student who is animated by a stimulating idea works more diligently and effectively than one without. The idea may be a lofty professional ideal; it may be a desire to please one's family, a sense of duty, or a wish to excel. Whatever it is, an idea may stimulate to extraordinary achievements. Adopt some compelling aim if you have none. A vocational aim often serves as a powerful incentive throughout one's student life. An idea may operate for even more transient purposes; it may make one oblivious to present discomfort to a remarkable degree. This is accomplished through the aid of suggestion. When feelings of fatigue approach, you may ward them off by resolutely suggesting to yourself that you are feeling fresh.

Above all, the will is effective in lifting one to higher levels of efficiency. It is notorious that a single effort of the will, "such as saying 'no' to some habitual temptation or performing some courageous act, will launch a man on a higher level of energy for days and weeks, will give him a new range of power. 'In the act of uncorking the whiskey bottle which I had brought home to get drunk upon,' said a man to me, 'I suddenly found myself running out into the garden, where I smashed it on the ground. I felt so happy and uplifted after this act, that for two months I wasn't tempted to touch a drop.'" But the results of exertions of the will are not usually so immediate, and you may accept it as a fact that in raising yourself to a higher level of energy you cannot do it by a single effort. Continuous effort is required until the higher levels of energy have formed the habit of responding when work is to be done. In laying the burden upon Nature's mechanism of habit, you see you are again face to face with the proposition laid down at the beginning of the book - that education consists in the process of forming habits of mind. The particular habit most important to cultivate in connection with the production of second-wind is the habit of resisting fatigue. Form the habit of persisting in spite of apparent obstacles and limitations. Though they seem almost unsurmountable, they are really only superficial. Buried deep within you are stores of energy that you yourself are unaware of. They will assist you in accomplishing feats far greater than you think yourself capable of. Draw upon these resources and you will find yourself gradually living and working upon a higher plane of efficiency, improving the quality of your work, increasing the quantity of your work and enhancing your enjoyment in work.

Reading and Exercise

Readings: James (9) Seashore (14) Chapter III. Swift (20) Chapter V.

Exercise I. Describe conditions you have observed at time of second-wind in connection with prolonged (a) physical exertion, (b) intellectual exertion.

Indiana University, 1921