Practical Mind-Reading

William Walker AtkinsonProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

2.0

Word count: 120K words
Chapters: 13

Summary

Practical Mind-Reading by William Walker Atkinson. Author: Atkinson, William Walker, 1862–1932. Language: English. Class: BF: Philosophy, Psychology, Religion: Psychology, Philosophy, Psychoanalysis. Release Date: Nov 12, 2012

Editor's review

This book is a short practical psychology pamphlet by William Walker Atkinson on "mind-reading," a popular psychological work rooted in the early New Thought movement. Its value lies not in offering modern scientific psychological evidence but in presenting how people in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries popularly understood telepathy, suggestion, attention, and observation. The book discusses how to infer others' thoughts by observing their expressions, posture, and speech habits, and how to train concentration and self-suggestion. For today's readers, it is an interesting source for understanding the history of popular psychology and self-help literature; the writing is direct and the chapters are short, making it suitable for light leisure reading. Readers need not treat it as a rigorous scientific guide but can view it as a historical text from which to sense how people of that era understood the human mind and interpersonal influence.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers interested in the history of popular psychology and the development of self-help literature
Those who enjoy short, light chapters and want to learn about the early mind-reading topic
Enthusiasts studying the New Thought movement or late nineteenth-century popular culture
Readers who wish to use old texts to observe changes in the ideas of an era

Not a good fit for

Those expecting modern scientific psychological evidence and experimental methods
Readers who want to learn serious communication skills or psychotherapeutic knowledge
Readers who are rather averse to mysticism and popular psychology narratives

Reading tips

Start with the table of contents to grasp the overall framework, then select chapters of interest for close reading
Distinguish the historical context from contemporary scientific understanding while reading, and maintain a critical perspective
Read alongside other materials on the history of popular psychology to appreciate the evolution of ideas
After each chapter, write down your own questions as leads for further verification

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is the mind-reading in this book scientifically grounded?

This book is an early popular psychology work; its "mind-reading" refers more to inferring others' thoughts by observing expressions, posture, and speech habits, mixed with then-popular notions such as telepathy. It is not equivalent to modern scientific psychology and should be read in its historical context.

Can I understand it without a psychology background?

Yes. The book is written in accessible language with short chapters and does not rely on technical terminology, making it suitable for general readers to dip into. But precisely because it lacks rigorous argumentation, readers need to judge for themselves which content reflects the ideas of its time and which still has reference value.

Is this book suitable for learning interpersonal communication?

Some discussion of observation and attention may offer inspiration for communication, but many claims in the book lack modern verification and should not be used directly as a communication guide. For systematic learning of communication skills, choose books based on modern psychological research instead.

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About the author

William Walker Atkinson Author · United States · 1862–1932

William Walker Atkinson (1862–1932) was an American lawyer, publisher and writer, and one of the pioneers of the New Thought movement. Born in Baltimore, he was admitted to the Pennsylvania bar in 1894, after which he turned to writing on spirituality, yoga and practical psychology. He authored more than a hundred works over his lifetime, often under pen names such as Theron Q. Dumont and Yogi Ramacharaka. His writings cover a wide range of subjects, including breathing methods, Raja Yoga and Gnani Yoga, clairvoyance and occult powers, mental technique, logical thinking and memory training; they combine popular exposition with practical guidance and have had a lasting influence on later mind-body literature. He died in Los Angeles in 1932.