Schultz: autogenic training

As a new psychotherapeutic method, autogenic training was proposed in 1932 by the German psychotherapist Johann Heinrich Schulz. He compared self-reports and physiological changes in participants in experimental hypnosis, as well as in individuals practicing the yoga system. Both at the beginning of immersion in a hypnotic sleep or in a state of concentration of attention invariably noted the appearance of a feeling of heaviness associated with muscle relaxation, and a feeling of warmth that came as a result of the expansion of blood vessels. Schultz suggested that purposefully evoking these sensations could lead to the initial stages of hypnosis. To do this, he developed a special set of exercises aimed at training the relaxation of skeletal muscles and smooth muscles of blood vessels and internal organs. Schultz called his method autogenic training.