Genevieve Behrend

Genevieve Behrend is remembered chiefly as a teacher and populariser of Thomas Troward’s Mental Science. Her book Your Invisible Power explicitly presents itself as the mental science of Troward, making the relationship between teacher, interpreter and later audience unusually visible. The biographical record available in standard library catalogues is thinner than the enthusiastic retellings that circulate around New Thought figures, so a careful profile should not fill those gaps with legend.

Behrend’s book turns Troward’s abstract system toward exercises in concentration, mental imagery and sustained attention. It presents those exercises as a route to practical results because it shares Troward’s view of mind and causation. That view is the author’s metaphysical premise, not an established account of how images affect external events. Visualisation can be discussed as rehearsal or a way to clarify an intention without importing the book’s stronger claims.

Her importance lies in translation as much as originality: she made a dense philosophical idiom feel actionable to readers. That translation also creates a familiar risk, because a compact exercise can detach from the assumptions that originally supported it. One useful reflective use is simply to observe the difference between imagining a desired scene, naming a next action and claiming control over an outcome. Behrend’s text is a clear historical place to see those layers come apart.