How to Stop Worrying and Start Living Part 15

Quite often in New York, where I work, there is a chance for me to spend an hour at the Yale Club gym. No man can worry while he is playing squash tennis or skiing. He is too busy to worry. The large mental mountains of trouble become minute molehills that new thoughts and acts quickly smooth down.

I find the best antidote for worry is exercise. Use your muscles more and your brain less when you are worried, and you will be surprised at the result. It works that way with me-worry goes when exercise begins.

I Was "The Worrying Wreck From Virginia Tech."

By Jim Birdsall Plant Superintendent C.F. Muller Company 180 Baldwin Avenue, Jersey City, New Jersey Seventeen years ago, when I was in military college at Blacks-burg, Virginia, I was known as "the worrying wreck from Virginia Tech". I worried so violently that I often became ill. In fact, I was ill so often that I had a regular bed reserved for me at the college infirmary at all times. When the nurse saw me coming, she would run and give me a hypo. I worried about everything. Sometimes I even forgot what I was worrying about. I worried for fear I would be busted out of college because of my low grades. I had failed to pa.s.s my examinations in physics and other subjects, too. I knew I had to maintain an average grade of 75-84. I worried about my health, about my excruciating attacks of acute indigestion, about my insomnia. I worried about financial matters. I felt badly because I couldn't buy my girl candy or take her to dances as often as I wanted to. I worried for fear she would marry one of the other cadets. I was in a lather day and night over a dozen intangible problems.

In desperation, I poured out my troubles to Professor Duke Baird, professor of business administration at V.P.I.

The fifteen minutes that I spent with Professor Baird did more for my health and happiness than all the rest of the four years I spent in college. "Jim," he said, "you ought to sit down and face the facts. If you devoted half as much time and energy to solving your problems as you do to worrying about them, you wouldn't have any worries. Worrying is just a vicious habit you have learned."

He gave me three rules to break the worry habit: Rule 1. Find out precisely what is the problem you are worrying about.

Rule 2. Find out the cause of the problem.

Rule 3. Do something constructive at once about solving the problem.

After that interview, I did a bit of constructive planning. Instead of worrying because I had failed to pa.s.s physics, I now asked myself why I had failed. I knew it wasn't because I was dumb, for I was editor-in-chief of The Virginia Tech Engineer.

I figured that I had failed physics because I had no interest in the subject. I had not applied myself because I couldn't see how it would help me in my work as an industrial engineer. But now I changed my att.i.tude. I said to myself: "If the college authorities demand that I pa.s.s my physics examination before I obtain a degree, who am I to question their wisdom?"

So I enrolled for physics again. This time I pa.s.sed because instead of wasting my time in resentment and worrying about how hard it was, I studied diligently.

I solved my financial worries by taking on some additional jobs, such as selling punch at the college dances, and by borrowing money from my father, which I paid back soon after graduation.

I solved my love worries by proposing to the girl that I feared might marry another cadet. She is now Mrs. Jim Birdsall.

As I look back at it now, I can see that my problem was one of confusion, a disinclination to find the causes of my worry and face them realistically.

Jim Birdsall learned to stop worrying because he a.n.a.lYSED his troubles. In fact, he used the very principles described in the chapter "How to a.n.a.lyse and Solve Worry Problems."

I Have Lived By This Sentence By Dr. Joseph R. Sizoo President, New Brunswick Theological Seminary (The oldest theological seminary in the United States, founded in 1784) Years ago, in a day of uncertainty and disillusionment, when my whole life seemed to be overwhelmed by forces beyond my control, one morning quite casually I opened my New Testament and my eyes fell upon this sentence: "He that sent me is with me-the Father hath not left me alone." My life has never been the same since that hour. Everything for me has been for ever different after that. I suppose that not a day has pa.s.sed that I have not repeated it to myself. Many have come to me for counseling during these years, and I have always sent them away with this sustaining sentence. Ever since that hour when my eyes fell upon it, I have lived by this sentence. I have walked with it and I have found in it my peace and strength. To me it is the very essence of religion. It lies at the rock bottom of everything that makes life worth living. It is the Golden Text of my life.

I Hit Bottom And Survived By Ted Ericksen 16,237 South Cornuta Avenue, Bellflower, California Southern California Representative National Enameling and Stamping Company I used to be a terrible "worry wart". But no more. In the summer of 1942, I had an experience that banished worry from my life-for all time; I hope. That experience made every other trouble seem small by comparison.

For years I had wanted to spend a summer on a commercial fis.h.i.+ng craft in Alaska, so in 1942 I signed on a thirty-two-foot salmon seining vessel out of Kodiak, Alaska. On a craft of this size, there is a crew of only three: the skipper who does the supervising, a No. 2 man who a.s.sists the skipper, and a general work horse, who is usually a Scandinavian. I am a Scandinavian.

Since salmon seining has to be done with the tides, I often worked twenty hours out of twenty-four. I kept up that schedule for a week at a time. I did everything that n.o.body else wanted to do. I washed the craft. I put away the gear. I cooked on a little wood-burning stove in a small cabin where the heat and fumes of the motor almost made me ill. I washed the dishes. I repaired the boat. I pitched the salmon from our boat into a tender that took the fish to a cannery. My feet were always wet in rubber boots. My boots were often filled with water, but I had no time to empty them. But all that was play compared to my main job, which was pulling what is called the "cork line". That operation simply means placing your feet on the stem of the craft and pulling in the corks and the webbing of the net. At least, that is what you are supposed to do. But, in reality, the net was so heavy that when I tried to pull it in, it wouldn't budge. What really happened was that in trying to pull in the cork line, I actually pulled in the boat. I pulled it along on my own power, since the net stayed where it was. I did all this for weeks on end It was almost the end of me, too. I ached horribly. I ached all over. I ached for months.

When I finally did have a chance to rest, I slept on a damp lumpy mattress piled on top of the provisions locker. I would put one of the lumps in the mattress under the part of my back that hurt most-and sleep as if I had been dragged. I was drugged by complete exhaustion.

I am glad now that I had to endure all that aching and exhaustion because it has helped me stop worrying. Whenever I am confronted by a problem now-instead of worrying about it, I say to myself: "Ericksen, could this possibly be as bad as pulling the cork line?" And Ericksen invariably answers: "No, nothing could be that bad!" So I cheer up and tackle it with courage. I believe it is a good thing to have to endure an agonising experience occasionally. It is good to know that we have hit bottom and survived. That makes all our daily problems seem easy by comparison.

I Used To Be One Of The World's Biggest Jacka.s.ses By Percy H. Whiting Managing Director, Dale Carnegie and Company 50 East 42nd Street, New York, New York I have died more times from more different diseases than any other man, living, dead, or half dead.

I was no ordinary hypochondriac. My father owned a drug-store, and I was practically brought up in it. I talked to doctors and nurses every day, so I knew the names and symptoms of more and worse diseases than the average layman. I was no ordinary hypo-I had symptoms! I could worry for an hour or two over a disease and then have practically all the symptoms of a man who was suffering from it. I recall once that, in Great Barrington, Ma.s.sachusetts, the town in which I lived, we had a rather severe diphtheria epidemic. In my father's drug-store, I had been selling medicines day after day to people who came from infected homes. Then the evil that I feared came upon me: I had diphtheria myself. I was positive I had it. I went to bed and worried myself into the standard symptoms. I sent for a doctor. He looked me over and said: "Yes, Percy, you've got it." That relieved my mind. I was never afraid of any disease when I had it-so I turned over and went to sleep. The next morning I was in perfect health.

For years I distinguished myself and got a lot of attention and sympathy by specialising in unusual and fantastic disease-I died several times of both lockjaw and hydrophobia. Later on, I settled down to having the run-of-mill ailments-specialising on cancer and tuberculosis.

I can laugh about it now, but it was tragic then. I honestly and literally feared for years that I was walking on the edge of the grave. When it came time to buy a suit of clothes in the spring, I would ask myself: "Should I waste this money when I know I can't possibly live to wear this suit out?"

However, I am happy to report progress: in the past ten years, I haven't died even once.

How did I stop dying? By kidding myself out of my ridiculous imaginings. Every time I felt the dreadful symptoms coming on, I laughed at myself and said: "See here, Whiting, you have been dying from one fatal disease after another now for twenty years, yet you are in first-cla.s.s health today. An insurance company recently accepted you for more insurance. Isn't it about time, Whiting, that you stood aside and had a good laugh at the worrying jacka.s.s you are?"

I soon found that I couldn't worry about myself and laugh at myself at one and the same time. So I've been laughing at myself ever since.

The point of this is: Don't take yourself too seriously. Try "just laughing" at some of your sillier worries, and see if you can't laugh them out of existence.

I Have Always Tried To Keep My Line Of Supplies Open"

By Gene Autry The world's most famous and beloved singing cowboy I figure that most worries are about family troubles and money. I was fortunate in marrying a small-town Oklahoma girl who had the same background I had and enjoyed the same things. We both try to follow the golden rule, so we have kept our family troubles to a minimum.

I have kept my financial worries to a minimum also by doing two things. First, I have always followed a rule of absolute one hundred per cent integrity in everything. When I borrowed money, I paid back every penny. Few things cause more worry than dishonesty.

Second, when I started a new venture, I always kept on ace in the hole. Military experts say that the first principle of fighting a battle is to keep your line of supplies open. I figure that that principle applies to personal battles almost as much as to military battles. For example, as a lad down in Texas and Oklahoma, I saw some real poverty when the country was devastated by droughts. We had mighty hard scratching at times to make a living. We were so poor that my father used to drive across the country in a covered wagon with a string of horses and swap horses to make a living. I wanted something more reliable than that. So I got a job working for a railway-station agent and learned telegraphy in my spare time. Later, I got a job working as relief operator for the Frisco Railway. I was sent here, there, and yonder to relieve other station agents who were ill or on vacation or had more work than they could do. That job paid $150 per month. Later, when I started out to better myself, I always figured that that railroad job meant economic safety. So I always kept the road open back to that job. It was my line of supplies, and I never cut myself off from it until I was firmly established in a new and better position.

For example, back in 1928, when I was working as a relief operator for the Frisco Railway in Chelsea, .Oklahoma, a stranger drifted in one evening to send a telegram. He heard me playing the guitar and singing cowboy songs and told me I was good-told me that I ought to go to New York and get a job on the stage or radio. Naturally, I was flattered; and when I saw the name he signed to his telegram, I was almost breathless: Will Rogers.

Instead of rus.h.i.+ng off to New York at once, I thought the matter over carefully for nine months. I finally came to the conclusion that I had nothing to lose and everything to gain by going to New York and giving the old town a whirl. I had a railroad pa.s.s: I could travel free. I could sleep sitting up in my seat, and I could carry some sandwiches and fruit for my meals.

So I went. When I reached New York, I slept in a furnished room for five dollars a week, ate at the Automat, and tramped the streets for ten weeks-and got nowhere. I would have been worried sick if I hadn't had a job to go back to. I had already worked for the railway five years. That meant I had seniority rights; but in order to protect those rights, I couldn't lay off longer than ninety days. By this time, I had already been in New York seventy days, so I rushed back to Oklahoma on my pa.s.s and began working again to protect my line of supply. I worked for a few months, saved money, and returned to New York for another try. This time I got a break. One day, while waiting for an interview in a recording-studio office, I played my guitar and sang a song to the girl receptionist: "Jeannine, I Dream of Lilac Time". While I was singing that song, the man who wrote it-Nat Schildkraut- drifted into the office. Naturally, he was pleased to hear anyone singing his song. So he gave me a note of introduction and sent me down to the Victor Recording Company. I made a record. I was no good-too stiff and self-conscious. So I took the advice of the Victor Recording man: I went back to Tulsa, worked for the railway by day, and at night I sang cowboy songs on a sustaining radio programme. I liked that arrangement. It meant that I was keeping my line of supplies open- so I had no worries.

I sang for nine months on radio station KVOO in Tulsa. During that time, Jimmy Long and I wrote a song ent.i.tled "That Silver-Haired Daddy of Mine". It caught on. Arthur Sattherly, head of the American Recording Company, asked me to make a recording. It clicked. I made a number of other recordings for fifty dollars each, and finally got a job singing cowboy songs over radio station WLS in Chicago. Salary: forty dollars a week. After singing there four years, my salary was raised to ninety dollars a week, and I picked up another three hundred dollars doing personal appearances every night in theatres.

Then in 1934, I got a break that opened up enormous possibilities. The League of Decency was formed to clean up the movies. So Hollywood producers decided to put on cowboy pictures; but they wanted a new kind of cowboy-one who could sing. The man who owned the American Recording Company was also part owner of Republic Pictures. "If you want a singing cowboy," he said to his a.s.sociates, "I have got one making records for us." That is how I broke into the movies. I started making singing-cowboy pictures for one hundred dollars a week. I had serious doubts about whether I would succeed in pictures, but I didn't worry. I knew I could always go back to my old job.

My success in pictures exceeded my wildest expectations. I now get a salary of one hundred thousand a year plus one half of all the profits on my pictures. However, I realise that this arrangement won't go on for ever. But I am not worried. I know that no matter what happens-even if I lose every dollar I have-I can always go back to Oklahoma and get a job working for the Frisco Railway. I have protected my line of supplies.

I Heard A Voice In India By E. Stanley Jones One of America's most dynamic speakers and the most famous missionary of his generation I have devoted forty years of my life to missionary work in India. At first, I found it difficult to endure the terrible heat plus the nervous strain of the great task that stretched before me. At the end of eight years, I was suffering so severely from brain fatigue and nervous exhaustion that I collapsed, not once but several times. I was ordered to take a year's furlough in America. On the boat returning to America, I collapsed again while speaking at a Sunday-morning service on the s.h.i.+p, and the s.h.i.+p's doctor put me to bed for the remainder of the trip.

After a year's rest in America, I started back to India, but stopped on the way to hold evangelistic meetings among the university students in Manila. In the midst of the strain of these meetings, I collapsed several times. Physicians warned me that if I returned to India, I would die. In spite of their warnings, I continued on to India, but I went with a deepening cloud upon me. When I arrived in Bombay, I was so broken that I went straight to the hills and rested for several months. Then I returned to the plains to continue my work. It was no use. I collapsed and was forced to return to the hills for another long rest. Again I descended to the plains, and again I was shocked and crushed to discover that I couldn't take it. I was exhausted mentally, nervously, and physically. I was completely at the end of my resources. I feared that I would be a physical wreck for the balance of my life.

If I didn't get help from somewhere, I realised that I would have to give up my missionary career, go back to America, and work on a farm to try to regain my health. It was one of my darkest hours. At that time I was holding a series of meetings in Lucknow. While praying one night, an event happened that completely transformed my life. While in prayer-and I was not particularly thinking about myself at the time-a voice seemed to say: "Are you yourself ready for this work to which I have called you?"

I replied: "No, Lord, I am done for. I have reached the end of my resources."

The Voice replied "If you will turn that over to Me and not worry about it, I will take care of it."

I quickly answered: "Lord, I close the bargain right here."

A great peace settled into my heart and pervaded my whole being. I knew it was done! Life-abundant life-had taken possession of me. I was so lifted up that I scarcely touched the road as I quietly walked home that night. Every inch was holy ground. For days after that I hardly knew I had a body. I went through the days, working all day and far into the night, and came down to bedtime wondering why in the world I should ever go to bed at all, for there was not the slightest trace of tiredness of any kind. I seemed possessed by life and peace and rest-by Christ Himself.

The question came as to whether I should tell this. I shrank from it, but I felt I should-and did. After that it was sink or swim before everybody. More than a score of the most strenuous years of my life have gone by since then, but the old trouble has never returned. I have never had such health. But it was more than a physical touch. I seemed to have tapped new life for body, mind, and spirit. After that experience, life for me functioned on a permanently higher level. And I had done nothing but take it!

During the many years that have gone by since then, I have travelled all over the world, frequently lecturing three times a day, and have found time and strength to write The Christ of the Indian Road and eleven other books. Yet in the midst of all this, I have never missed, or even been late to, an appointment. The worries that once beset me have long since vanished, and now, in my sixty-third year, I am overflowing with abounding vitality and the joy of serving and living for others.

I suppose that the physical and mental transformation that I have experienced could be picked to pieces psychologically and explained. It does not matter. Life is bigger than processes and overflows and dwarfs them.

This one thing I know: my life was completely transformed and uplifted that night in Lucknow, thirty-one years ago, when at the depth of my weakness and depression, a voice said to me: "If you will turn that over to Me and not worry about it, I will take care of it," and I replied: "Lord, I close the bargain right here."

When The Sheriff Came In My Front Door By Homer Croy Novelist, 150 Pinehurst Avenue, New York, New York The bitterest moment of my life occurred one day in 1933 when the sheriff came in the front door and I went out the back. I had lost my home at 10 Standish Road, Forest Hills, Long Island, where my children were born and where I and my family had lived for eighteen years. I had never dreamed that this could happen to me. Twelve years before, I thought I was sitting on top of the world. I had sold the motion-picture rights to my novel West of the Water Tower for a top Hollywood price. I lived abroad with my family for two years. We summered in Switzerland and wintered on the French Riviera- just like the idle rich.

I spent six months in Paris and wrote a novel ent.i.tled They Had to See Paris. Will Rogers appeared in the screen version. It was his first talking picture. I had tempting offers to remain in Hollywood and write several of Will Rogers' pictures. But I didn't. I returned to New York. And my troubles began!

It slowly dawned on me that I had great dormant abilities that I had never developed. I began to fancy myself a shrewd business man. Somebody told me that John Jacob Astor had made millions investing in vacant land in New York. Who was Astor? Just an immigrant peddler with an accent. If he could do it, why couldn't I? ... I was going to be rich! I began to read the yachting magazines.

I had the courage of ignorance. I didn't know any more about buying and selling real estate than an Eskimo knows about oil furnaces. How was I to get the money to launch myself on my spectacular financial career? That was simple. I mortgaged my home, and bought some of the finest building lots in Forest Hills. I was going to hold this land until it reached a fabulous price, then sell it and live in luxury-I who had never sold a piece of real estate as big as a doll's handkerchief. I pitied the plodders who slaved in offices for a mere salary. I told myself that G.o.d had not seen fit to touch every man with the divine fire of financial genius.

Suddenly, the great depression swept down upon me like a Kansas cyclone and shook me as a tornado would shake a hen coop.

I had to pour $220 a month into that monster-mouthed piece of Good Earth. Oh, how fast those months came! In addition, I had to keep up the payments on our now-mortgaged house and find enough food. I was worried. I tried to write humour for the magazines. My attempts at humour sounded like the lamentations of Jeremiah! I was unable to sell anything. The novel I wrote failed. I ran out of money. I had nothing on which I could borrow money except my typewriter and the gold fillings in my teeth. The milk company stopped delivering milk. The gas company turned off the gas. We had to buy one of those little outdoor camp stoves you see advertised; it had a cylinder of gasoline; you pump it up by hand and it shoots out a flame with a hissing like an angry goose.

We ran out of coal; the company sued us. Our only heat was the fireplace. I would go out at night and pick up boards and left-overs from the new homes that the rich people were building ... I who had started out to be one of these rich people.

I was so worried I couldn't sleep. I often got up in the middle of the night and walked for hours to exhaust myself so I could fall asleep.

I lost not only the vacant land I had bought, but all my heart's blood that I had poured into it.

The bank closed the mortgage on my home and put me and my family out on the street.

In some way, we managed to get hold of a few dollars and rent a small apartment. We moved in the last day of 1933. I sat down on a packing case and looked around. An old saying of my mother's came back: "Don't cry over spilt milk."

But this wasn't milk. This was my heart's blood!

After I had sat there a while I said to myself: "Well, I've hit bottom and I've stood it. There's no place to go now but up."

I began to think of the fine things that the mortgage had not taken from me. I still had my health and my friends. I would start again. I would not grieve about the past. I would repeat to myself every day the words I had often heard my mother say about spilt milk.

I put into my work the energy that I had been putting into worrying. Little by little, my situation began to improve. I am almost thankful now that I had to go through all that misery; it gave me strength, fort.i.tude, and confidence. I know now what it means to hit bottom. I know it doesn't kill you. I know we can stand more than we think we can. When little worries and anxieties and uncertainties try to disturb me now, I banish them by reminding myself of the time I sat on the packing case and said: "I've hit bottom and I've stood it. There is no place to go now but up."

What's the principle here? Don't try to saw sawdust. Accept the inevitable! If you can't go lower, yon can try going up.

The Toughest Opponent I Ever Fought Was Worry By Jack Dempsey During my career in the ring, I found that Old Man Worry was an almost tougher opponent than the heavyweight boxers I fought. I realised that I had to learn to stop worrying, or worry would sap my vitality and undermine my success. So, little by little, I worked out a system for myself. Here are some of the things I did: 1. To keep up my courage in the ring, I would give myself a pep talk during the fight. For example, while I was fighting Firpo, I kept saying over and over: "Nothing is going to stop me. He is not going to hurt me. I won't feel his blows. I can't get hurt. I am going to keep going, no matter what happens." Making positive statements like that to myself, and thinking positive thoughts, helped me a lot. It even kept my mind so occupied that I didn't feel the blows. During my career, I have had my lips smashed, my eyes cut, my ribs cracked-and Firpo knocked me clear through the ropes, and I landed on a reporter's typewriter and wrecked it. But I never felt even one of Firpo's blows. There was only one blow that I ever really felt. That was the night Lester Johnson broke three of my ribs. The punch never hurt me; but it affected my breathing. I can honestly say I never felt any other blow I ever got in the ring.

2. Another thing I did was to keep reminding myself of the futility of worry. Most of my worrying was done before the big bouts, while I was going through training. I would often lie awake at nights for hours, tossing and worrying, unable to sleep. I would worry for fear I might break my hand or sprain my ankle or get my eye cut badly in the first round so I couldn't co-ordinate my punches. When I got myself into this state of nerves, I used to get out of bed, look into the mirror, and give myself a good talking to. I would say: "What a fool you are to be worrying about something than hasn't happened and may never happen. Life is short. I have only a few years to live, so I must enjoy life." I kept saying to myself: "Nothing is important but my health. Nothing is important but my health." I kept reminding myself that losing sleep and worrying would destroy my health. I found that by saying these things to myself over and over, night after night, year after year, they finally got under my skin, and I could brush off my worries like so much water.

3. The third-and best-thing I did was pray! While I was training for a bout, I always prayed several times a day. When I was in the ring, I always prayed just before the bell sounded for each round. That helped me fight with courage and confidence. I have never gone to bed in my life without saying a prayer; and I have never eaten a meal in my life without first thanking G.o.d for it ... Have my prayers been answered? Thousands of times!

I Prayed To G.o.d To Keep Me Out Of An Orphan's Home By Kathleen Halter Housewife, 1074 Roth, University City 14, Missouri As a little child, my life was filled with horror. My mother had heart trouble. Day after day, I saw her faint and fall to the floor. We all feared she was going to die, and I believed that all little girls whose mothers died were sent to the Central Wesleyan Orphans' Home, located in the little town of Warrenton, Missouri, where we lived. I dreaded the thought of going there, and when I was six years old I prayed constantly: "Dear G.o.d, please let my mummy live until I am old enough not to go to the orphans' home."

Twenty years later, my brother, Meiner, had a terrible injury and suffered intense pain until he died two years later. He couldn't feed himself or turn over in bed. To deaden his pain, I had to give him morphine hypodermics every three hours, day and night. I did this for two years. I was teaching music at the time at the Central Wesleyan College in Warrenton, Missouri. When the neighbours heard my brother screaming with pain, they would telephone me at college and I would leave my music cla.s.s and rush home to give my brother another injection of morphine. Every night when I went to bed, I would set the alarm clock to go off three hours later so I would be sure to get up to attend to my brother. I remember that on winter nights I would keep a bottle of milk outside the window, where it would freeze and turn into a kind of ice-cream that I loved to eat. When the alarm went off, this ice cream outside the window gave me an additional incentive to get up.

In the midst of all these troubles, I did two things that kept me from indulging in self-pity and worrying and embittering my life with resentment. First, I kept myself busy teaching music from twelve to fourteen hours a day, so I had little time to think of my troubles; and when I was tempted to feel sorry for myself, I kept saying to myself over and over: "Now, listen, as long as you can walk and feed yourself and are free from intense pain, you ought to be the happiest person in the world. No matter what happens, never forget that as long as you live! Never! Never!"

I was determined to do everything in my power to cultivate an unconscious and continuous att.i.tude of gratefulness for my many blessings. Every morning when I awoke, I would thank G.o.d that conditions were no worse than they were; and I resolved that in spite of my troubles I would be the happiest person in Warrenton, Missouri. Maybe I didn't succeed in achieving that goal, but I did succeed in making myself the most grateful young woman in my town-and probably few of my a.s.sociates worried less than I did.

This Missouri music teacher applied two principles described in this book: she kept too busy to worry, and she counted her blessings. The same technique may be helpful to you.

I Was Acting Like An Hysterical Woman By Cameron s.h.i.+pp Magazine Writer I had been working very happily in the publicity department of the Warner Brothers studio in California for several years. I was a unit man and feature writer. I wrote stories for newspapers and magazines about Warner Brother stars.

Suddenly, I was promoted. I was made the a.s.sistant publicity director. As a matter of fact, there was a change of administrative policy, and I was given an impressive t.i.tle: Administrative a.s.sistant.

This gave me an enormous office with a private refrigerator, two secretaries, and complete charge of a staff of seventy-five writers, exploiters, and radio men. I was enormously impressed. I went straight out and bought a new suit. I tried to speak with dignity. I set up filing systems, made decisions with authority, and ate quick lunches.

I was convinced that the whole public-relations policy of Warner Brothers had descended upon my shoulders. I perceived that the lives, both private and public, of such renowned persons as Bette Davis, Olivia De Havilland, James Cagney, Edward G. Robinson, Errol Flynn, Humphrey Bogart, Ann Sheridan, Alexis Smith, and Alan Hale were entirely in my hands.

In less than a month I became aware that I had stomach ulcers. Probably cancer.

My chief war activity at that time was chairman of the War Activities Committee of the Screen Publicists Guild. I liked to do this work, liked to meet my friends at guild meetings. But these gatherings became matters of dread. After every meeting, I was violently ill. Often I had to stop my car on the way home, pulling myself together before I could drive on. There seemed to be so much to do, so little time in which to do it. It was all vital. And I was woefully inadequate.

I am being perfectly truthful-this was the most painful illness of my entire life. There was always a tight fist in my vitals. I lost weight. I could not sleep. The pain was constant.

So I went to see a renowned expert in internal medicine. An advertising man recommended him. He said this physician had many clients who were advertising men.

This physician spoke only briefly, just enough for me to tell him where I hurt and what I did for a living. He seemed more interested in my job than in my ailments, but I was soon rea.s.sured: for two weeks, daily, he gave me every known test. I was probed, explored, X-rayed, and fluoroscoped. Finally, I was instructed to call on him and hear the verdict.

"Mr. s.h.i.+pp," he said, leaning back and offering me a cigarette, "we have been through these exhaustive tests. They were absolutely necessary, although I knew of course after my first quick examination that you did not have stomach ulcers.

"But I knew, because you are the kind of man you are and because you do the kind of work you do, that you would not believe me unless I showed you. Let me show you."

So he showed me the charts and the X-rays and explained them. He showed me I had no ulcers.

"Now," said the doctor, "this costs you a good deal of money, but it is worth it to you. Here is the prescription: don't worry.

"Now"-he stopped me as I started to expostulate-;"now, I realise that you can't follow the prescription immediately, so I'll give you a crutch. Here are some pills. They contain belladonna. Take as many as you like. When you use these up, come back and I'll give you more. They won't hurt you. But they will always relax you.

"But remember: you don't need them. All you have to do is quit worrying.