How to Stop Worrying and Start Living Part 2

"I went to the mirror. And when I looked in that mirror, I saw what worry was doing to my looks! I saw the lines it was forming. I saw the anxious expression. So I said to myself: 'You've got to stop this at once! You can't afford to worry. The only thing you have to offer at all is your looks, and worry will ruin them I'"

Few things can age and sour a woman and destroy her looks as quickly as worry. Worry curdles the expression. It makes us clench our jaws and lines our faces with wrinkles. It forms a permanent scowl. It may turn the hair grey, and in some cases, even make it fall out. It can ruin the complexion- it can bring on all kinds of skin rashes, eruptions, and pimples.

Heart disease, is the number-one killer in America today. During the Second World War, almost a third of a million men were killed in combat; but during that same period, heart disease killed two million civilians-and one million of those casualties were caused by the kind of heart disease that is brought on by worry and high-tension living. Yes, heart disease is one of the chief reasons why Dr. Alexis Carrel said: "Business men who do not know how to fight worry die young."

The Negroes down south and the Chinese rarely have the kind of heart disease brought on by worry, because they take things calmly. Twenty times as many doctors as farm workers die from heart failure. The doctors lead tense lives-and pay the penalty.

"The Lord may forgive us our sins," said William James, "but the nervous system never does."

Here is a startling and almost incredible fact: more Americans commit suicide each year than die from the five most common communicable diseases.

Why? The answer is largely: "Worry."

When the cruel Chinese war lords wanted to torture their prisoners, they would tie their prisoners hand and foot and put them under a bag of water that constantly dripped ... dripped ... dripped ... day and night. These drops of water constantly falling on the head finally became like the sound of hammer blows-and drove men insane. This same method of torture was used during the Spanish Inquisition and in German concentration camps under Hitler.

Worry is like the constant drip, drip, drip of water; and the constant drip, drip, drip of worry often drives men to insanity and suicide.

When I was a country lad in Missouri, I was half scared to death by listening to Billy Sunday describe the h.e.l.l-fires of the next world. But he never ever mentioned the h.e.l.l-fires of physical agony that worriers may have here and now. For example, if you are a chronic worrier, you may be stricken some day with one of the most excruciating pains ever endured by man: angina pectoris.

Boy, if that ever hits you, you will scream with agony. Your screams will make the sounds in Dante's Inferno sound like Babes in Toyland. You will say to yourself then: "Oh, G.o.d, oh, G.o.d, if I can ever get over this, I will never worry about anything-ever." (If you think I am exaggerating, ask your family physician.) Do you love life? Do you want to live long and enjoy good health? Here is how you can do it. I am quoting Dr. Alexis Carrel again. He said: "Those who keep the peace of their inner selves in the midst of the tumult of the modern city are immune from nervous diseases."

Can you keep the peace of your inner self in the midst of the tumult of a modem city? If you are a normal person, the answer is "yes". "Emphatically yes." Most of us are stronger than we realise. We have inner resources that we have probably never tapped. As Th.o.r.eau said in his immortal book, Walden: "I know of no more encouraging fact than the unquestionable ability of man to elevate his life by a conscious endeavour. ... If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavours to live the life he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours."

Surely, many of the readers of this book have as much will power and as many inner resources as Olga K. Jarvey has. Her address is Box 892, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. She discovered that under the most tragic circ.u.mstances she could banish worry. I firmly believe that you and I can also-if we apply the old, old truths discussed in this volume. Here is Olga K. Jarvey's story as she wrote it for me: "Eight and a half years ago, I was condemned to die-a slow, agonising death-of cancer. The best medical brains of the country, the Mayo brothers, confirmed the sentence. I was at a dead-end street, the ultimate gaped at me! I was young. I did not want to die! In my desperation, I phoned to my doctor at Kellogg and cried out to him the despair in my heart. Rather impatiently he upbraided me: 'What's the matter, Olga, haven't you any fight in you? Sure, you will die if you keep on crying. Yes, the worst has overtaken you. O.K.-face the facts! Quit worrying 1 And then do something about it!' Right then and there I took an oath, an oath so solemn that the nails sank deep into my flesh and cold chills ran down my spine: 'I am not going to worry! I am not going to cry! And if there is anything to mind over matter, I am going to win! I am going to LIVE!'

"The usual amount of X-ray in such advanced cases, where they cannot apply radium, is 10 1/2 minutes a day for 30 days. They gave me X-ray for 14 1/2 minutes a day for 49 days; and although my bones stuck out of my emaciated body like rocks on a barren hillside, and although my feet were like lead, I did not worry! Not once did I cry! I smiled! Yes, I actually forced myself to smile.

"I am not so foolish as to imagine that merely smiling can cure cancer. But I do believe that a cheerful mental att.i.tude helps the body fight disease. At any rate, I experienced one of the miracle cures of cancer. I have never been healthier than in the last few years, thanks to those challenging, fighting words of Dr. McCaffery: 'Face the facts: Quite worrying; then do something about it!'"

I am going to close this chapter by repeating its t.i.tle: the words of Dr. Alexis Carrel: "Business men who do not know how to fight worry die young."

The fanatical followers of the prophet Mohammed often had verses from the Koran tattooed on their b.r.e.a.s.t.s. I would like to have the t.i.tle of this chapter tattooed on the breast of every reader of this book: "Business men who do not know how to fight worry die young."

Was Dr. Carrel speaking of you?

Could be.

Part One In A Nutsh.e.l.l

RULE 1: If you want to avoid worry, do what Sir William Osier did: Live in "day-tight compartments". Don't stew about the future. Just live each day until bedtime.

RULE 2: The next time Trouble-with a capital T- comes gunning for you and backs you up in a corner, try the magic formula of Willis H. Carrier: a. Ask yourself, "What is the worst that can possibly happen if I can't solve my problem?"

b. Prepare yourself mentally to accept the worst-if necessary.

c. Then calmly try to improve upon the worst-which you have already mentally a agreed to accept.

RULE 3: Remind yourself of the exorbitant price you can pay for worry in terms of your health. "Business men who do not know how to fight worry die young."

Part Two - Basic Techniques In a.n.a.lysing Worry

Chapter 4 - How To a.n.a.lyse And Solve Worry Problems.

I keep six honest serving-men (They taught me all I knew): Their names are What and Why and When And How and Where and Who.

-Rudyard Kipling ----.

Will the magic formula of Willis H. Carrier, described in Part One, Chapter 2, solve all worry problems? No, of course not. Then what is the answer? The answer is that we must equip ourselves to deal with different kinds of worries by learning the three basic steps of problem a.n.a.lysis. The three steps are: 1. Get the facts.

2. a.n.a.lyse the facts.

3. Arrive at a decision-and then act on that decision.

Obvious stuff? Yes, Aristotle taught it-and used it. And you and I must use it too if we are going to solve the problems that are hara.s.sing us and turning our days and nights into veritable h.e.l.ls.

Let's take the first rule: Get the facts. Why is it so important to get the facts? Because unless we have the facts we can't possibly even attempt to solve our problem intelligently. Without the facts, all we can do is stew around in confusion. My idea? No, that was the idea of the late Herbert E. Hawkes, Dean of Columbia College, Columbia University, for twenty-two years. He had helped two hundred thousand students solve their worry problems; and he told me that "confusion is the chief cause of worry". He put it this way-he said: "Half the worry in the world is caused by people trying to make decisions before they have sufficient knowledge on which to base a decision. For example," he said, "if I have a problem which has to be faced at three o'clock next Tuesday, I refuse even to try to make a decision about it until next Tuesday arrives. In the meantime, I concentrate on getting all the facts that bear on the problem. I don't worry," he said, "I don't agonise over my problem. I don't lose any sleep. I simply concentrate on getting the facts. And by the time Tuesday rolls around, if I've got all the facts, the problem usually solves itself!"

I asked Dean Hawkes if this meant he had licked worry entirely. "Yes," he said, "I think I can honestly say that my live is now almost totally devoid of worry. I have found," he went on, "that if a man will devote his time to securing facts in an impartial, objective way, his worries usually evaporate in the light of knowledge."

Let me repeat that: "If a man will devote his time to securing facts in an impartial, objective way, his worries will usually evaporate in the light of knowledge."

But what do most of us do ? If we bother with facts at all- and Thomas Edison said in all seriousness: "There is no expedient to which a man will not resort to avoid the labour of thinking"-if we bother with facts at all, we hunt like bird dogs after the facts that bolster up what we already think-and ignore all the others! We want only the facts that justify our acts-the facts that fit in conveniently with our wishful thinking and justify our preconceived prejudices!

As Andre Maurois put it: "Everything that is in agreement with our personal desires seems true. Everything that is not puts us into a rage."

Is it any wonder, then, that we find it so hard to get at the answers to our problems? Wouldn't we have the same trouble trying to solve a second-grade arithmetic problem, if we went ahead on the a.s.sumption that two plus two equals five? Yet there are a lot of people in this world who make life a h.e.l.l for themselves and others by insisting that two plus two equals five-or maybe five hundred!

What can we do about it? We have to keep our emotions out of our thinking; and, as Dean Hawkes put it, we must secure the facts in "an impartial, objective" manner.

That is not an easy task when we are worried. When we are worried, our emotions are riding high. But here are two ideas that I have found helpful when trying to step aside from my problems, in order to see the facts in a clear, objective manner.

1. When trying to get the facts, I pretend that I am collecting this information not for myself, but for some other person. This helps me to take a cold, impartial view of the evidence. This helps me eliminate my emotions.

2. While trying to collect the facts about the problem that is worrying me, I sometimes pretend that I am a lawyer preparing to argue the other side of the issue. In other words, I try to get all the facts against myself-all the facts that are damaging to my wishes, all the facts I don't like to face.

Then I write down both my side of the case and the other side of the case-and I generally find that the truth lies somewhere in between these two extremities.

Here is the point I am trying to make. Neither you nor I nor Einstein nor the Supreme Court of the United States is brilliant enough to reach an intelligent decision on any problem without first getting the facts. Thomas Edison knew that. At the time of his death, he had two thousand five hundred notebooks filled with facts about the problems he was facing.

So Rule 1 for solving our problems is: Get the facts. Let's do what Dean Hawkes did: let's not even attempt to solve our problems without first collecting all the facts in an impartial manner.

However, getting all the facts in the world won't do us any good until we a.n.a.lyse them and interpret them.

I have found from costly experience that it is much easier to a.n.a.lyse the facts after writing them Sown. In fact, merely writing the facts on a piece of paper and stating our problem clearly goes a long way toward helping us to reach a sensible decision. As Charles Kettering puts it: "A problem well stated is a problem half solved."

Let me show you all this as it works out in practice. Since the Chinese say one picture is worth ten thousand words, suppose I show you a picture of how one man put exactly what we are talking about into concrete action.

Let's take the case of Galen Litchfield-a man I have known for several years; one of the most successful American business men in the Far East. Mr. Litchfield was in China in 1942, when the j.a.panese invaded Shanghai. And here is his story as he told it to me while a guest in my home: "Shortly after the j.a.ps took Pearl Harbour," Galen Litchfield began, "they came swarming into Shanghai. I was the manager of the Asia Life Insurance Company in Shanghai. They sent us an 'army liquidator'-he was really an admiral- and gave me orders to a.s.sist this man in liquidating our a.s.sets. I didn't have any choice in the matter. I could co-operate-or else. And the 'or else' was certain death.

"I went through the motions of doing what I was told, because I had no alternative. But there was one block of securities, worth $750,000, which I left off the list I gave to the admiral. I left that block of securities off the list because they belonged to our Hong Kong organisation and had nothing to do with the Shanghai a.s.sets. All the same, I feared I might be in hot water if the j.a.ps found out what I had done. And they soon found out.

"I wasn't in the office when the discovery was made, but my head accountant was there. He told me that the j.a.p admiral flew into a rage, and stamped and swore, and called me a thief and a traitor! I had defied the j.a.panese Army! I knew what that meant. I would be thrown into the Bridge house!

"The Bridge house 1 The torture chamber of the j.a.panese Gestapo! I had had personal friends who had killed themselves rather than be taken to that prison. I had had other friends who had died in that place after ten days of questioning and torture. Now I was slated for the Bridge house myself!

"What did I do? I heard the news on Sunday afternoon. I suppose I should have been terrified. And I would have been terrified if I hadn't had a definite technique for solving my problems. For years, whenever I was worried I had always gone to my typewriter and written down two questions-and the answers to these questions: "1. What am I worrying about?

"2. What can I do about it?

"I used to try to answer those questions without writing them down. But I stopped that years ago. I found that writing down both the questions and the answers clarifies my thinking.

So, that Sunday afternoon, I went directly to my room at the Shanghai Y.M.C.A. and got out my typewriter. I wrote: "I. What am I worrying about?

I am afraid I will be thrown into the Bridge house tomorrow morning.

"Then I typed out the second question: "2. What can I do about it?

"I spent hours thinking out and writing down the four courses of action I could take-and what the probable consequence of each action would be.

1. I can try to explain to the j.a.panese admiral. But he "no speak English". If I try to explain to him through an interpreter, I may stir him up again. That might mean death, for he is cruel, would rather dump me in the Bridge house than bother talking about it.

2. I can try to escape. Impossible. They keep track of me all the time. I have to check in and out of my room at the Y.M.C.A. If I try to escape, I'll probably be captured and shot.

3. I can stay here in my room and not go near the office again. If I do, the j.a.panese admiral will be suspicion, will probably send soldiers to get me and throw me into the Bridge-house without giving me a chance to say a word.

4. I can go down to the office as usual on Monday morning. If I do, there is a chance that the j.a.panese admiral may be so busy that he will not think of what I did. Even if he does think of it, he may have cooled off and may not bother me. If this happens, I am all right. Even if he does bother me, I'll still have a chance to try to explain to him. So, going down to the office as usual on Monday morning, and acting as if nothing had gone wrong gives me two chances to escape the Bridge-house.

"As soon as I thought it all out and decided to accept the fourth plan-to go down to the office as usual on Monday morning-I felt immensely relieved.

"When I entered the office the next morning, the j.a.panese admiral sat there with a cigarette dangling from his mouth. He glared at me as he always did; and said nothing. Six weeks later-thank G.o.d-he went back to Tokyo and my worries were ended.

"As I have already said, I probably saved my life by sitting down that Sunday afternoon and writing out all the various steps I could take and then writing down the probable consequences of each step and calmly coming to a decision. If I hadn't done that, I might have floundered and hesitated and done the wrong thing on the spur of the moment. If I hadn't thought out my problem and come to a decision, I would have been frantic with worry all Sunday afternoon. I wouldn't have slept that night. I would have gone down to the office Monday morning with a hara.s.sed and worried look; and that alone might have aroused the suspicion of the j.a.panese admiral and spurred him to act.

"Experience has proved to me, time after time, the enormous value of arriving at a decision. It is the failure to arrive at a fixed purpose, the inability to stop going round and round in maddening circles, that drives men to nervous breakdowns and living h.e.l.ls. I find that fifty per cent of my worries vanishes once I arrive at a clear, definite decision; and another forty per cent usually vanishes once I start to carry out that decision.

"So I banish about ninety per cent of my worries by taking these four steps: "1. Writing down precisely what I am worrying about.

"2. Writing down what I can do about it.

"3. Deciding what to do.

"4. Starting immediately to carry out that decision."

Galen Litchfield is now the Far Eastern Director for Starr, Park and Freeman, Inc., III John Street, New York, representing large insurance and financial interests.

In fact, as I said before, Galen Litchfield today is one of the most important American business men in Asia; and he confesses to me that he owes a large part of his success to this method of a.n.a.lysing worry and meeting it head-on.

Why is his method so superb? Because it is efficient, concrete, and goes directly to the heart of the problem. On top of all that, it is climaxed by the third and indispensable rule: Do something about it. Unless we carry out our action, all our fact-finding and a.n.a.lysis is whistling upwind-it's a sheer waste of energy.

William James said this: "When once a decision is reached and execution is the order of the day, dismiss absolutely all responsibility and care about the outcome." In this case, William James undoubtedly used the word "care" as a synonym for "anxiety".) He meant-once you have made a careful decision based on facts, go into action. Don't stop to reconsider. Don't begin to hesitate worry and retrace your steps. Don't lose yourself in self-doubting which begets other doubts. Don't keep looking back over your shoulder.

I once asked Waite Phillips, one of Oklahoma's most prominent oil men, how he carried out decisions. He replied: "I find that to keep thinking about our problems beyond a certain point is bound to create confusion and worry. There comes a time when any more investigation and thinking are harmful. There comes a time when we must decide and act and never look back."

Why don't you employ Galen Litchfield's technique to one of your worries right now?

Here is question No. 1 -What am I worrying about? (Please pencil the answer to that question in the s.p.a.ce below.) Question No. 2 -What can I do about it? (Please write your answer to that question in the s.p.a.ce below.) Question No. 3 -Here is what I am going to do about it.

Question No. 4 -When am I going to start doing it?

Chapter 5 - How to Eliminate Fifty Per Cent of Tour Business Worries IF you are a business man, you are probably saying to yourself right now: "The t.i.tle of this chapter is ridiculous. I have been running my business for nineteen years; and I certainly know the answers if anybody does. The idea of anybody trying to tell me how I can eliminate fifty per cent of my business worries-it's absurd I"

Fair enough-I would have felt exactly the same way myself a few years ago if I had seen this t.i.tle on a chapter. It promises a lot-and promises are cheap.

Let's be very frank about it: maybe I won't be able to help you eliminate fifty per cent of your business worries. In the last a.n.a.lysis, no one can do that, except yourself. But what I can do is to show you how other people have done it-and leave the rest to you!

You may recall that on page 25 of this book I quoted the world-famous Dr. Alexis Carrel as saying: "Business men who do not know how to fight worry die young."

Since worry is that serious, wouldn't you be satisfied if I could help you eliminate even ten per cent of your worries? ... Yes? ... Good! Well, I am going to show you how one business executive eliminated not fifty per cent of his worries, but seventy-five per cent of all the time he formerly spent in conferences, trying to solve business problems.

Furthermore, I am not going to tell you this story about a "Mr. Jones" or a "Mr. X" or "or a man I know in Ohio"- vague stories that you can't check up on. It concerns a very real person-Leon s.h.i.+mkin, a partner and general manager of one of the foremost publis.h.i.+ng houses in the United States: Simon and Schuster, Rockefeller Centre, New York 20, New York.

Here is Leon s.h.i.+mkin's experience in his own words: "For fifteen years I spent almost half of every business day holding conferences, discussing problems. Should we do this or that-do nothing at all? We would get tense; twist in our chairs; walk the floor; argue and go around in circles. When night came, I would be utterly exhausted. I fully expected to go on doing this sort of thing for the rest of my life. I had been doing it for fifteen years, and it never occurred to me that there was a better way of doing it. If anyone had told me that I could eliminate three-fourths of all the time I spent in those worried conferences, and three-fourths of my nervous strain-I would have thought he was a wild-eyed, slap-happy, armchair optimist. Yet I devised a plan that did just that. I have been using this plan for eight years. It has performed wonders for my efficiency, my health, and my happiness.

"It sounds like magic-but like all magic tricks, it is extremely simple when you see how it is done.

"Here is the secret: First, I immediately stopped the procedure I had been using in my conferences for fifteen years-a procedure that began with my troubled a.s.sociates reciting all the details of what had gone wrong, and ending up by asking: 'What shall we do?' Second, I made a new rule-a rule that everyone who wishes to present a problem to me must first prepare and submit a memorandum answering these four questions: "Question 1: What is the problem?

("In the old days we used to spend an hour or two in a worried conference without anyone's knowing specifically and concretely what the real problem was. We used to work ourselves into a lather discussing our troubles without ever troubling to write out specifically what our problem was.) "Question 2: What is the cause of the problem?

("As I look back over my career, I am appalled at the wasted hours I have spent in worried conferences without ever trying to find out clearly the conditions which lay at the root of the problem.) "Question 3: What are all possible solutions of the problem?

("In the old days, one man in the conference would suggest one solution. Someone else would argue with him. Tempers would flare. We would often get clear off the subject, and at the end of the conference no one would have written down all the various things we could do to attack the problem.) "Question 4: What solution do you suggest?

("I used to go into a conference with a man who had spent hours worrying about a situation and going around in circles without ever once thinking through all possible solutions and then writing down: 'This is the solution I recommend.') "My a.s.sociates rarely come to me now with their problems. Why? Because they have discovered that in order to answer these four questions they have to get all the facts and think their problems through. And after they have done that they find, in three-fourths of the cases, they don't have to consult me at all, because the proper solution has popped out like a piece of bread popping out from an electric toaster. Even in those cases where consultation is necessary, the discussion takes about one-third the time formerly required, because it proceeds along an orderly, logical path to a reasoned conclusion.

"Much less time is now consumed in the house of Simon and Schuster in worrying and talking about what is wrong; and a lot more action is obtained toward making those things right."

My friend, Frank Bettger, one of the top insurance men in America, tells me he not only reduced his business worries, but nearly doubled his income, by a similar method.