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Keep a diary—a diary in which you ought to record your triumphs in the application of these principles. Be specific. Give names, dates, results. Keeping such a record will inspire you to greater efforts; and how fascinating these entries will be when you chance upon them some evening, years from now!
Nine Suggestions on How to Get the Most Out of This Book
“Our main business is not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand.”
living in “day-tight compartments.”
Touch a button and hear, at every level of your life, the iron doors shutting out the Past—the dead yesterdays. Touch another and shut off, with a metal curtain, the Future—the unborn tomorrows. Then you are safe—safe for today! … Shut off the past! Let the dead past bury its dead…. Shut out the yesterdays which have lighted fools the way to dusty death…. The load of tomorrow, added to that of yesterday, carried today, makes the strongest falter. Shut off the future as tightly as the past…. The future is today…. There is no tomorrow.
the best possible way to prepare for tomorrow is to concentrate with all your intelligence, all your enthusiasm, on doing today’s work superbly today. That is the only possible way you can prepare for the future.
Sir William Osler urged the students at Yale to begin the day with Christ’s prayer “Give us this day our daily bread.”
No, this prayer teaches us to ask for today’s bread only. Today’s bread is the only kind of bread you can possibly eat.
Whether in war or peace, the chief difference between good thinking and bad thinking is this: good thinking deals with causes and effects and leads to logical, constructive planning; bad thinking frequently leads to tension and nervous breakdowns.
Lead, kindly Light … Keep thou my feet: I do not ask to see The distant scene; one step enough for me.
‘I want you to think of your life as an hourglass. You know there are thousands of grains of sand in the top of the hourglass; and they all pass slowly and evenly through the narrow neck in the middle. Nothing you or I could do would make more than one grain of sand pass through this narrow neck without impairing the hourglass. You and I and everyone else are like this hourglass. When we start in the morning, there are hundreds of tasks which we feel that we must accomplish that day, but if we do not take them one at a time and let them pass through the day slowly and evenly, as do the grains
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‘One grain of sand at a time…. One task at a time.’
One of the most appalling comments on our present way of life is that at one time half of all the beds in our hospitals were reserved for patients with nervous and mental troubles, patients who had collapsed under the crushing burden of accumulated yesterdays and fearful tomorrows. Yet a vast majority of those people could have avoided those hospitals—could have led happy, useful lives—if they had only heeded the words of Jesus: “Have no anxiety about the morrow”; or the words of Sir William Osler: “Live in day-tight compartments.”
So let’s be content to live the only time we can possibly live: from now until bedtime. “Anyone can carry his burden, however hard, until nightfall,” wrote Robert Louis Stevenson. “Anyone can do his work, however hard, for one day. Anyone can live sweetly, patiently, lovingly, purely, till the sun goes down. And this is all that life really means.”
‘Every day is a new life to a wise man.’
‘Today is a new life.’
Happy the man, and happy he alone, He, who can call to-day his own: He who, secure within, can say: “To-morrow, do thy worst, for I have liv’d to-day.”
Life, we learn too late, is in the living, in the tissue of every day and hour.”
“My life,” he said, “has been full of terrible misfortunes most of which never happened.”
But today well lived makes every yesterday a dream of happiness And every tomorrow a vision of hope. Look well, therefore, to this day! Such is the salutation to the dawn.
1. Shut the iron doors on the past and the future. Live in Day-tight Compartments.
“Step I. I analyzed the situation fearlessly and honestly and figured out what was the worst that could possibly happen as a result of this failure.
“Step II. After figuring out what was the worst that could possibly happen, I reconciled myself to accepting it, if necessary.
“Step III. From that time on, I calmly devoted my time and energy to trying to improve upon the worst which I had already accepted mentally.
one of the worst features about worrying is that it destroys our ability to concentrate.
When we have accepted the worst, we have nothing more to lose. And that automatically means—we have everything to gain!
Ask yourself, “What is the worst that can possibly happen?” 2. Prepare to accept it if you have to. 3. Then calmly proceed to improve on the worst.
“Seventy per cent of all patients who come to physicians could cure themselves if they only got rid of their fears and worries. Don’t think for a moment that I mean that their ills are imaginary,” he said. “Their ills are as real as a throbbing toothache and sometimes a hundred times more serious. I refer to such illnesses as nervous indigestion, some stomach ulcers, heart disturbances, insomnia, some headaches, and some types of paralysis.
“You do not get stomach ulcers from what you eat. You get ulcers from what is eating you.”
Fear, worry, hate, supreme selfishness, and the inability to adjust themselves to the world of reality—these were largely the causes of their stomach illnesses and stomach ulcers….
Their “nervous troubles” are caused not by a physical deterioration of the nerves, but by emotions of futility, frustration, anxiety, worry, fear, defeat, despair.
Relaxation and Recreation The most relaxing recreating forces are a healthy religion, sleep, music, and laughter. Have faith in God—learn to sleep well— Love good music—see the funny side of life— And health and happiness will be yours.
Get the facts. 2. Analyze the facts. 3. Arrive at a decision—and then act on that decision
“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.”
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.
merely writing the facts on a piece of paper and stating our problem clearly goes a long way toward helping us reach a sensible decision.
“1. What am I worrying about? “2. What can I do about it?
“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.”
“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.
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.”
1. What is the problem? 2. What is the CAUSE of the problem? 3. What are all possible solutions to the problem? 4. What solution do you suggest?
“The secret of being miserable is to have the leisure to bother about whether you are happy or not.”
By the law of averages, it won’t happen.’ That phrase has destroyed ninety per cent of my worries; and it has made the past twenty years of my life beautiful and peaceful beyond my highest expectations.”
It has been said that nearly all of our worries and unhappiness come from our imagination and not from reality.
let the law of averages do the worrying for me—and
“Let’s examine the record.” Let’s ask ourselves: “What are the chances, according to the law of averages, that this event I am worrying about will ever occur?”
As you and I march across the decades of time, we are going to meet a lot of unpleasant situations that are so. They cannot be otherwise. We have our choice. We can either accept them as inevitable and adjust ourselves to them, or we can ruin our lives with rebellion and maybe end up with a nervous breakdown.
“Be willing to have it so,” he said. “Acceptance of what has happened is the first step to overcoming the consequences of any misfortune.”
I have ceased mourning over the past that is forever gone. I am living each day now with joy—just as my nephew would have wanted me to do. I have made peace with life.
