How to Stop Worrying and Start Living - by Dale Carnegie

Live in "Day-tight Compartments"

A Magic Formula For Solving Worry Situations

  1. 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.

How To Break The Worry Habit Before It Breaks You

  • RULE 1: Crowd worry out of your mind by keeping busy. Plenty of action is one of the best therapies ever devised for curing "wibber gibbers".

  • RULE 2: Don't fuss about trifles. Don't permit little things-the mere termites of life-to ruin your happiness.

  • RULE 3: Use the law of averages to outlaw your worries. Ask yourself: "What are the odds against this thing's happening at all?"

  • RULE 4: Co-operate with the inevitable. If you know a circumstance is beyond your power to change or revise, say to yourself "It is so; it cannot be otherwise."

  • RULE 5: Put a "stop-loss" order on your worries. Decide just how much anxiety a thing may be worth-and refuse to give it any more.

  • RULE 6: Let the past bury its dead. Don't saw sawdust.

Seven Ways To Cultivate A Mental Attitude That Will Bring You Peace And Happiness

  • RULE 1: Let's fill our minds with thoughts of peace, courage, health, and hope, for "our life is what our thoughts make it".

  • RULE 2: Let's never try to get even with our enemies, because if we do we will hurt ourselves far more than we hurt them. Let's do as General Eisenhower does: let's never waste a minute thinking about people we don't like.

  • RULE 3: A. Instead of worrying about ingratitude, let's expect it. Let's remember that Jesus healed ten lepers in one day-and only one thanked Him. Why should we expect more gratitude than Jesus got? B. Let's remember that the only way to find happiness is not to expect gratitude-but to give for the joy of giving. C. Let's remember that gratitude is a "cultivated" trait; so if we want our children to be grateful, we must train them to be grateful.

  • RULE 4: Count your blessings-not your troubles!

  • RULE 5: Let's not imitate others. Let's find ourselves and be ourselves, for "envy is ignorance" and "imitation is suicide".

  • RULE 6: When fate hands us a lemon, let's try to make a lemonade.

  • RULE 7: Let's forget our own unhappiness-by trying to create a little happiness for others. "When you are good to others, you are best to yourself."

How To Keep From Worrying About Criticism

  • RULE 1: Unjust criticism is often a disguised compliment. It often means that you have aroused jealousy and envy. Remember that no one ever kicks a dead dog.

  • RULE 2: Do the very best you can; and then put up your old umbrella and keep the rain of criticism from running down the back of your neck.

  • RULE 3: Let's keep a record of the fool things we have done and criticise ourselves. Since we can't hope to be perfect, let's do what E. H. Little did: let's ask for unbiased, helpful, constructive criticism.

Four Good Working Habits That Will Help Prevent Fatigue And Worry Good Working

  1. Clear Your Desk of All Papers Except Those Relating to the Immediate Problem at Hand.

  2. Do Things in the Order of Their Importance.

  3. When You Face a Problem, Solve It Then and There if You Have the Facts Necessary to Make a Decision. Don't Keep Putting off Decisions.

  4. Learn to Organise, Deputise, and Supervise.

Good writing is the kind that transfers your thoughts and emotions to the reader- and to do that, you don't need a large vocabulary, but you do need ideas, experience, convictions, examples and excitement.

Remember what George Bernard Shaw said? "The secret of being miserable is to have the leisure to bother about whether you are happy or not." Keep active, keep busy!