Epictetus said that nineteen centuries ago, but modern medicine would back him up. Dr. G. Canby Robinson declared that four out of five patients admitted to Johns Hopkins Hospital were suffering from conditions brought on in part by emotional strains and stresses. This was often true even in cases of organic disturbances. “Eventually,” he declared, “these trace back to maladjustments to life and its problems.”
Montaigne, the great French philosopher, adopted these seventeen words as the motto of his life: “A man is not hurt so much by what happens, as by his opinion of what happens.” And our opinion of what happens is entirely up to us.
What do I mean? Have I the colossal effrontery to tell you to your face-when you are mowed down by troubles, and your nerves are sticking out like wires and curling up at the ends-have I the colossal effrontery to tell you that, under those conditions, you can change your mental attitude by an effort of will? Yes, I mean precisely that! And that is not all. I am going to show you how to do it. It may take a little effort, but the secret is simple.
William James, who has never been topped in his knowledge of practical psychology, once made this observation: “Action seems to follow feeling, but really action and feeling go together; and by regulating the action, which is under the more direct control of the will, we can indirectly regulate the feeling, which is not.”
In other words, William James tells us that we cannot instantly change our emotions just by “making up our minds to”-but that we can change our actions. And that when we change our actions, we will automatically change our feelings.
“Thus,” he explains, “The sovereign voluntary path to cheerfulness, if your cheerfulness be lost, is to sit up cheerfully and to act and speak as if cheerfulness were already there.”
Does that simple trick work? It works like plastic surgery! Try it yourself. Put a big, broad, honest-to-God smile on your face; throw back your shoulders; take a good, deep breath; and sing a snatch of song. If you can’t sing, whistle. If you can’t whistle, hum. You will quickly discover what William James was talking about-that it is physically impossible to remain blue or depressed while you are acting out the symptoms of being radiantly happy!
This is one of the little basic truths of nature that can easily work miracles in all our lives. I know a woman in California -I won’t mention her name-who could wipe out all of her miseries in twenty-fours if only she knew this secret. She’s old, and she’s a widow-that’s sad, I admit-but does she try to act happy? No; if you ask her how she is feeling, she says: “Oh, I’m all right”-but the expression on her face and the whine in her voice say: “Oh, God, if you only knew the troubles I’ve seen!” She seems to reproach you for being happy in her presence. Hundreds of women are worse off that she is: her husband left her enough insurance to last the rest of her life, and she has married children to give her a home. But I’ve rarely seen her smile. She complains that all three of her sons-in-law are stingy and selfish-although she is a guest in their homes for months at a time. And she complains that her daughters never give her presents-although she hoards her own money carefully, “for my old age”. She is a blight on herself and her unfortunate family! But does it have to be so? That is the pity of it-she could change herself from a miserable, bitter, and unhappy old woman into an honoured and beloved member of the family-if she wanted to change. And all she would have to do to work this transformation would be to start acting cheerful; start acting as though she had a little love to give away-instead of squandering it all on her own unhappy and embittered self.
I know a man in Indiana-H. J. Englert, of 1335 nth Street, Tell City, Indiana-who is still alive today because he discovered this secret. Ten years ago Mr. Englert had a case of scarlet fever; and when he recovered, he found he had developed nephritis, a kidney disease. He tried all kinds of doctors, “even quacks”, he informs me, but nothing could cure him.
Then, a short time ago, he got other complications. His blood pressure soared. He went to a doctor, and was told that his blood pressure was hitting the top at 214. He was told that it was fatal-that the condition was progressive, and he had better put his affairs in order at once.
“I went home,” he says, “and made sure that my insurance was all paid up, and then I apologised to my Maker for all my mistakes, and settled down to gloomy meditations.
“I made everyone unhappy. My wife and family were miserable, and I was buried deep in depression myself. However, after a week of wallowing in self-pity, I said to myself: ‘You’re acting like a fool! You may not die for a year yet, so why not try to be happy while you’re here?’
“I threw back my shoulders, put a smile on my face, and attempted to act as though everything were normal. I admit it was an effort at first-but I forced myself to be pleasant and cheerful; and this not only helped my family, but it also helped me.
“The first thing I knew, I began to feel better-almost as well as I pretended to feel! The improvement went on. And today-months after I was supposed to be in my grave-I am not only happy, well, and alive, but my blood pressure is down! I know one thing for certain: the doctor’s prediction would certainly have come true if I had gone on thinking ‘dying’ thoughts of defeat. But I gave my body a chance to heal itself, by nothing in the world but a change of mental attitude!”
Let me ask you a question: If merely acting cheerful and thinking positive thoughts of health and courage can save this man’s life, why should you and I tolerate for one minute more our minor glooms and depressions? Why make ourselves, and everyone around us, unhappy and blue, when it is possible for us to start creating happiness by merely acting cheerful?
Years ago, I read a little book that had a lasting and profound effect on my life. It was called As a Man Thinketh (*) by James Lane Allen, and here’s what it said:
“A man will find that as he alters his thoughts towards things and other people, things and other people will alter towards him. … Let a man radically alter his thoughts, and he will be astonished at the rapid transformation it will effect in the material conditions of his life. Men do not attract that which they want, but that which they are. … The divinity that shapes our ends is in ourselves. It is our very self. … All that a man achieves is the direct result of his own thoughts. … A man can only rise, conquer and achieve by lifting up his thoughts. He can only remain weak and abject and miserable by refusing to lift up his thoughts.”
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[*] Fowler & Co. Ltd.
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According to the book of Genesis, the Creator gave man dominion over the whole wide earth. A mighty big present. But I am not interested in any such super-royal prerogatives. All I desire is dominion over myself-dominion over my thoughts; dominion over my fears; dominion over my mind and over my spirit. And the wonderful thing is that I know that I can attain this dominion to an astonishing degree, any time I want to, by merely controlling my actions-which in turn control my reactions.
So let us remember these words of William James: “Much of what we call Evil … can often be converted into a bracing and tonic good by a simple change of the sufferer’s inner attitude from one of fear to one of fight.”
Let’s fight for our happiness!
Let’s fight for our happiness by following a daily programme of cheerful and constructive thinking. Here is such a programme. It is entitled “Just for Today”. I found this programme so inspiring that I gave away hundreds of copies. It was written thirty-six years ago by the late Sibyl F. Partridge. If you and I follow it, we will eliminate most of our worries and increase immeasurably our portion of what the French call la joie de vivre.
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Just For Today
1. Just for today I will be happy. This assumes that what Abraham Lincoln said is true, that “most folks are about as happy as they make up their minds to be.” Happiness is from within; it is not a matter of externals.
2. Just for today I will try to adjust myself to what is, and not try to adjust everything to my own desires. I will take my family, my business, and my luck as they come and fit myself to them.
3. Just for today I will take care of my body. I will exercise it, care for it, nourish it, not abuse it nor neglect it, so that it will be a perfect machine for my bidding.
4. Just for today I will try to strengthen my mind. I will learn something useful. I will not be a mental loafer. I will read something that requires effort, thought and concentration.
5. Just for today I will exercise my soul in three ways: I will do somebody a good turn and not get found out. I will do at least two things I don’t want to do, as William James suggests, just for exercise.
6. Just for today I will be agreeable. I will look as well as I can, dress as becomingly as possible, talk low, act courteously, be liberal with praise, criticise not at all, nor find fault with anything and not try to regulate nor improve anyone.
7. Just for today I will try to live through this day only, not to tackle my whole life problem at once. I can do things for twelve hours that would appall me if I had to keep them up for a lifetime.
8. Just for today I will have a programme. I will write down what I expect to do every hour. I may not follow it exactly, but I will have it. It will eliminate two pests, hurry and indecision.
9. Just for today I will have a quiet half-hour all by myself and relax. In this half-hour sometimes I will think of God, so as to get a little more perspective into my life.
10. Just for today I will be unafraid, especially I will not be afraid to be happy, to enjoy what is beautiful, to love, and to believe that those I love, love me.
If we want to develop a mental attitude that will bring us peace and happiness, here is Rule 1:
Think and act cheerfully, and you will feel cheerful.
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Chapter 13 – The High Cost Of Getting Even
One night, years ago, as I was travelling through Yellowstone Park, I sat with other tourists on bleachers facing a dense growth of pine and spruce. Presently the animal which we had been waiting to see, the terror of the forests, the grizzly bear, strode out into the glare of the lights and began devouring the garbage that had been dumped there from the kitchen of one of the park hotels. A forest ranger, Major Martindale, sat on a horse and talked to the excited tourists about bears. He told us that the grizzly bear can whip any other animal in the Western world, with the possible exception of the buffalo and the Kadiak bear; yet I noticed that night that there was one animal, and only one, that the grizzly permitted to come out of the forest and eat with him under the glare of the lights: a skunk. The grizzly knew that he could liquidate a skunk with one swipe of his mighty paw. Why didn’t he do it? Because he had found from experience that it didn’t pay.
I found that out, too. As a farm boy, I trapped four-legged skunks along the hedgerows in Missouri; and, as a man, I encountered a few two-legged skunks on the sidewalks of New York. I have found from sad experience that it doesn’t pay to stir up either variety.
When we hate our enemies, we are giving them power over us: power over our sleep, our appetites, our blood pressure, our health, and our happiness. Our enemies would dance with joy if only they knew how they were worrying us, lacerating us and getting even with us! Our hate is not hurting them, but our hate is turning our own days and nights into a hellish turmoil.
Who do you suppose said this: “If selfish people try to take advantage of you, cross them off your list, but don’t try to get even. When you try to get even, you hurt yourself more than you hurt the other fellow”? … Those words sound as if they might have been uttered by some starry-eyed idealist. But they weren’t. Those words appeared in a bulletin issued by the Police Department of Milwaukee.