How was it to be brought about?

At every fresh attack of the harassing demon I rebuked myself with the stern command, “Quit your Worrying.”  Little by little I succeeded in obeying my own orders.  A measurable degree of serenity has since blessed my life.  It has been no freer than other men’s lives from the ordinary—­and a few extraordinary—­causes of worry, but I have learned the lesson.  I have Quit Worrying.  To help others to attain the same desirable and happy condition has been my aim in these pages.

It was with set purpose that I chose this title.  I might have selected “Don’t Worry.”  But I knew that would fail to convey my principal thought to the casual observer of the title.  People will worry, they do worry.  What they want to know and need to learn is how to quit worrying.  This I have attempted herein to show, with the full knowledge, however, that no one person’s recipe can infallibly be used by any other person—­so that, in reality, all I have tried to do is to set forth the means I have followed to teach myself the delightful lesson of serenity, of freedom from worry, and thereby to suggest to receptive minds a way by which they may possibly attain the same desirable end.

It was the learned and wise Dr. Johnson who wrote: 

He may be justly numbered amongst the benefactors of mankind, who contracts the great rules of life into short sentences, that may easily be impressed on the memory, and taught by frequent recollection to recur habitually to the mind.

I have no desire to claim as original the title used for these observations, but I do covet the joy of knowing that I have so impressed it upon the memory of thousands that by its constant recurrence it will aid in banishing the monster, worry.

It is almost unavoidable that, in a practical treatise of this nature, there should be some repetition, both in description of worries and the remedies suggested.  To the critical reader, however, let me say:  Do not worry about this, for I am far more concerned to get my thought into the heads and hearts of my readers than I am to be esteemed a great writer.  Let me help but one troubled soul to quit worrying and I will forego all the honors of the ages that might have come to me had I been an essayist of power.  And I have repeated purposely, for I know that some thoughts have to knock again and again, ere they are admitted to the places where they are the most needed.

I have written strongly; perhaps some will think too strongly.  These, however, must remember that I have written advisedly.  I have been considering the subject for half or three parts of a life-time.  I have studied men and women; carefully watched their lives; talked with them, and seen the lines worry has engraved on their faces.  I have seen and felt the misery caused by their unnecessary worries.  I have sat by the bedsides of people made chronic invalids by worry, and I have stood in the cells of maniacs driven insane by worry.  Hence I hate it in all its forms, and have expressed myself only as the facts have justified.