I have been reading an old book from Dale Carnegie called “HOW TO STOP WORRYING AND START LIVING”. I have shared a few other thoughts from this book before and wanted to give you his “Seven ways to cultivate a mental attitude that will bring you peace and happiness”.
I believe these seven things can really help in your mental and emotional health.
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 still 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 you a lemon, let’s try to make 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.”
I hope these rules are an encouragement to you. If you can put them into practice you will experience more peace and happiness. As I read through this book I can see that Carnegie was a Christian and was taking Biblical principles and putting it into easy to understand principles for people to follow. That is our challenge today, to put Biblical principles into action in our lives to make a difference in this world.