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How to Stop Worrying and Start Living: Time-tested methods for conquering worry.
By Dale Carnegie. New York: Pocket Books, 1944, revised 1984, 341 pages, $7.50
Many people in this country and all over the world have issues with worry. Some people even worry themselves into having physical ailments such as high blood pressure, stomach ulcers, and heart problems. The focus of the book How to Stop Worrying and Start Living: Time-tested methods for conquering worry is ways to overcome the worry that overshadows the lives of so many people living in today’s society. Even though the book was originally written in 1944, many of the ideas and strategies that are presented in it are still valid today. How to Stop Worrying and Start Living would be a valuable tool for psychotherapists who are treating clients who have issues with worry in their lives.
This eight part book focuses on general information regarding worry, ways to analyze the worry in your life, how to break the habit of worrying, ways to create a positive mental attitude, how to conquer worry, how to avoid worrying about criticism, ways to prevent fatigue, and a section devoted to personal recollections of how different individuals conquered worry. Each section includes personal accounts of how the topics approached in that section have been important in their lives. At the end of each part, there is an overview of the main points that have been addressed. This allows for an easy and quick way to reference the material. In the preface of the book, a suggestion is made by the author to read slowly and try to think about the ways each part of the book can be incorporated into your life. This is a very helpful hint because there are many interesting aspects of worry that are covered in this book, and breaking them up into smaller pieces is much less daunting than trying to take on everything at once.
How to Stop Worrying and Start Living was originally designed as a textbook for a class being taught by Dale Carnegie and was therefore geared towards adults who were seeking to further their education. Therefore, while the topics contained in this book would be useful to most people trying to overcome problems with worry, it may not be readable for clients with a limited education. This book is written at approximately an eighth grade reading level. Dale Carnegie’s book was originally written in 1944, and while it has been updated since then, the majority of personal stories and examples that are given are significantly out of date. Many of the vignettes in the book revolve around the Great Depression and World Wars I and II. However, even though the book is very dated, the information and techniques given are very valid and useful. Within each section, there are chapters with strategies as well as personal accounts given to show how these methods work. This is a huge strength of this book. By bringing the techniques to a personal level, the task of getting past worry in your life does not seem as difficult.
Because this book was originally written as a textbook, it is broken up into distinct sections. This aspect of the book would allow a psychotherapist to have the client focus on specific parts of the book that are relevant to the issues that he or she is facing. For example, if there was a client who was having trouble with worrying at work, one might direct them to chapter twenty-six within part seven because there are specific techniques there that may help that person. After assigning a portion of the book, it would be important to have the client reflect on what they have read. A suggestion given in the preface of the book is to pick one strategy that has been read about and write down how it can be incorporated into your life to reduce the amount of worry that is being experienced. It is important for the psychotherapist to assist the client in implementing the chosen strategies into their life. Setting goals and planning how to achieve them using ideas from the book should be a cooperative effort between client and therapist. There are many strategies covered in the book, and focusing on one at a time is important so as not to overwhelm the client. Within How to Stop Worrying and Start Living, there are also many inspirational quotes, poems, and stories that, if pointed out and discussed, may provide some hope and encouragement to a client during the week when they are not in psychotherapy.
How to Stop Worrying and Start Living is a useful book that looks at the universal issue of worry. The techniques that are taught are very applicable and based in common sense. Therefore, even though Dale Carnegie’s book was written in 1944, it still provides practical information and functional strategies to help reduce the symptoms of worry.