“Do you believe in confession, in the case of a non-Catholic, for the purpose of relieving the mind?
“How can I overcome prejudice? I find I am prejudiced against certain sects and races.”
Rather a stiff task, to answer all these questions. Of course, I cannot “answer” them fully. All I or any one can do is to give a few hints which may be useful.
Oversleeping is not necessarily laziness. Go to bed earlier, if you have to rise at a certain hour. It’s a safe rule to take all the sleep you can get. The rule in my own family is, “Let the sleepy sleep.”
Laziness is not a bad quality always. A lazy body often houses a most energetic mind. The real cure for physical laziness is fun; find some form of exercise that lures you. Mental laziness is a more difficult disease, and you can only cure it by taking yourself severely in hand. Usually, I should say, it is hopeless.
Fear can generally be mitigated, if not altogether removed, by intelligence. It is a by-product of ignorance, as a rule. We are afraid of what we don’t know. Science (knowledge) has done much to alleviate superstition (ignorance).
Worry can only be remedied by adopting some rational theory of life, some common-sense philosophy. Maeterlinck and Emerson have done me more good, as worry-antidotes, than any other masters.
How to “let go” of bedevilling thoughts is a hard problem. Thoughts that burn, stew, ferment, and torment—who has not suffered from them? About all I can do is to let them run their course. I say, “This too shall pass!” and try to bear up against the pestiferous imaginings and memories until they wear themselves out.
It is also a good idea to have some attractive, interesting, fascinating vision, of a pleasant nature, to which we can turn our minds when annoying suggestions persist. The author of “Alice in Wonderland” (who was a great mathematician) used to work out geometrical tasks, which he called “pillow problems” (and wrote a book of that name), to get himself to sleep. Can’t you find some alluring things to think of when wooing slumber? Call for them, and by and by they will come.
Do I believe in confession? Nothing can so purge the soul. Still, it must be exercised with the extremest care, judgment, and discretion, else you may harm others in pacifying yourself.