An immense help in the field of mental hygiene is to be obtained from religion and philosophy, although this is not the place to advocate any particular form of either, and from the standpoint of hygiene, it does not greatly matter! One may get his chief help from the Bible, from faith-healing cults, from writers like Emerson, from Tagore and other Orientals, or from Marcus Aurelius and Epictetus.
“Religion of Healthymindedness”
Professor William James commends the adoption of a “religion of healthymindedness” in which we renounce all wrong or diseased mental states, cultivating only the healthy ones, such as courage, patience, optimism, and reverence.
The Habit of Happiness
When the mind turns from shadow to sunshine, the body will tend also to assume the radiance of health. Stevenson said that there is no duty we so much underrate as the duty of being happy. The habit of being happy enables one to be freed, or largely freed, from the domination of outward conditions. Though the trait is apparently totally lacking in some, while existing to a high degree in others, experience has shown that conscious cultivation will develop it to an appreciable degree, even in very stubborn cases. As in little Pollyanna’s “Glad Game,” it is possible to find something to be glad about in every situation in life.
Control of Attention
The secret of equanimity consists not so much in repressing the fear or worry, as in dropping or ignoring it—that is, diverting and controlling the attention. It does no good to carry a mental burden. “Forget it!” The main art of mental hygiene consists in the control of attention. Perhaps the worst defect in the Occidental philosophy of life is the failure to learn this control. The Oriental is superior in such self-training. The exceptional man in Western civilization who learns this control can do the most work and carry the most responsibility. On much the same principle as the Indians used when their young men were trained to endure pain self-inflicted, we might well devote a few minutes each day to the difficult task of changing at will our attention from the thing which is engrossing it to anything else we choose; or, what is more difficult still, to blank nothingness. When we have sufficiently strengthened this power, we can turn off the current of our thoughts as we turn off the lights and lie down to sleep in peace, as a trained sailor does in a storm.
Making Up One’s Mind
If a person’s work is drudgery but has to be endured, the making up of the mind to endure it cheerfully, the relinquishment of the doubtful but fascinating pleasure of dwelling upon one’s misery, is found to largely obviate the burden. It is the making up of the mind which presents the difficulty. The truth is that we instinctively shrink from making, without reservation, important decisions as to our future course of conduct. We balk even at really committing ourselves not to worry. A man who, when he complained of his lot, was advised to “grin and bear it,” replied that he’d have to bear it, but he’d be hanged if he’d grin!
Intensity of Desires