The famous psychologist, Karl Menninger, might have given us a magic key to handling stress and unhappiness in our lives. “What would you advise a person to do,” one man asked, “if that person felt a nervous breakdown coming on?” Menninger’s answer: “Lock up your house, go across the railway tracks, find someone in need, and do something to help that person.” In other words, when you have problems of your own, put some of your efforts into helping someone else solve his problems.
Whenever I get to feeling blue or stressed or just plain in the mood for a pity party I take that message out and read it and then I examine what I have done for someone else recently. Almost always I find that I have been thinking mostly about me and very little about the other guy. Most times, as a great song lyric says, “I pick myself up, brush myself off and I start all over again. Give it a try and let me know if it works for you and if somebody volunteers to help you with a problem, let them. They might have come from a way across the tracks just to make the offer.
Be the first to comment