“Fear causes worry. Worry makes you tense and nervousand affects the nerves of your stomach and actually changes thegastric juices of your stomach from normal to abnormal and oftenleads to stomach ulcers.”
Dr. Joseph F. Montague， author of the book Nervous StomachTrouble， says much the same thing. He says： “You do not getstomach ulcers from what you eat. You get ulcers from what iseating you.”
Dr. W. C. Alvarez， of the Mayo Clinic， said “Ulcers frequently flareup or subside according to the hills and valleys of emotional stress.”
That statement was backed up by a study of 15，000 patientstreated for stomach disorders at the Mayo Clinic. Four out offive had no physical basis whatever for their stomach illnesses.
Fear， worry， hate， supreme selfishness， and the inability to adjustthemselves to the world of reality—these were largely the causesof their stomach illnesses and stomach ulcers… Stomach ulcers can kill you. According to Life magazine， they now stand tenth inour list of fatal diseases.
I recently had some correspondence with Dr. Harold C.
Habein of the Mayo Clinic. He read a paper at the annualmeeting of the American Association of Industrial Physiciansand Surgeons， saying that he had made a study of 176 businessexecutives whose average age was 44.3 years. He reported thatslightly more than a third of these executives suffered from oneof three ailments peculiar to hightension living-heart disease，digestive-tract ulcers， and high blood pressure. Think of it—athird of our business executives are wrecking their bodies withheart disease， ulcers， and high blood pressure before they evenreach forty-five. What price success！ And they aren’t even buyingsuccess！ Can any man possibly be a success who is paying forbusiness advancement with stomach ulcers and heart trouble?
What shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world—and loseshis health? Even if he owned the whole world， he could sleep inonly one bed at a time and eat only three meals a day. Even aditchdigger can do that—and probably sleep more soundly andenjoy his food more than a high-powered executive. Frankly， Iwould rather be a share-cropper down in Alabama with a banjoon my knee than wreck my health at forty-five by trying to run arailroad or a cigarette company. And speaking of cigarettes—thebest-known cigarette manufacturer in the world recently droppeddead from heart failure while trying to take a little recreationin the Canadian woods. He amassed millionsand fell dead atsixty-one. He probably traded years of his life for what is called“business success”。
In my estimation， this cigarette executive with all his millionswas not half as successful as my father， a Missouri farmer—whodied at eighty-nine without a dollar.
The famous Mayo brothers declared that more than half ofour hospital beds are occupied by people with nervous troubles.
Yet， when the nerves of these people are studied under a highpowered microscope in a post-mortem examination， theirnerves in most cases are apparently as healthy as the nerves ofJack Dempsey. Their “nervous troubles” are caused not by aphysical deterioration of the nerves， but by emotions of futility，frustration， anxiety， worry， fear， defeat， despair. Plato said that“the greatest mistake physicians make is that they attempt to curethe body without attempting to cure the mind; yet the mind andbody are one and should not be treated separately！”
It took medical science twenty-three hundred years torecognise this great truth. We are just now beginning to develop anew kind of medicine called psychosomatic medicine—a medicinethat treats both the mind and the body. It is high time we weredoing that， for medical science has largely wiped out the terriblediseases caused by physical germs—diseases such as smallpox，cholera， yellow fever， and scores of other scourges that sweptuntold millions into untimely graves. But medical science hasbeen unable to cope with the mental and physical wrecks caused，not by germs， but by emotions of worry， fear， hate， frustration，and despair. Casualties caused by these emotional diseases aremounting and spreading with catastrophic rapidity. Doctorsfigure that one American in every twenty now alive will spenda part of his life in an institution for the mentally ill. One out ofevery six of our young men called up by the draft in the SecondWorld War was rejected as mentally diseased or defective.
What causes insanity? No one knows all the answers. Butit is highly probable that in many cases fear and worry arecontributing factors. The anxious and harassed individual whois unable to cope with the harsh world of reality breaks off all contact with his environment and retreats into a private dreamworld of his own making， and this solves his worry problems.
As I write I have on my desk a book by Dr. Edward Podolskyentitled Stop Worrying and Get Well. Here are some of thechapter titles in that book：● What Worry Does To The Heart● High Blood Pressure Is Fed By Worry● Rheumatism Can Be Caused By Worry● Worry Less For Your Stomach’s Sake● How Worry Can Cause A Cold● Worry And The Thyroid● The Worrying DiabeticAnother illuminating book about worry is Lion Against Himself，by Dr. Karl Menninger， one of the “Mayo brothers of psychiatry.”
Dr. Menninger’s book is a startling revelation of what you do toyourself when you permit destructive emotions to dominate yourlife. If you want to stop working against yourself， get this book.
Read it. Give it to your friends. It costs four dollars—and is one ofthe best investments you can make in this life.
Worry can make even the most stolid person ill. General Grantdiscovered that during the closing days of the Civil War. Thestory goes like this： Grant had been besieging Richmond for ninemonths. General Lee’s troops， ragged and hungry， were beaten.
Entire regiments were deserting at a time. Others were holdingprayer meetings in their tents-shouting， weeping， seeing visions.