Fatigue， Worry， and Resentment
One of the chief causes of fatigue is boredom. let’s take thecase of Alice， a stenographer who lives on your street. Alice camehome one night utterly exhausted. She acted fatigued. She wasfatigued. She had a headache. She had a backache. She was soexhausted she wanted to go to bed without waiting for dinner.
Her mother pleaded.... She sat down at the table. The telephonerang. The boy friend！ An invitation to a dance！ Her eyes sparkled.
Her spirits soared. She rushed upstairs， put on her Alice—bluegown， and danced until three o’clock in the morning； and whenshe finally did get home， she was not the slightest bit exhausted.
She was， in fact， so exhilarated she couldn’t fall asleep.
Was Alice really and honestly tired eight hours earlier，when she looked and acted exhausted？ Sure she was. She wasexhausted because she was bored with her work， perhaps boredwith life. There are millions of Alices. You may be one of them.
It is a well-known fact that your emotional attitude usuallyhas far more to do with producing fatigue than has physicalexertion. A few years ago， Joseph E. Barmack， Ph.D.， publishedin the Archives of Psychology a report of some of his experimentsshowing how boredom produces fatigue. Dr. Barmack put a groupof students through a series of tests in which， he knew， they couldhave little interest. The result？ The students felt tired and sleepy，complained of headaches and eyestrain， felt irritable. In somecases， even their stomachs were upset. Was it all “imagination”？
No. Metabolism tests were taken of these students. These testsshowed that the blood pressure of the body and the consumptionof oxygen actually decrease when a person is bored， and that thewhole metabolism picks up immediately as soon as he begins tofeel interest and pleasure in his work！
We rarely get tired when we are doing something interesting andexciting. For example， I recently took a vacation in the CanadianRockies up around Lake Louise. I spent several days trout fishingalong Corral Creek， fighting my way through brush higher than myhead， stumbling over logs， struggling through fallen timber—yetafter eight hours of this， I was not exhausted. Why？ Because I wasexcited， exhilarated. I had a sense of high achievement： six cutthroattrout. But suppose I had been bored by fishing， then how doyou think I would have felt？ I would have been worn out by suchstrenuous work at an altitude of seven thousand feet.
Even in such exhausting activities as mountain climbing，boredom may tire you far more than the strenuous work involved.
For example， Mr. S. H. Kingman， president of the Farmers andMechanics Savings Bank of Minneapolis， told me of an incidentthat is a perfect illustration of that statement. In July， 1943， theCanadian government asked the Canadian Alpine Club to furnishguides to train the members of the Prince of Wales Rangers inmountain climbing. Mr. Kingman was one of the guides chosento train these soldiers. He told me how he and the other guides—men ranging from forty-two to fifty-nine years of age—tookthese young army men on long hikes across glaciers and snowfields and up a sheer cliff of forty feet， where they had to climbwith ropes and tiny foot-holds and precarious hand-holds. Theyclimbed Michael’s Peak， the Vice-President Peak， and otherunnamed peaks in the Little Yoho Valley in the Canadian Rockies.
After fifteen hours of mountain climbing， these young men， who were in the pink of condition （they had just finished a six-weekcourse in tough Commando training）， were utterly exhausted.
Was their fatigue caused by using muscles that had not beenhardened by Commando training？ Any man who had ever beenthrough Commando training would hoot at such a ridiculousquestion！ No， they were utterly exhausted because they werebored by mountain climbing. They were so tarred， that manyof them fell asleep without waiting to eat. But the guides—menwho were two and three times as old as the soldiers—were theytired？ Yes， but not exhausted. The guides ate dinner and stayedup for hours， talking about the day’s experiences. They were notexhausted because they were interested.
When Dr. Edward Thorndike of Columbia was conductingexperiments in fatigue， he kept young men awake for almosta week by keeping them constantly interested. After muchinvestigation， Dr. Thorndike is reported to have said： “Boredomis the only real cause of diminution of work.”
If you are a mental worker， it is seldom the amount of workyou do that makes you tired. You may be tired by the amount ofwork you do not do. For example， remember the day last weekwhen you were constantly interrupted. No letters answered.
Appointments broken. Trouble here and there. Everything wentwrong that day. You accomplished nothing whatever， yet youwent home exhausted—and with a splitting head.
The next day everything clicked at the office. You accomplishedforty times more than you did the previous day. Yet you went homefresh as a snowy-white gardenia. You have had that experience.
So have I.
The lesson to be learned？ Just this： our fatigue is often causednot by work， but by worry， frustration， and resentment.
While writing this chapter， I went to see a revival of Jerome Kern’s delightful musical comedy， Show Boat. Captain Andy，captain of the Cotton Blossom， says， in one of his philosophicalinterludes： “The lucky folks are the ones that get to do the thingsthey enjoy doing.” Such folks are lucky because they have moreenergy， more happiness， less worry， and less fatigue. Where yourinterests are， there is your energy also. Walking ten blocks with anagging wife can be more fatiguing than walking ten miles withan adoring sweetheart.