There is just this difference between the healing of a physical sore
and the healing of strained and irritated nerves With the one our
bodies are healed, and things go on in them about the same as
before. With the other, every use of the will to free ourselves from
the irritation and its cause not only enables us to get free from
the nervous illness, but in addition brings us new nerve vigor.
When nervous illness is met deeply enough and in the normal way, the
result is that the nerves become stronger than ever before.
Often the effect of nervous strain in women is constant talking.
Talk--talk--talk, and mostly about themselves, their ailments, their
worries, and the hindrances that are put in their way to prevent
their getting well. This talking is not a relief, as people
sometimes feel. It is a direct waste of vigor. But the waste would
be greater if the talk were repressed. The only real help comes when
the talker herself recognizes the strain of her talk and "loosens"
into silence.
People must find themselves out to get well--really well--from
nervous suffering. The cause of nervous strain is so often in the
character and in the way we meet circumstances and people that it
seems essential to recognize our mistakes in that direction, and to
face them squarely before we can do our part toward removing the
causes of any nervous illness.
Remember it is not circumstances that keep us ill. It is not people
that cause our illness. It is not our environment that overcomes us.
It is the way we face and deal with circumstances, with people, and
with environment that keeps our nerves irritated or keeps them quiet
and wholesome and steady.
Let me tell the story of two men, both of whom were brought low by
severe nervous breakdown. One complained of his environment,
complained of circumstances, complained of people. Everything and
every one was the cause of his suffering, except himself. The result
was that he weakened his brain by the constant willful and enforced
strain, so that what little health he regained was the result of
Nature's steady and powerful tendency toward health, and in spite of
the man himself.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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