So you want peace of mind!


So !Jou MJant

By Hugh RON&ill, S.J.

A Queen'sJ/ork
Pamphlet



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#



So You Want

PEACE OF MIND!
By HUGH P. O'NEILL, S.J.

The BOOK STALLS are jammed
tight nowadays with colorfully jacketed

volumes on that great common goal,

“Peace of Mind.” If a conscientious reader

were to take a few years and plod through

all of them, he would probably emerge

from the experience with weak eyes, a

wan smile, and a burning anxiety about

which of the books is best suited to quench

a burning anxiety.

Nevertheless Til agree that the subject

is worthwhile. As a matter of fact, I

once became so enthused about it that I

wrote a long dissertation on “Peace of

Mind,” complete with definitions, disquisi-

tions, illustrations, ramifications, and apt

quotations. It was really a nice job, but

whenever I read it over, I got such a

peaceful feeling that I dropped off to

sleep.

Copyright 1955

THE QUEEN’S WORK



So I tore it up, threw it away, and

forthwith decided that a better subject

would be “Worry.” There is one sure
thing about worry: it keeps people awake.

Satan and Worry

In turning the topic upside down, I

do not mean to imply that worry is the
only obstacle or the greatest obstacle to

peace of mind. I merely mean that Satan
has devised no means more effective than

worry for souring the lives of good people

everywhere.

In general the greatest enemy to peace

of mind is a bad conscience, but there is
a remedy for bad consciences.

King David, St. Peter, St. Mary Mag-
dalen, and St. Augustine—all had at
one time very bad consciences, but they

found peace of mind in sincere contrition

and the assurance of divine pardon. They
did not moon and fret over the fact that
they had spoiled their record. They did
not think about their record. They thought
only of restoring to God the glory of
which their sins had deprived Him. They
did not indulge in remorse. Remorse is

depressing. They had recourse to true
contrition. True contrition is stimulating,
inspiring, dynamic.

— 2 —



The Will of God

An incurable disease or financial disaster
gives some people a good chance to be

sorry for themselves ; but I know a number

of chronic invalids and permanent in-

solvents who radiate nothing but sunshine
and cheerfulness. They are able to do
this because their hearts are in tune with

God's heart and they have resigned them-

selves to His beneficent will.

Every healthy minded human being has

a natural capacity and tendency to accept

the inevitable, and this natural disposition,

aided by divine grace, can face anything

with equanimity. Some painful situations

in life can be changed by our own
efforts. God expects us to find and apply
the remedy.

Other situations cannot be changed, such

as the loss of a limb or the death of a

dear friend. God expects us to accept these
situations as an expression of His divine

will. It does not matter how such situa-
tions arise. They may be due to accidents
or to the malice of others, or they may
be direct results of sinful actions on our

own part. Just as soon as the situation
becomes unchangeable, it becomes the will

of God in our regard.

— 3 —



When we turn to God in our troubles,
He does not say: “It was your own fault.
Take your medicine. ,, He always says:
‘‘Come to me and I will refresh you.”

What Is It?

Now let us turn to the chief bugbear
of good people: worry. What is worry?
Worry is a chronic state of apprehensive-
ness, a mixture of fear for the future,

regret for the past, uneasiness in the

present—all heavily spiced with feelings
of guilt. It is a sort of psychological cold

in the head, just about as pleasant, as

stubborn, as universal, arid as non-fatal as

chronic sinusitis. The scientific name for
this pestiferous malady is “anxiety neu-
rosis.” We shall call it neurosis for
short.

Rudolph Allers says that we are all
potential neurotics. A brother psychiatrist
say that Allers is crazy. “It is not true,”

says he, “that we are all potential neu-
rotics. Cross out ‘potential’.”

Be that as it may, it is admitted by
all authorities that at least one-third of

the population of the United States suffers

from neurosis to an extent that definitely

interferes with work, marriage, health, and

the pursuit of happiness. The bright spot

— 4 —



in the picture, if it can be called bright,

is that neurotics often live to a ripe old

age, and seldom go crazy.

Symptoms

Well now, my dear brother and sister
neurotics, let us discuss our symptoms. We
shall keep it all in the family. Not a
word outside of this pamphlet!

A typical neurotic may be expected to
possess a personalized assortment of some

of the following characteristics: He may
have a constantly recurring feeling of

inadequacy and frustration, sometimes

amounting to actual depression. He may
suffer from a general inability to get along

with people, or to feel at home with
them. He may even be haunted with the
feeling that other people are not looking

at him. He usually has one or two pet
phobias, that, is, exaggerated fears of such

things as high places, dark rooms, or front

seats; thunderstorms, microbes, spiders, or

cats. He has groundless fears of disease,
presentiments of calamity, and anticipa-

tions of failure. He may have a whole
host of bodily ailments for which his doctor

can find no physical cause at five dollars

a visit. He has a chronic sense of guilt,
or acute attacks of scrupulosity. He is often
a perfectionist, never satisfied with any-

— 5 —



thing that he does. He writes disserta-
tions, reads them over and throws them

away. (Have I left anybody out?)

Insecurity

A careful inspection of these and all
other neurotic symptoms will reveal the

fact that they all spring from one common
root : a sense of insecurity. The neurotic is
afraid of something. He is afraid that
he has lost, or will lose, or does not

have enough of, a certain quality without

which life is not worth living.

What is it that we all must have to
make life worth living?

It is the same thing for all of us,

saint or sinner, rich or poor, old or young.

That one thing is a consciousness of per-
sonal value.

What does that mean? A thing is said
to have value if it deserves to be wanted.

A thing that no one could ever want
has no value; a thing that is currently

wanted has actual value; a thing that may
be wanted in the future has potential

value. You and I simply must have a
feeling that we deserve to be wanted and
that there are at least a few people who
don't mind having us around.

— 6 —



Now why do I say “need to be wanted”
instead of “need to be loved*’? Isn’t love,

after all, the whole purpose of our ex-

istence? Did not God make us all to love
and be loved?

That is quite true, and love is the
only thing that can satisfy us. Yet there

are people in the world who do not know
the meaning of love. As children they
may never have had any experience of true
love, but in any event, their hearts have

been so calloused by selfishness that they

have no capacity for either giving or re-

ceiving true love. Still these people do

have a deep craving to be wanted, and

they try to satisfy this craving by creating

situations in which other people will not

be able to get along Vithout them.

One way of doing this is to seize posi-
tions of power and authority—in other
words, become important. A thing is
important only if you cannot get along

without it. We cannot imagine that
Malenkov cares whether anyone loves him.
He does not know what true love means,
but he has done a pretty good job of see-
ing to it that hundreds of millions of

people are not going to get along without

him. If these people are interested in

living, they had better be interested in
Georgi. At the other end of the scale

— 7 —



we find possessive parents who do all that
they can to keep their children from

growing up and becoming independent of

them.

A Basic Fear
There is a better way of illustrating

this need to be wanted. A certain writer
makes the statement that the basic fear

in all human hearts is the fear of being
engulfed in the ocean of humanity, that is

to say, of being lost in the crowd, of

being overlooked, forgotten. Most of us

are not interested in cutting a figure in

the ocean of humanity, but it would

kill us to find ourselves down in the mud
at the bottom of our own little frogpond.

This approach ntay be developed as

follows: If nobody knows about me, no-

body will care about me; and if nobody

cares about me, I may as well not exist.

I become a social nonentity.

Now we know that the strongest in-
stinct in human nature is the instinct of

self-preservation. This instinct goes into

action just as soon as we are faced with
a threat to life or limb. At the thought

of annihilation it becomes absolutely fran-

tic. We fear death chiefly because it
symbolizes,’ and seems to imply, annihila-

tion ; and confronted with a choice be-

— 8 —



tween dying of pneumonia and being

vaporized by an atom bomb, we would
probably choose the former. The thought
of it would not give us so much of that
all-gone feeling; it would leave something

around which to build a funeral.

Social Survival

Now this same instinct of self-preserva-
tion is much more interested in our social
than in our physical survival. Social an-

nihilation is a much greater calamity than
death, and suicide itself is a natural re-

sponse to the conviction that the society

of ones fellow men has nothing more to
offer. It is a variation of the old wheeze:

“You can't fire me. I quit.”

It is quite probable that morbid fear

concerning one's health is merely a dis-

placement of fear concerning social sig-

nificance. A person whose finger is always
on his pulse is really not counting his

heartbeats; he is merely wondering if any-

body loves him.

We can never overestimate what social
significance means to us. Anyone who says
that he does not care what anybody thinks

about him, who means what he says, and
who acts on that attitude, is contradicting
the basic law of human nature and is
mentally very sick. We sometimes read

— 9 —



in the papers of hermits who live in the
woods or who shut themselves up in their
city homes. They are all essentially psy-
chotic, which is a scientific way of say-
ing “absolutely nuts.”

Love for Fellow Men

Now how can I save myself from being
lost in the crowd? Well, if I have a

sincere love for my fellow men, I shall not
even think of the possibility of being lost

in the crowd. I shall be so united to them

by the bonds of love that it will be

impossible for me to feel that I am for-
gotten.

In this connection I must remember that

it is my love for my fellow men more
than their love for me that gives me the
feeling of security, the feeling of belong-

ing. There must of course be some reci-

procity, but it does not have to be on

a fifty-fifty basis. No child ever loves a
mother as much as the mother loves the
child, and a mother's love for her child

is more important for her mental health

than is her feeling that she is loved by

her child. But suppose that I do not love

my fellow men. I must then find some
way to keep myself from being lost in
the crowd. The only way that I can do
this is to make myself prominent, make

— 10 —



myself distinctive, make myself first,

highest, most powerful, most wealthy, any-

thing at all that will make people notice

me.

We sometimes wonder why so many
men drive themselves to death in their
efforts to make a fortune, to attain politi-

cal power, or win some coveted honor.

We call it avarice or ambition, but avarice
and ambition do not tell the whole story.

The instinct of self-preservation has en-
tered the picture. Such men have maneu-
vered themselves into a state of mind in

which the attainment of a certain goal

becomes an absolute necessity if they are

to escape social annihilation. In their

minds, to be outdone by anybody is to be

sunk
;

to come in second is to be lost

in the crowd of those who also ran.

When a man wants money merely for
the things that money can buy, he may
easily reach a stage where he will be

willing to retire and enjoy life. But if

money becomes symbolic of social position,
he can never have enough of it.

Here is a man for instance who says
to himself: “If I could only make a million
dollars, I would really be somebody.

Wouldn't people look up at me?”

Well, he makes his million dollars, and

as he stands on his little mountain top

— 11 —



and looks around, he suddenly finds that

hr is surrounded by several hundred other

little mountains, each with a tycoon on

top. What a disappointment!

“What's the use?” he says. “Here I
am, just another millionaire! Lost in the

crowd
!”

Then he pulls himself together, and
sets his goal at twenty million.

Envy of Power

There is still another reason why the
quest for power and wealth and honor

defeats its own purpose. To become power-
ful means to make a lot of enemies, be-
cause you have made a lot of people afraid
of you. To become wealthy means to
create envy in the hearts of less successful

seekers of wealth; to win a championship

means that you have defeated and humili-

ated the rest of the field.

Power, wealth, and honor do not bring

men together. They divide, they separate,
they make men bitter rivals. The only
way that a successful man can retain his
position is to gain more power, freeze out
all competitors, liquidate all enemies.

Now what has all this to do with us
poor neurotics? Simply this: I and you

and the rest of us have been bitten by

— 12 —



the same bug. We have been breathing
the atmosphere of rugged individualism.

We do not have sufficient confidence in
the power of love to save us from social

asphyxiation.

We too would like to be first in some
line or other. We may not be conscious
of it, but the ambition is there along with

the jealousy, the resentment, the aggres-

siveness, the hostility that are inseparable

from ambition.

The Glamorous "Me"

Down in the heart, that is, in the sub-
conscious mind of every neurotic, there is
a picture of a very glamorous person.

That picture represents the degree of
success which the neurotic feels that he
must attain if life is to have any meaning.
It is not merely the type of person that

he would like to be; it is the kind of
person that he must become if he is to
escape annihilation. This is the central
factor in all neurosis.

Now the neurotic may take three differ-
ent attitudes toward this image of himself.

He may be under the delusion that he
has already become his idealized image,
and he will unwittingly adopt the postures,
the gestures, the dress, and the tone of

— 13 —



voice that are in keeping with that image.

He will become socially intolerable, and
the reaction of his friends, or rather of his

associates, will be : “ Well, who in the devil
does he think he is?” Meantime the poor

fellow wonders what is the matter. He
does not mean any harm; he is not trying

to be a big shot; he is just trying to

survive.

The Perfectionist

More often the neurotic will feel that
the idealized image is almost within reach,

and that he will attain it if he will only

try hard enough. He reminds us of a
person standing on tiptoe trying to get

his fingers on a tantalizing curtain cord.

Such a person is called a perfectionist; he

gives himself no rest day or night. In the

eyes of his friends he may be a very
successful man, but he does not measure

success by their plebeian standards. As

long as he ha£ not reached his idealized

goal, he is a failure.

We often meet people who really should
be very happy and satisfied with their lot

in life, but instead of that, we find them

restless, moody, often depressed and ready

to give up the fight. Sometimes they do

give up, and that means that they have

— 14 —



taken the third attitude, the feeling that

their idealized image has forever escaped

them. What is called a nervous break-
down is often nothing more than the
result of a sudden realization that the

idealized image has vanished into thin air.

Such a breakdown can be a serious thing,

but it need not be. If we can catch the
poor fellow before he jumps from the
Empire State Building, we may be able
to show him how to construct a more
sensible image, one that he can actually

attain. Karen Horney claims that a neu-
rotic may achieve a very fine adjustment
to reality through a series of nervous

breakdowns, but that, of course, is the

hard way.

Twofold Difference

The difference between an idealized
image and a true ideal consists in two
things. First, a true ideal is something

that you would like to achieve if you
could; an idealized image is subconscious,
and therefore, hazy, nebulous, and fan-
tastic. The pursuit of an ideal can make
us feel expansive, dynamic, and friendly;
the pursuit of an idealized image makes
us cold, secretive, suspicious, and aggres-
sive.

— 15 —



Subconscious vs. Respectability

We have made use of the term “sub-
conscious mind.” Perhaps we should have
a definition. The subconscious mind is
really nothing more than a set of feelings

that are so contrary to our sense of

respectability that we are not willing to
admit that we have them, at least not to
the extent that we have them.

Such feelings are greediness, cowardice,

sensuality, jealousy, hatred—in fact, all
the capital sins. They represent the savage
in us. For instance, we pay a sincere
compliment to a friend who has been
elected to office. We really mean what
we say, but the subconscious mind is

burned up with jealousy. We are grate-
ful for some good advice, but the sub-

conscious mind wishes that so-and-so had

minded his own business. We pray most
devoutly for our boss’s speedy recovery

from illness, but our subconscious mind

can see certain advantages in a permanent

relapse. I could go on and give more

examples, but I am not willing to incrim-
inate myself any further.

It is very hard for us to admit the

presence of such unlovable traits in our-

selves, but we may as well face them

because they are there. The saints recog-
nized their presence, and that is why they

— 16 —



could say such terrible things about them-

selves. We close our eyes to them and
that is why we are neurotic.

Subversion of the Mind

The fact that we have thousands of
Communists in this country does not make
the United States a Communist country.
They cause a lot of local trouble, they
hate everything that we stand for, they
would like to overthrow our government.
Yet we are not too much afraid of them;
we know that they could never win a
national election or put through any Com-
munistic legislation. We also know that
we can control them more effectively if
we keep them out in the open and do
not drive them underground.

It is the same with the subversive

elements in our subconscious minds. These

tendencies cause us to be oversensitive to

slights or supposed insults, to exaggerate

dangers and difficulties, to be impulsive,

to say mean things, and to wish terrible
things. On the other hand they do not
outvote our love or dominate our actions

in things that really matter. Why then
should we be so afraid of admitting their
presence, why should we drive them under-
ground by denying their existence? If we
look them in the face, they will make us

— 17 —



feel humble, but they will not make us
feel guilty.

All neurotics feel guilty because they do
not know where the stench is coming
from.

Moreover the more we repress our un-
lovable instincts, the more inclined we are
to attribute those very tendencies to others,

and that precisely is where the great harm
is done. We become too prone to distrust
the love of others. We are constantly
asking them to prove that they love us.
A hasty word, a bit of negligence or of
selfishness on their part is often quite
enough to make us feel, for the moment
at least, that they do not love us at all.
Then our instinct of self-preservation goes
into a dither and we explode. That is why
we are so unaccountably interested in
maintaining our importance, our power,

our glamor, and all the other things that

we think will keep us from becoming
nobodies even in our own families.

Childhood

The amount of trustfulness that we feel
toward others is profoundly influenced by
the experiences of our childhood. To be
a first-class neurotic you have to start

quite young, usually before the age of

six. You must have had parents who

— 18 —



were themselves maladjusted. Mothers get

most of the blame, but then the majority

of books on the subject are written by

men.

These parents were either too indulgent

and spoiled you, or they were too possessive

and refused to let you grow up, or they
were too exacting and gave you the feeling

that you could never do anything right,

and that you were destined to be at least

a mild disgrace to the family. Perhaps

they were always quarreling and made you
apprehensive that your home might break
up at any time. Perhaps they constantly

worried over matters of health, or finances,

or social position, or the follies of the

national administration then in power.

As the result of living in this troubled
atmosphere you developed feelings of in-

adequacy, of insecurity, of secret antagon-

ism toward your parents, a secret sense

of guilt for having that antagonism, a

secret desire to punish yourself for being

such a naughty boy or girl, and so on ad
infinitum.

This situation was complicated by an-
other factor. Most parents realize that
young children do not naturally love their
brothers and sisters. They have to be
taught this love. Children are natural

rivals for parental attention and care

;

— 19 —



often they are bitter rivals. The least
favor shown to one and withheld from
another is the occasion of jealousy, and

jealousy always includes hate.

Well-adjusted and religious-minded

parents are usually very successful in cop-

ing with this situation. Other parents are

not so successful. They are apt to show
favoritism, take sides, permit teasing and

other forms of cruelty, and reinforce it

all by the bad example of their own hot
tempers. The result will be that rivalry,
mistrust, suspicion, aggression, and re-

venge will warp the personalities of their
children, and set the stage for future

trouble.

We must bear in mind that a hostile
attitude toward parents and brothers and

sisters in childhood carries over into adult

life and poisons marriage and all other

dealings with our fellow men. Worst of
all, it cannot fail to have an unfortunate

effect on our relations with God Himself.

God and Neighbor

Our divine Lord once said: “If you do
not love your neighbor whom you see,
how can you love God whom you do
not see?”

Similarly if we do not trust our neigh-
bor whom we see, how can we trust God

— 20 —



whom we do not see? Many a case of
scrupulosity would clear up if the scrupu-
lous person could only realize that he is

treating God with the same lack of trust-
fulness that he manifests toward his fel-

low men, or used to manifest toward his
parents in childhood.

When we were little children, our par-
ents occupied the place of God in our
regard. They had all the attributes of
deity. They were ever so much stronger
than we were, they had authority over us,
we depended upon them for protection.
They knew more than we did. They
knew everything. They could tell when
we had been in mischief. In fact they
usually caught us in the act. They gave
us our standard of morality: what they
smiled at was morally good, what they
frowned at was naughty.

Eventually they told us that there was
someone else whose smile and frown were
more important than theirs. They told us
about “Our Father who art in heaven.”
Now if our parents were unduly harsh
with us, or if they were inconsistent and
unpredictable, it is easy to see that we
probably got off to a bad start in our

attitude toward our heavenly Father. This
twisted attitude may still be lurking in
the depths of our subconscious minds.

— 21 —



A Remedy

Now let us sum up and propose a
remedy. Worry, as we have seen, is a
chronic sense of insecurity in regard to

personal value. We are afraid of social
annihilation. We have not learned to
trust people. We are afraid that they do
not love us enough, that they do not care

for us. The reason for this mistrust is
at bottom a carryover from childhood.

Without knowing what we are up to,
we demand too much love, too many
assurances of love, and we are more than
a bit stingy with our own love. We try
to make up for this supposed lack of love
by aiming at importance, prominence, suc-

cess. This program defeats its own pur-
pose. It inserts further wedges between

us and our fellow men, and between us

and God. It makes other men not friends,
but rivals, competitors, enemies. In our

blindness we try to remedy this situation
by grasping at more importance, more

prominence, more success. We become
involved in a vicious circle; and the older

we get, the more desperate our plight
becomes.

The remedy is obvious—not easy, but
obvious and within reach of all.

— 22 —



It consists in cultivating better relations

with God and our fellow men. Better
relations mean more love, more sincere
love, more trustfulness.

The best way to cultivate trustfulness
is to act as if you already have it. It is

a basic truth of psychology that if you

want to have a certain feeling, the best
way to get it is to act as if you already
have it. The only way to get at the
subconscious mind is through action. If

you want to feel brave, act brave; if you
want to feel cheerful, smile; if you want
to be a loving friend, act the part of a

loving friend, both to God and to man.

This is not hypocrisy. You are not try-
ing to get something out of your friends;

you are trying to get something into your-

self. You are trying to re-educate yourself,
to become emotionally mature.

Realize that your adult personality has

been slanted by your childhood experi-

ences. You cannot get rid of the slant
entirely, but you can reduce it amazingly.

The more you reduce it, the more peace
of mind you will enjoy.

Of course it would not be realistic to
expect anything like perfect peace of mind
in this life. Even St. Paul desired to be
dissolved and to be with Christ.

— 23 —



In the economic order a 40 percent

reduction in prices and taxes would un-

doubtedly balance your budget. In the

psychological order a 40 percent reduction

in worry would make life quite tolerable

for all of us. I cannot promise you the

first 40 percent, but the second is a

definite possibility, and you do not have

to wait until election time to do some-

thing about it.

Imprimi potest:

Daniel H. Conway, S.J.

Provincial, Missouri Province

Imprimatur:

+Joseph E. Ritter

Archbishop of St. Louis

August 10, 1954

— 24 —





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