Vintage Advice: Finding Hope During Difficult Times
“Many women form the chronic habit of indulging in fits of depressing that we call the ‘blues.’ They allow the ‘blues’ an easy entrance to their minds, in fact are always at home to them and are susceptible to every form of discouragement that comes along. Every little setback, every little difficulty, sends them into the ‘blues’ and they will say ‘what’s the use?’ As a result their work is poor and ineffective, and they do not accomplish the things they desire.
Every time you give way to discouragement, every time you are blue, you are going backward, your destructive thoughts are tearing down what you have been trying to build. One fit of discouragement, visualizing failure or poverty, will rapidly destroy the result of much triumphant thought building. Your creative forces will harmonize with your thoughts, your emotions and moods; they will create in sympathy with them.
Saturate your mind with hope, the expectation of better things, with the belief that your dreams are coming true. Be convinced that you are going to win out; let your mind rest with success thoughts. Don’t let the enemies of your success and happiness dominate in your mind or they will bring to you the condition they represent.
I know of nothing that gives more satisfaction than the consciousness that we have formed the habit of winning, the habit of victory, the habit of carrying a victorious mental attitude, of walking, acting, talking, looking like a winner. That sort of attitude always keeps the dominant, helpful qualities to the fore, always in the ascendancy.
One of the most obstinate of habits in life, and one fatal to efficiency, is the habit of feeling defeated…”
—Excerpted from “Pots and Pans and Millions: A Study of Woman’s Right to Be in Business,” written by Edith Mae Cummings, 1929.
(Courtesy of Abigail Grotke)
