You must work systematically. You must economize effort. You must
permit no distractions and do your work leisurely. You must take time
to think things over in a natural way. You must waste no thoughts in
business hours on social or pleasurable pursuits that would dissipate
your mental capital. You must work when you work, and you may play
when you play, but your business must be the most fascinating of games
and the only one you play during business hours.

[Sidenote: _How Your Mental Capital is Dissipated_]

Another thing you need is _poise_. One trouble with you now is that
you waste your priceless powers in useless anxiety.

The minute business falls off you begin to worry. You fritter your
mental energies in fretting until you are incapable of real thought,
and being unable to think your way out you get excited.

Remember it is all just a game, and you are in it only for the fun of
the thing. You will never win out if you persist in tearing your hair.

Before he crossed the Rubicon Julius Cæsar was staggered at the
greatness of the undertaking before him. The more he reflected and
took counsel of his friends, the greater loomed the difficulties of
the attempt and the more appalling the calamities his passage of that
river would bring upon the Roman world. But when at last with the cry,
"The die is cast!" he plunged into the river, there was an end for him
to mental dissension, a freedom to plan and execute, an expansion of
courage and power.

[Sidenote: _Conquering Indecision_]