This book nursed me all through my teenage years

Come to think of it, there are a number of books that have had a positive impact on me.

I’m fortunate to have started reading at an early age, thanks to Mr Solomon, the deputy head teacher at our primary school.

He was my teacher of English as well as the custodian of the school library box – a large bright red wooden contraption stored in his office. Luckily, I happened to be one of his favourite pupils, which gave me free reign to raid it at will.

This is how European literature (the only available reading material at the time) became second nature to my young and impressionable mind.

I had several choices; The Merchant of Venice on greed and wit, and Around the World in Eighty Days that opened my mind to wild wide world of limitless possibilities. On the softer side was Alice in Wonderland. Others like King Solomon’s Mines had complex concepts that proved a bit of a challenge at the time, though I did get the gist of the story.

Later on in high school, my taste varied and I read everything that I could lay my hands on. I was among those who came at the tail-end of James Hardly Chase craze. These were adrenaline packed novels whose traditional signature was fast-paced action with a title to match.

On the more serious side were Mwangi Gicheru’s Across the Bridge, A Grain of Wheat by Ngugi wa Thiong’o, The Cockroach Dance by Meja Mwangi and Chinua Achebe’s No Longer at Ease, among others.

Others were very abstract with surreal settings. The Invisible Man describes a scientist whose experiment went wrong. He acquires the ability of making himself invisible.

This list would be incomplete without the mention ghost stories, they were meant to scare and come with a standard warning — don’t read this on your way to bed.

However, the one book that had the greatest impact on my life, the one that I read over and over again and would recommend to all is, unfortunately, out of print but is available in digital format. It’s a non-fiction book that was written ahead of its time.

How To Stop Worrying And Start Living, by Dale Carnegie, was first printed in 1948 but the truism in this book is relevant more today than at the readership for which it was written. Worrying is an ever present human emotion that is accelerated by today’s go-getter attitude.

The popular name for worry today is stress.

Motivational speakers and self-help books are the current trend. In the field of inspiration books, authors like Bill Carson have become world famous after writing best sellers like Think Big. No doubt this is a great read but some people need more than just inspiration. They need the know how to make their current situation bearable.

This is what Dale Carnage manages to do in How to Stop Worrying and Start Living. As a teenager, worry is like a shadow, it stalks you 24/7. I was lucky to have read this book at the age of 17. The life experiences cited in the book resonated perfectly with what I was going through at the time. However, the book is relevant to all types of people.

The book has 10 chapters: the first three define what worry is and how to break the worry habit. A ship has a number of compartments each designated for a particular function.

We fail to deal with our worry because it is amorphous; it should be placed in its individual compartments to make it easy to deal with.
In part four and five, the author tackles attitude.

This brings peace, happiness and assists us in conquering worry. In the two chapters he provides proof of the strength of mind over matter.
Three major causes of worry make up part Seven to nine; fatigue and low spirit, work related worries and financial worries.

If you think about it, these three are the same worries affecting us today. Conquer them and you are guaranteed of a worry free life.

Lastly, Dale Carnage ends this gem with 32 true stories of people who conquered their worries and emerged winners.

It’s true that modernity has made life better for humanity but old is gold; this book has effective techniques of fighting stress.

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