How To Stop Worrying And Start Living

The demand for Mrs. Speer's home-baked pastry became so great that she had to move out of her kitchen into a shop and hire two girls to bake for her: pies, cakes, bread, and rolls. During the war, people stood in line for an hour at a time to buy her home-baked foods.

"I have never been happier in my life," Mrs. Speer said. "I work in the shop twelve to fourteen hours a day, but I don't get tired because it isn't work to me. It is an adventure in living. I am doing my part to make people a little happier. I am too busy to be lonesome or worried. My work has filled a gap in my life left vacant by the passing of my mother and husband and my home."

When I asked Mrs. Speer if she felt that other women who were good cooks could make money in their spare time in a similar way, in towns of ten thousand and up, she replied:

"Yes-of course they can!"

?How To Stop Worrying And Start Living? By Dale Carnegie 144

Mrs. Ora Snyder will tell you the same thing. She lives in a town of thirty thousand-Maywood, Illinois. Yet she started in business with the kitchen stove and ten cents'

worth of ingredients. Her husband fell ill. She had to earn money. But how? No experience. No skill. No capital. Just a housewife. She took the white of an egg and sugar and made some candy on the back of the kitchen stove; then she took her pan of candy and stood near the school and sold it to the children for a penny a piece as they went home. "Bring more pennies tomorrow," she said. "I'll be here every day with my home-made candy." During the first week, she not only made a profit, but had also put a new zest into living. She was making both herself and the children happy. No time now for worry.

This quiet little housewife from Maywood, Illinois, was so ambitious that she decided to branch out-to have an agent sell her kitchen-made candy in roaring, thundering Chicago. She timidly approached an Italian selling peanuts on the street. He shrugged his shoulders. His customers wanted peanuts, not candy. She gave him a sample. He liked it, began selling her candy, and made a good profit for Mrs. Snyder on the first day.

Four years later, she opened her first store in Chicago. It was only eight feet wide. She made her candy at night and sold it in the daytime. This erstwhile timid housewife, who started her candy factory on her kitchen stove, now has seventeen stores-fifteen of them in the busy Loop district of Chicago.

Here is the point I am trying to make. Nellie Speer, in Jackson Heights, New York, and Mrs. Ora Snyder, in May-wood, Illinois, instead of worrying about finances, did something positive. They started in an extremely small way to make money off the kitchen stove-no overhead, no rent, no advertising, no salaries. Under these conditions, it is almost impossible for a woman to be defeated by financial worries.

Look around you. You will find many needs that are not filled. For example, if you train yourself to be a good cook, you can probably make money by starting cooking classes for young girls right in your own kitchen. You can get your students by ringing door-bells.

Books have been written about how to make money in your spare time; inquire at your public library. There are many opportunities for both men and women. But one word of warning: unless you have a natural gift for selling, don't attempt door-to-door selling.

Most people hate it and fail at it.

Rule No. 10: Don't gamble-ever.

I am always astounded by the people who hope to make money by betting on the ponies or playing slot machines. I know a man who makes his living by owning a string of these "one armed bandits", and he has nothing but contempt for the foolish people who are so naive as to imagine that they can beat a machine that is already rigged against them.