By David Robson, Elia Barbieri/The Guardian, The Guardian, February 14, 2022
In the late 19th-century America, a somewhat bizarre form of abstinence emerged. The vice was not alcohol but anxiety. Citizens of New York began to attend regular “Don’t Worry Clubs” in which they encouraged each other to look on the bright side of life. Their founder, Theodore Seward, argued that Americans were “slaves to the worrying habit”, which was the “enemy which destroys happiness”. It needed to be “attacked” with “resolute and persevering effort”.
By the early 20th century, the psychologist William James described how people had developed a kind of “religion of healthy-mindedness” with the aim of turning the mind away from all negative thoughts and feelings.
Today, we seem to be living in a global Don’t Worry Club. Books, magazines, podcasts and TV shows frequently outline the dangers of stress. Many assume that anxious feelings are inherently and inevitably bad for us in the short and long term – and that they must be eliminated.
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