ducing the efficiency of my labor?

One of the busiest and most efficient men in England is quoted as
having explained his own accomplishment of big results with the least
expenditure of effort: "By organizing myself to run smoothly, as well
as my business; by schooling myself to keep cool, and to do what I
have to do without expending more nervous energy on the task than is
necessary; by avoiding all needless friction. In consequence, when I
finish my day's work, I feel nearly as fresh as when I started."

[Sidenote: _Why a Man Breaks Down_]

The late Professor James, of Harvard University, often referred to as
the founder of modern psychology, spoke thus disparagingly of
untrained effort: "Your convulsive worker breaks down and has bad
moods so often that you never know where he may be when you most need
his help,--he may be having one of his 'bad days.' We say that so many
of our fellow-countrymen collapse and have to be sent abroad to rest
their nerves, because they work so hard. I suspect that this is an
immense mistake, I suspect that neither the nature nor the amount of
our work is accountable for the frequency and the severity of our
breakdowns, but that their cause lies rather in those absurd feelings
of hurry and having no time, in the breathlessness and tension, that
anxiety of feature and solicitude for results, that lack of inner
harmony and ease, in short, by which with us the work is apt to be
accompanied."

[Sidenote: _How to Economize Effort_]

The fact is that to be a truly busy man you must be never in a hurry.
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