“How,” writes a lady to me, “can I remove the following difficulties from my path?  
“How can I overcome the lazy habit of oversleeping in the morning—laziness in general, in fact?
 
“How can I overcome the fear and worry habit?
 
“How can I ‘let go’ of the thoughts of past disappointments, mistakes, etc? I have tried all manner of ways to divert my mind by work and study.
 
“Do you believe in confession, in the case of a non-Catholic, for the purpose of relieving the mind?
 
“How can I overcome prejudice? I find 57 I am prejudiced against certain sects and races.”
 
Rather a stiff task, to answer all these questions. Of course, I cannot “answer” them fully. All I or any one can do is to give a few hints which may be useful.
 
Oversleeping is not necessarily laziness. Go to bed earlier, if you have to rise at a certain hour. It’s a safe rule to take all the sleep you can get. The rule in my own family is, “Let the sleepy sleep.”
 
Laziness is not a bad quality always. A lazy body often houses a most energetic mind. The real cure for physical laziness is fun; find some form of exercise that lures you. Mental laziness is a more difficult disease, and you can only cure it by taking yourself severely in hand. Usually, I should say, it is hopeless.
 
Fear can generally be mitigated, if not 58 altogether removed, by intelligence. It is a by-product of ignorance, as a rule. We are afraid of what we don’t know. Science (knowledge) has done much to alleviate superstition (ignorance).
 
Worry can only be remedied by adopting some rational theory of life, some common-sense philosop............