Editor’s Note: San Diego Jewish World is fortunate to have among its contributors the authors of many books. To acquaint you with them, and their literary output, we will from time to time offer articles by the authors telling of their works. This article is by Dr. Michael Mantell, an Advanced Behavior Coach based in San Diego.
By Michael Mantell, PhD
SAN DIEGO — Ask my elementary school teachers if I would ever write a book and they’d laugh. Yet, when each of the three books I’ve written thus far hit the stands, I laughed. I’ve had the privilege of writing books in the self-help genre. I believe that each of the three, and the fourth on its way, can fill the mind of the reader with thoughts of increase, advancement and promotion leading to a better life, a healthier and happier life.
I’ve spent 40 years before retiring this year in the scientific study and application of optimal human functioning and have brought this to my 1988 original, “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff PS It’s All Small Stuff,” my 1996, “Ticking Bombs: Defusing Violence in the Workplace,” and the “25th Anniversary update of my Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff PS It’s All Small Stuff.” The same holds true for my upcoming book in the same arena of healthy thinking – replace your negative and fearful thoughts with positive and hopeful thinking—and start the journey toward the happy life you’ve always wanted.
My “Ticking Bombs: Defusing Violence in the Workplace,” made its impact in helping so many companies prevent the ugly side of human frustration boiling over to violence in the workplace during the time when “going postal” became the hot corporate buzz words. When the Postmaster General of the U.S. at the time wrote a forward for me, and CEO’s of many, many companies called on me to help design programs to prevent violence through careful hiring and management training, I was delighted. It helped define my work for a decade. It led me to consult with the US Postal Service. At the first meeting I attended, covered by the press, I saw no members of the Postal Service worker’s union represented and called them out on it. How can we solve the problem of violence in the Post Office with no working mail carriers represented? Boy was I a brash kid from Newark, N.J.
In 1988 when I wrote “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff: PS It’s All Small Stuff,” little did I know that a number of years later my book would go into three printings, have an audio version, be celebrated and awarded wonderful titles like “Good Morning America’s” “Hot Pick” and “Publishers Weekly Magazine’s” “Listen Up Award: Best Audio of 1996.” I also didn’t anticipate the controversy. The book rocked the self-help world at the time, and the audio version won the highly coveted Publishers Weekly Best Audio Award in the self-help category.
Now celebrating its twenty-fifth anniversary the updated Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff offers the most contemporary tools that can enhance your life today. You have the power to choose how you feel, how you react, and how you deal with your circumstances. Replace your negative and fearful thoughts with positive and hopeful thinking—and start the journey toward the happy life you’ve always wanted.
But what about the controversy?
Ahhh, yes the controversy. I didn’t sweat it.
After all, William Safire noted in his 2004 book, “The Right Word in the Right Place at the Right Time,” that I first popularized the expression, “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff” in my 1988 book. But that didn’t stop someone else from coming along and writing another book using the same expression in the title.
Here’s what happened. One day in 1996, I was walking through Fashion Valley shopping mall in San Diego, and passed a Barnes and Noble bookstore. I almost fell off my feet when I gazed in the window and saw a floor to ceiling display of my book, “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff: PS It’s All Small Stuff.” Honestly, I was beaming.
After all, a young kid from Newark, NJ who went from a 1.8 GPA in my first semester of college to a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania and living in San Diego, California seeing my first book so displayed in Barnes and Noble…well, an immediate phone call to my wife, Paula, was in order.
“Oh my goodness! You won’t believe this,” I shouted in the phone to Paula. “The book is all over Barnes and Noble.”
“Wow, that’s incredible! How come we didn’t know this was going to happen?” Paula wondered. I did too.
Then it hit me. “Wait a second, that’s not the cover of the book. They must have changed it,” I told Paula. “Hold on, something else is weird,” I remember mumbling.
“They also changed the ‘PS It’s All Small Stuff’ to ‘AND It’s All Small Stuff’!” I added bewildered. Then it hit me.
“You aren’t going to believe this, better sit down. Someone else wrote something way too similar!” I told my wife.
What followed was a long string of phone calls from friends and families, lawyers and publishers, media and newspapers. But thanks to William Safire, he clarified the story.
“What are you going to do to that guy?” “Did you see him in the UK’s newspaper lying in the hammock with dollar bills strewn all over him?” “Did that character plagiarize your book?”
I wasn’t going to do anything to him. I did see the picture of him lying in a hammock covered with money all over him from head to toe. Ewwwww is right! I didn’t believe he actually plagiarized my original book, nor did the many attorneys who reviewed the case. Close, but no sweat.
Sweat it? Are you kidding? I loved it. You see, things don’t happen TO us, but rather, things happen FOR us! What an opportunity this was!
Like Alfred E. Neuman, the fictitious cover boy of my favorite magazine growing up, “Mad Magazine” who wondered, starting in the magazine’s 24th issue, “What, Me Worry?” I don’t worry. I don’t sweat it. Never have. Never will. It’s like drinking poison and hoping the other guy suffers. Why cause suffering in myself? It’s bad enough something I’d prefer not happen actually happened. On top of that I should create suffering within myself as well. Never. Ever.
“Dr. Mantell, you wrote ‘Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff’?” Yes sir, I did.
“Dr. Mantell, would you come on and talk about your bestselling book, ‘Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff’?” Sure I would! And did. And do.
“Dr. Mantell, I loved your book.” Thanks, did you love mine or the other one. “What other one? Wow, he stole your title!” No, he actually didn’t.
Wherever I spoke, the confusion and controversy caused by the other author’s close call was a topic to discuss and use as an example of never, ever sweating the small stuff. Never. Ever. I don’t sweat it, I don’t regret it, I move on and I forget it. My book will teach you exactly how to do the very same.
Years of this went on until one day the chairman of the department of psychology of one of the nation’s top universities called to inform me that the other author died. He wondered if he “got what he deserved.” Can you believe that question?
I couldn’t. After all, while I didn’t know the other author, I imagined he had a family, friends, impacted many and of course I only wished him and his surviving family well, peace and comfort. And still do. Never. Ever. Sweat the small stuff. Ever.
What’s my secret to not ever causing stress within myself, and especially over the shenanigans of others?
Here it is, so repeat after me: the link is what you think. I’ll say it again: the link is what you think. Repeat after me: the link is what you think. Write it down, cut it out, paste it on the dashboard of your car or keep it on your desk, and look at it the next time you are in traffic, have a run-in with your boss, look at your bank account (if you have one), weigh yourself, or wake up in the morning and wonder what the heck you did the night before. The link is what you think, it’s not—not ever—the external event.
You actually think that someone else’s behavior makes you upset? You think another book by an all but the same, misleading, title can cause upset? You believe that seeing another book by a confusingly all too similar title is worth sweating? You’d be wrong, erroneous, inaccurate, and wasting precious time in life if you answer, “yes” to these questions. Never, ever, sweat the small stuff. There’s too much health and happiness to focus on. Why look at the thorns on the rose bush when you can look at the roses on the thorn bush?
I hope you enjoy this 25th anniversary edition of the original “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff: PS It’s All Small Stuff.” Its noble purpose remains what the original in 1988 set out to do: to help you improve your life, live fit, healthy and happy.
I’m especially grateful to have the support, love and constant guidance of my wife, Paula, and our children and six grandchildren. In the years that have passed since I wrote my first book in 1988, we’ve been blessed in so many ways, beyond description really, though our six grandchildren certainly sit at the top of that pile.
Now our 9 year-old grandaughter, Rebecca, says she wants to be an author…and has already written a number of chapters for her first book. And on it goes. Small stuff? There is none.
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Dr Michael Mantell, based in San Diego, provides coaching to business leaders, athletes, individuals and families to reach breakthrough levels of success and significance in their professional and personal lives. Mantell may be contacted via michael.mantell@sdjewishworld.com
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