Think Yourself Thin – The New Mental Outlook to Help You Lose Weight

EXCERPT:

“It’s later than you think…

WE WOULD ALL LIKE TO BE SLIM and young and good-looking. I wish I could wave a magic wand and transform all of you into glamorous, radiant creatures of twenty-one. But like the witch in John van Druten’s Bell, Book and Candle, my wand is useless, and my broom, good only for prosaic, utilitarian tasks, stands idly in the closet. However, if you are overweight, I believe I can show you how to become comfortably thin, look and feel younger and healthier—and have a good chance to live longer, too, if you’ll put your mind to it.

There are nearly one hundred and ten million adults in America, and it has been estimated that, of that number, over twenty-two million weigh too much—and would be better off if they didn’t. When twenty per cent of a population suffers from a serious defect, something should be done about it. I’m not optimistic enough to believe that I can influence the weight and health of that great a portion of the population—but if I help even a few, I’ll be mighty happy about it.

I’m taking it for granted that you weigh too much, or that someone you’re interested in weighs too much.

Otherwise you’d be pretty foolish to waste your time over this book. Of course, you could gloat over the over-weights and what they have to put up with! But this book is not for gloaters. It is for those who are too fat and who want to do something about it.

I could make definite promises that you’ll lose weight— and look and feel better if you follow the rules you’ll read here; I could guarantee that you’d weigh less and improve in health—but I don’t dare. Not because you won’t lose weight if you follow the rules, but because too many readers can’t or won’t read.

Thyra Samter Winslow was bornLouis and Sara (Harris) Samter on March 15, 1893, she began writing as a child, and like many of her young female characters, yearned for life beyond her hometown of Fort Smith, Arkansas. She eventually left to attend the University of Missouri School of Journalism and later moved to Chicago where she worked as a chorus girl, actor, and dancer—experiences she depicts in her novel Show Business (1926). Finally Samter secured a position as a feature writer with the Chicago Tribune from 1915 to 1916, and during this time began publishing stories and articles for newspapers and magazines such as The Smart Set and American Mercury. She briefly attended Columbia University and the Cincinnati Art Academy.
In the early 1920s, she married John Seymour Winslow. They were divorced in 1927, and she married Nelson Waldorf Hyde the same year. Her career as a fiction writer blossomed in the 1930s when she began to publish stories in The New Yorker, and gained the attention of critics such as Carl Van Doren. In 1937, Winslow and Hyde divorced, and she began working as a screenwriter with Columbia, RKO, and later with Warner Brothers and NBC. She lived the rest of her life in Hollywood and New York City.