When William James, another great leader in studies of the human mind, died in 1910, a young newspaper reporter had already begun exploring the minds of America's greatest men. Here he is, 53 years later, Dr Napoleon Hill. [applause] Thank you.
Thank you very much. [applause] [applause stops] My greatest book, "Think and Grow Rich," was written in the White House in 1933 in the most intense surrounding of negative attitude I have ever witnessed in my entire life, which is the evidence, I think, of the fact that there are ways and means of maintaining a positive mental attitude even though you're surrounded with negative influences. The subject of a positive mental attitude is so very important that I want you to know I'm working from a script because I want this lecture to be letter-perfect.
A positive mental attitude is a state of mind which the individual must create and maintain by methods of his own choice through the operations of his own willpower based on motives of his own adoption. In the printed lesson on this subject, many suggestions are offered as to practical methods by which the individual may take possession of his own mind and develop the habit of directing the mind in a positive mental attitude. There are so many people in this world who can see the hole in the doughnut but they cannot see the doughnut around the hole.
One with a positive mental attitude sees the hole in the doughnut all right, but he also sees the doughnut around the hole. Nothing constructive and worthy of man's efforts ever has been or ever will be achieved except that which comes from a positive mental attitude based upon a definite purpose and activated by a burning desire and intensified until the burning desire is elevated to the plane of applied faith. When it comes to wishes, everyone has a flock of them.
When it comes to idle curiosity, everyone has a stock of it. When it comes to hopes, perhaps half of the people have hopes for unattained things or circumstances. Burning desire--only that small percentage of people who can be called successful ever feel the urge of this burning desire.
Applied faith--only the leaders attain this degree of mind control, which can exist only in a positive mental attitude. Prayer brings positive results only when it is expressed in a positive mental attitude. The most effective prayers are those expressed by individuals who have conditioned their minds to habitually think in terms of a positive mental attitude.
For a great number of years, it was a mystery to me as to why my prayers failed more often than they succeeded. When I found out the real cause, I discovered that I was in the habit of going to prayer only when I was in difficulty, when I wanted someone to bail me out. Later on, I learned that the best way to go to prayer is to condition the mind long before an emergency arises by expressing thanks and gratitude for the blessings you already have.
The vibrations of thought sent out from the individual's mind carry with them, though, to other minds the precise state of mind in which they are released, a fact well known to all master salesmen who have learned how to condition the minds of their prospective buyers before they meet them. Mr W. Clement Stone has approximately 2,000 salesmen.
They have learned the art of conditioning the minds of their prospective buyer to buy long before they interview him. That's an astounding thing, but I am sure that Mr Stone's increase from $3 million of personal wealth to over $100 million is due, in the main, to the fact that those salesmen have been trained to condition first their own minds to be positive, and then that vibration of their minds goes ahead and affects the minds of the prospective buyer. No one can successfully teach the science of personal achievement while in a negative mental attitude.
Underscore that one, please. No lawyer can convince a jury, no clergyman can inspire his parishioners, no speaker can hold and influence his audience without the aid of a positive mental attitude. And it has been said that the most successful doctors in all branches of therapy are those who treat their patients with a positive mental attitude.
If a doctor went into the sickroom in a negative mental attitude, there wouldn't be a chance on earth for him to do his patient any good. The subconscious mind of an individual can be educated to produce constructive results only when it is given instructions in a positive mental attitude. The subconscious mind responds most favorably and immediately to a burning desire backed by applied faith, faith followed by action.
Constructive mottos are often used by people who recognize what a powerful influence one's daily environment has on the makings of a positive mental attitude. When I was associated with R. G.
LeTourneau in 1942 and '43, I wrote over 3,000 positive mottos, and here are some of them. You can do it if you believe you can. And how true that is.
Whatever it is that you're tackling, whatever your problem is, you can solve it if you believe you can. Do more than you are paid for, and soon you will be paid for more than you do. The person.
. . is worth most who requires the least amount of supervision.
And how true that is. Remember, your only limitation is that which you set up in your own mind. You fix your own limitation.
Nobody can fix it for you. The tone of your voice speaks louder than your words. Keep it pleasing, please.
A negative mind spawns only negative ideas. And there's more wrapped up in that short sentence than appears on the lines. A negative mind spawns only negative ideas.
A real master salesman will not, under any circumstances, approach a prospective buyer until he has first conditioned his mind to be absolutely positive, because he knows that the prospective buyer will pick up his own vibrations and his own feelings and act upon them. The use made of one's time determines the space he occupies in the world. Time spent in silent thought may yield fabulous riches through the creation of sound ideas.
A man is no bigger than the circumstances which he allows to worry him. Isn't that a marvelous thought? A man is no bigger than the circumstances which he allows to bother him or worry him.
A closed mind stumbles over the blessings of life without discovering them. When the devil wants a job well done, he picks a disgruntled person to do the job. There isn't the slightest doubt in the world about the soundness of that.
The man who can get the job done without alibis is on the sure road to success. Opportunity has the habit of getting in the way of the person with a positive mental attitude. A person with a positive mental attitude attracts opportunity, favorable opportunities, just like a magnet attracts steel filings and as definitely.
And in reverse, a negative mental attitude repels opportunity. Opportunity has the habit of getting in the way of the person with a positive mental attitude. Isn't that a marvelous thought?
Cooperation and friendship are two assets that can be had only by first giving them. No one can get to the top and remain there without taking others with him. Politeness begins at home, or it doesn't begin at all.
It may not be your duty to return good for evil, but it is your privilege. Never guess when there is a way of knowing. When you do more than you're paid for, you put the boss on a limb; when you do less, you put yourself on a limb.
Faith will bridge all rivers of doubt so one may pass over safely. A spider spinning its web has more definiteness of purpose than has most men. And how true that is.
There is a method by which one may transmute failure into success, poverty into riches, sorrow into joy, fear into faith. The transmutation must start with a positive mental attitude because success, riches, and faith do not make bedfellows with a negative mental attitude. The transmutation procedure is simple.
First, when failure overtakes you, start thinking of it as if it had been a success. Start imaging the circumstances of the failure in your own imagination as being a success. Start, also, looking for the seed of an equivalent benefit which seems comes with every failure.
While the wounds of disappointment and failure are wide open, it's very difficult for one to start looking for that seed of an equivalent or a greater benefit, but if you allow a little time to elapse after any type of adversity and then begin to search, you will find that seed of an equivalent benefit. It never fails. It's always there.
Because the Creator has so constructed man that he never allows anything to be taken away from anybody without something of equal or greater benefit being available to that person. Although the person may never discover it, the potential is there just the same. When poverty threatens to catch up with you or has actually caught up, start thinking of it as riches, and visualize the riches in all the things that you wish to do with actual riches.
Also start looking for the seed of an equivalent benefit. When fear overtakes you, just remember that fear is only faith in reverse gear. Isn't that an enormous thought?
Fear--faith is only-- fear is only faith in reverse gear. And start thinking in terms of faith by seeing yourself translating faith into whatever circumstance or things you desire. When sorrow overtakes you, start expressing yourself in terms of joy, perhaps by singing or giving thanks for your power to convert sorrow into joy.
Act out these positive parts, and they will become real. Isn't that an astounding thought? Of course, when you start acting joyously when the people around you know that your heart is burdened with sorrow, you may seem ridiculous, but never mind what the other fellow thinks; it's what you think that counts.
[applause] Thank you. [applause] I have been criticized by some who didn't understand the nature of my ten invisible guides, but the reply is that they serve me perfectly. They allow me to say to the world that I have everything upon the face of this earth that I need or desire or want, and if I need more, all I have to do is to reach out my hand and get it and close my hand on it.
So if those who do not understand the law back of my ten invisible guides wish to criticize, that's their misfortune, not mine. Have a session with yourself in the bathroom every evening just before retiring. Look at yourself in the mirror, and compliment yourself orally and enthusiastically for having already accomplished the things you desire to accomplish tomorrow, and do not stop until you have convinced yourself that what you wish to happen tomorrow will happen.
You know, nature has a way of, uh, seeing to it that that which you expect comes along. She doesn't want to disappoint. If you expect failure, if you expect defeat, if you expect ill health, the chances are that you will not be disappointed.
But if you expect success, which is far better, the chances are also that you will not be disappointed. Who is the greatest person living at the present time? The answer, of course, is that you are the greatest person now living.
If you don't believe this, then begin at once to tell yourself it is true, for it is true as far as you are concerned. Do you know of any person living, past or present, or-- who is more important than you are? Of course you don't.
You are great because you can always become that which you sincerely desire to be. That might not be true if you lived in Russia or China, but you don't live in Russia or China. You live in the United States of America, the freest, the greatest, the most wonderful nation upon the face of this earth, and you have all of the benefits of this great country to back you in assuming that you're going to be successful.
Create in your imagination an army of invisible guides who will take care of all of your needs, all of your desires, very much the same as I have done. For instance, the guide to physical sound health, whose duty it will be to keep your physical body healed and in good health; and the guide to financial prosperity, whose duty it will be to keep you supplied with all of the money you need; and the guide to peace of mind, whose duty it will be to keep your mind cleared of all fears, all doubts, all causes of fear and worry; and the guide to hope and the guide to faith, whose duties it will be to give you inspired guidance as to all of your plans, aims, and purposes; and the guide to romance and the guide to love, whose duties it will be to keep you young in body and in mind; and the guide to overall wisdom, whose duty it will be to convert to your benefit all circumstances and influences which affect your life, whether they are good or bad, negative or positive; and the guide to persistence; and the guide to Norm Hill. Norm Hill is my roving ambassador who carries out various orders from me, which are not specifically assigned to the other nine guides.
You needn't call your roving ambassador by the name of Norm Hill. You can call him anything you choose. But if you'll have this invisible talisman working for you, you'll find that he'll do a marvelous job if you believe he will.
Your only compensation needed to keep these invisible guides eternally active in your service will be an expression of gratitude offered each night before you retire, in which you will thank them individually for the service they have rendered you during the day and the service they will render you tomorrow and always. That's all they require, an expression of gratitude. Interesting that that word "gratitude" is one of the most marvelous words in the English language.
I often wonder how many people there are in the world who ever experience this marvelous feeling of gratitude for the blessings they already have. If you're struck by some of the ideas expressed in this lesson to be new, don't be alarmed, for it may well be that new ideas alert one's mind and motivate it to create still other new ideas. Motivation, action, enthusiasm, faith, these are the states of mind which are associated with a positive mental attitude.
Habits--you're the sum total of your habits, whether they be habits you have developed with purpose of forethought or habits you have allowed to creep upon you by neglect to form your own. A successful, well-balanced, and well-rounded-out life is the result of ordered habits and never the result of chance or neglect. Positive habits can live and thrive only in the mind which has been conditioned with a positive mental attitude.
And your other self-- each human being is a plural, not a singular, being. One of these beings is negative; the other is positive. And there is a battle from birth until death between these two as to which will dominate.
Usually the power is about evenly divided between the positives and the negatives, but often, the negative takes over completely and makes of the individual a subject of irritation to himself and to all others around him. The development of a positive mental attitude is the first step and which one must take in order to give the positive self full and complete control over the negative self. Then one has truly taken possession of his own mind and is able to direct it to whatever ends he may desire, thus fulfilling the purpose of the Creator in having given man complete control over but one thing, and that is his own mind.
I think, of all the facts that I have examined in life, that is the most fabulous, the most far-reaching, and the most significant, that the Creator has given man control over but one thing and one thing only, and that is the right to use his thinking, positively or negatively. Eternal vigilance is the price that one must pay to maintain a positive mental attitude because of these and other natural opposites of positive thinking, such as your negative self constantly maneuvers for power over you. You can feel that.
You don't need to take my word for it. You've felt it in the past. You may not have defined the feeling properly, but you know very well that there is something going on within you constantly in the nature of a negative thought.
Then your accumulated fears, doubts, and self-imposed limitations, which came over with you when you came from the other side, they're constantly standing in the way of a positive mental attitude. Then the negative influences near you, including people who are negative, and especially, sometimes, the people with whom you work or the relatives with whom you're associated, and perhaps some inborn negative traits which you brought over with you at the time of birth, these also can be transmuted into positive traits. Worries over the lack of money and the lack of progress in your business, profession, or calling in life-- I don't know of anything that can pull the rug out from under one quicker than worries over the lack of money.
Unrequited love and unbalanced emotional frustrations in your relationships with the opposite sex-- I suspect that sends as many people to the insane asylum as any other cause, unrequited love. It seems to me that a man or a woman who has been disappointed in a love affair would look upon the affair as-- very much as a sort of a streetcar ride. You know, if you don't like the car you're riding on, you can always get a transfer onto another one.
And if you haven't-- the car hasn't arrived yet, just remember, if you stand by the side of the streetcar line long enough, one will come along. So don't let it worry you in the meanwhile. And unsound health, either real or imaginary, that also is something that you have to battle against in order to maintain a positive mental attitude.
And intolerance, the lack of an open mind on all subjects toward all people, you certainly have to keep a close check on that one if you're going to maintain a positive mental attitude. It makes no difference how much another person may deserve your hatred or your dislike or your intolerance. He may deserve it, but you can't afford to give it on account of what it will do to you.
And greed for more material possessions than you need. . .
I have probably seen and known and dealt with more wealthy men in this country than any other one individual, and I want to tell you, my friends, that I can count on the fingers of my one hand the extremely wealthy men with whom I would have cared to change places. Most of them paid too much for the money they got. Their greed outran their reasoning.
They were getting no peace of mind out of life. You can get too much money in life; you can also get too little. Somewhere in between the two extremes is the proper place to stop.
I have a motto which says, "Not too much, not too little. " That goes not only for money; it goes for everything. Not too much, not too little, just enough to maintain a well-ordered and a well-balanced life.
Ignorance of the real extent of the power of your mind and its unlimited potentials for the attainment of anything you desire also is a handicap to the maintenance of a positive mental attitude. And lack of a definite major purpose and a plan for its attainment. .
. 2 out of 100, perhaps, have a definite major purpose, and that would be putting the percentage rather high, if you took the people as a whole. And the habit of allowing others to do your thinking for you.
. . Now, check yourself rigidly on each of the above enemies of positive thinking, and go to work wherever you grade less than 100% on immunity against any of these causes.
If you have a master mind alliance, have each of its members to carefully check and grade you on each of the above causes, since it is a common trait of human--of human beings to be biased in evaluating themselves, sometimes in their own favor, but more often against themselves. As a student of the science of personal achievement, you are indebted to the complete overhauling job through which you will evolve into new-- a new and a better set of habits by which you conduct your life. Remember, therefore, that no price you have to pay for this better way of living is too high.
Actually, the only price you have to pay is that of following the instructions laid down in the philosophy under these instructions until these instructions become your daily habits. Socrates said, "Wisdom softens poverty and adorns riches. " And Napoleon Hill says that a positive mental attitude will do the same, or even more, by eliminating poverty altogether.
Every adversity that carries with it the seed of an equivalent benefit-- the proper way to attain this benefit is by starting to look for the seed as soon as the adversity appears instead of brooding over the circumstance. A positive mental attitude is the only attitude in which that seed may be revealed and germinate into a full-blown flower of benefit. Everyone, my friends, I suppose, desires to be rich, but not everyone knows what constitutes enduring riches, and most people believe riches to consist only in the material things that money can buy.
Let me disillusion you on that subject by giving you an outline of the 12 great riches of life. Number 1: a positive mental attitude. That stands at the head of the list of all of the riches of life.
Number 2: sound physical health. And number 3: harmony in all of your human relations. Number 4: freedom from fear.
Number 5: the hope of future achievement. Number 6: the capacity for applied faith. Number 7: a willingness to share your blessings with others.
And number 8: to be engaged in the labor of love. Number 9: an open mind on all subjects toward all people. Number 10: complete self-discipline.
And there's a whole foundation of philosophy in that one alone, complete self-discipline. And number 11: the wisdom with which to understand people. And number 12: financial security.
Note that it comes last. There are 11 other things which may be used as a foundation upon which to make proper use of money, and without these other nine things, money can be just as dangerous as it can be helpful. Observe that money is the last thing on the list.
11 other riches precede it, without which money can become a curse and nothing more. Study these 12 great riches carefully, and observe that not one of them can be attained without the application of a positive mental attitude. That is why it leads the list.
In the lesson on a pleasing personality, you will observe also that a positive mental attitude heads the list of the 31 traits which give one a pleasing personality. And I thank you.
