You Always Need a Backup Plan
Being in the asphalt business in Detroit taught me very early on that things frequently go wrong. In fact, things go wrong so frequently, it is difficult to believe:
- Pumps break.
- Tanks break.
- Trucks break.
- People get injured.
- Employees do not show up to work.
- It rains.
- The police give you a hard time for the condition of your equipment.
- People do not pay you for the work you have done for them.
- Suppliers go out of business.
- Customers get incredibly angry with you.
- Accidents occur, and materials get spilled on roadways.
- People rob you.
- People steal your equipment.
- You need to “pay off” certain people in order to operate in certain geographic areas.
The list of things that go wrong in the asphalt business is virtually endless. I will mention this again: So many things went wrong when I was in the asphalt business, it was difficult to believe. I [Read more]
Do Your Job Search on Heavy Ground
For the past several years I have been interacting with people who are looking for jobs on a daily basis. I have also been working with recruiters, who find people jobs. After many years of working with various people, it often occurs to me that those who get the best jobs do their job search in an unconventional way: The best thing is to avoid doing what everyone else is doing when it comes to looking for a job. By far, the most effective strategy for getting a job is to look where other people are simply not looking. People who do things differently from everyone else often get the best jobs. I have seen this so many times it is difficult to believe. There are many unemployed people who believe a job search should be done in a certain way. Often, the people who learn to do things in a different way get the best results. In the Art of War, Sun Tzu defines eight types of ground on which combat can occur. In terms of your job search, two of the most interesting are Deadly Ground and Heavy Ground.
- An excellent and very effective way to win any war is to go undetected into enemy territory before attacking. You use the element of surprise to win the war. This is what Sun Tzu called “Heavy Ground.” Sun Tzu believes this is the best kind of battle. This is considered a battle of “art”.
- In Deadly Ground, two forces meet face to face to fight and there is no means of escape. The battle is one of brute force and there are generally going to be heavy casualties on both sides. Sun Tzu believes this is the worst kind of battle. A deadly ground battle is without “art” and allowing this to happen reflects poorly on the commander of the troops.
In a Heavy Ground battle, a weak force can paralyze a much stronger one. Most people are taught to march in “unison” and do things in the same [Read more]
Your Job Search and Future Prospects Will Be Determined by the Company You Keep
I have had the most unusual series of interviews over the past few weeks. Yesterday I interviewed a woman who came in smelling like alcohol–to such an extent that my eyes were watering. I asked her about her record and she told me that she had a DUI but “all that was behind her now.” She then wanted to make sure that this was not something that would “prejudice me” against hiring her. I must admit that since I was interviewing this woman for a job that involved a lot of driving, it sure as hell [Read more]
Do Not Trust Appearances: My Visit to Deep Springs College
The first time I visited Las Vegas was in 1988. The city was far different back then, with an old western vibe–not at all like the modern strip with all of the new casinos and so forth. Las Vegas, in the late 1980s, was more tired and run down; it was by no means the exciting city it is today. I am officially changing my license today and becoming a Las Vegas resident. Last night I found a condominium here. There is a massive amount of activity in Las Vegas, which makes it a [Read more]
Harmonize With the People in Your Environment
One of the most unusual candidates I ever worked with back when I was a job recruiter, was someone who had basically worked for five different law firms in a five-year period. He had absolutely stellar credentials, having attended the best schools, and having worked at the best law firms. The only problem was that it seemed he could not last more than a year at any place where he worked. When I started sending him out to various law firms, all the prospective employers came back and in no uncertain terms told me they were not interested in the guy. It was the strangest thing and I could not understand it at the time. On paper, the candidate looked like someone who would easily secure at least a handful of interviews. He was also very personable. One day I was driving down Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles near the federal building and I saw a man with a giant sign: “KICK THE JEWS OUT OF ISRAEL AND GIVE IT BACK TO PALESTINE!” He was screaming at cars while waving the sign in the air to get everyone’s attention. Incredibly, it was that candidate. When I recognized who it was, it suddenly made sense why nobody was interested in hiring the man. He was apparently a complete rebel who did not care to fit in with those around him. Since there is probably no law firm in Los Angeles without a substantial number of Jews in it who would be deeply offended by this guy’s views, I realized this guy was going to have a really hard time fitting in anywhere. Marching against the people who are likely to also be your employers and clients is probably not ever a good idea. Over the years I have seen many attorneys like this who, for whatever reason, make a decision to really stick out. They lose jobs and quickly develop a “do not touch this person with a ten foot pole” reputation that follows them wherever they go. Law firms want people who are going to fit in and simply get the work done. They do not want to offend clients. It is the same with any job–you need to fit in with the people you are working for and they need to see you as fitting in at all times. If you do not fit in and harmonize with others in your work environment, it can create serious problems for you. Several years ago I hired an employee who came across as a very quiet library type. He did excellent work and was quickly given raises and increased responsibility. He was a nice guy who kept a very low profile at work and seemed to be respected by his peers. Apparently he had gotten romantically involved with a coworker. One day a few weeks after I heard the two had ended their relationship, the female coworker and I were talking about something unrelated, and suddenly she started saying negative things about the guy in a roundabout way, making subtle digs. I was not interested in listening and attempted to change the conversation. Then she brought up something that really shocked me: “He has tattoos across his entire chest of skulls and stuff.” “Excuse me?” I said. “He is covered in tattoos. You have just never seen them because he has kept them covered up all these years at work.” She knew this would shock me. She then proceeded to tell me that the guy liked to hang out at industrial Goth-type clubs in Hollywood. The reason she was telling me all of this was because at the time our company was somewhat formal and comprised lots of attorneys. I am not the sort of guy who is generally into tattoos and the woman could look around and see that I did not have any other tattooed employees, as most of the staff was pretty conservative. This woman was trying to get me to form a negative opinion of the guy and I could tell she was also trying, as best as she could, to get him fired. In essence, what she was implying was “here among you is a traitor!!” She was trying to send me a signal loud and clear that this guy did not fit in, and that he was not who he represented himself to be. The girl did not stay with our company very long and a short time later the guy she had tattled on got a significant raise–and a year or so later, another raise. I was incredibly impressed with him and what he had been able to achieve. Not once did this guy come across as the sort of person who would have a bunch of tattoos and be interested in strange night life, vampires, and whatever it was that interested him. He was an impressive, intelligent person who, when at work, did his job very well and served as a role model to his fellow employees, especially the younger ones. The fact that his ex-girlfriend had seen him with his shirt off and could testify that he was covered in tattoos did not make the slightest difference to me. In fact, it made me think even more highly of him. He had managed to completely fit in at work and play the work role that was expected of him. When I was in college, the entire time I dated a girl who was Jewish. One time she came home with me over Christmas break and we went to a family Christmas party. My girlfriend, mom, sister, and I had driven from Detroit down to Ohio to visit the family of my mother’s second husband. We were in Toledo, Ohio, celebrating Christmas with this large Irish family in a very small house and at some point I wanted to get out of the house and get some fresh air. Down the street there was a giant church and I thought it would be fun to go look at it. My girlfriend and I decided we would go look at it and I informed a couple of my relatives that we were going to make the visit. It was about 3:30 in the afternoon and several of them were pretty buzzed on Miller High Life at that point. One walked up to us and said: “Why would she be interested in a church? She’s Jewish!” “Huh?” she said. “That’s right. We all know your secret. What’s it like seeing Christmas celebrated? Are you even allowed to go inside of a church?” Right then and there I realized we had been at this house the entire day and although not once did anyone say anything about her religion, it was clearly on their minds. Try as they might have, once the beers got rolling, they felt like they needed to make an issue out of it. My girlfriend ended up laughing it off; however, the conversation, short as it was, made us both feel incredibly uncomfortable. It had been nothing less than a tacit statement that my girlfriend did not fit in and was not one of the tribe. She thought the entire thing was pretty humorous but for me it actually felt a little menacing. People around us are always looking closely to see if we fit in. They are judging us and making assumptions even when we are not aware of it. In many cases, especially in the working world, it is important that we do our best to fit in at all costs. It can become a matter of survival. A couple of months later my girlfriend got back at me, albeit unintentionally. She took me to a Passover Seder in Chicago. My girlfriend had been raised a very conservative Jew. She spoke and read Hebrew and was incredibly well versed in her religion and all its traditions. The Hillel Center at the University of Chicago had a program where students could go have Passover with local families around Chicago. That night was really unusual to me; I had no idea what was going on. In the reading of the Haggadah I was unable to read in Hebrew and the people at the table looked very surprised. I managed to mess up virtually every ritual involved in the Seder. At the end of the evening, the man who had hosted the event approached me and started asking me all sorts of questions such as which synagogue I went to in Detroit and so forth. It was his subtle way of letting me know he knew I did not belong at the dinner, and it was very unwelcoming. I felt so uncomfortable. Some incredibly awkward moments followed. Clearly this man was insulted that he had opened this sacred event to include a non-Jew. I am not sure why he felt this way and in my experience with Judaism this is certainly not par for the course; nevertheless this particular person was very angry. In fact he became downright hostile. The following day someone from the Hillel Center called my girlfriend and told her that she should not have brought me to the Seder. The next year they also posted an “addendum” on the sign up form for the Seder, which explained that it was “bad judgment” to bring non-Jews to the Seder. Throughout my relationship with this girl, she broke up with me numerous times at her parents’ and family’s request because I was not the same religion as her. Many groups go a long way to protect this ideal, because maintaining the sense of solidarity within their group is so incredibly important to them. What these two events taught me–my family at Christmas and my girlfriend’s family at Passover was that people are incredibly sensitive about people fitting in with them. And every group seems to have both implied and expressed rules about who may or may not be allowed to fit in, based on how a person acts, looks, speaks, or believes. I ended up marrying another girl who was Jewish, several years ago. I had a Jewish wedding and during this wedding I could see that a lot of my relatives were confused as to what was going on. For most of my relatives, this was the first Jewish wedding they had ever attended, and for most it felt like a completely alien culture and set of traditions. I could relate to this because it was how I had felt too, before I had learned about and experienced it all first hand. A month or so ago I was having dinner in the Harvard Club of New York to celebrate my cousin’s birthday. At one point in the evening, my great uncle came up to speak with me and I noticed he had some information written on a piece of paper. He had gone to Harvard and Phillips, Andover, and was from a very old American family, out of which had come the first American Senator from Kansas (and the President pro tempore of the Senate)–among other things. My great uncle is a really nice guy who is always curious about various ideas. Recently, he decided to have some genetic testing done by some group affiliated with National Geographic. For the past several weeks he had been pondering the results: It turned out that his mother’s side was Jewish, which meant that my father would have been Jewish due to blood lines. My great uncle was very intrigued by this, and he told me how this side of his family had come over from Holland hundreds of years ago and must have been Jewish. He was actually in a state of disbelief–not sure what to make about any of this information. A couple of years ago I also took a genetic test and got interesting results: It came back that my mother was Jewish. My mother, of course, had no idea and for days sat puzzled in front of the computer. She had been raised in a small town in the Midwest and did not understand how her mother could possibly have been Jewish. When my wife and I went to visit her last Christmas she had put a Star of David on her window and appeared to be going with it in terms of what she had discovered. My point is not to instruct you based on my religious learning and what I have discovered about my roots. Instead, my point is far more general and far-reaching. Historically, at least in terms of the places my family has lived (Michigan, Kansas), Jews were treated poorly and not given the same opportunities as the rest of the general population. What I am surmising is that in order to get ahead, what many Jews [Read more]
The Power of Perceptions
In 1991 I purchased a four-year old Audi 5000 automobile for $2,500. When the car was new, it had been listed at $40,000. It was really beautiful inside. It had all sorts of electronic controls, powered everything, and it drove incredibly well. In fact, I can honestly say that the Audi 5000 was one of the nicest cars I have ever owned. In the entire time I owned the car, I had very few problems with it. The car was very comfortable in all respects and it cost me less than a much older, cheap compact car would have. As [Read more]
The Secret of the Ages
Robert Collier’s book, The Secret of the Ages, is one of the true classics of self-improvement literature. The book has been referenced in, and the inspiration for, many other self-improvement works, such as the recent phenomenon The Secret.
Collier writes about the incredible power that we all have available to us to achieve anything we want. While the historical background of the New Thought Movement and other influences on writers such as Napolean Hill and others is a subject in itself, it is important to understand that The Secret of the Ages is among the first books to really push forward the idea of thoughts being things, the subconscious mind’s ability to completely influence our outcomes and the power of our mind to achieve incredible change.
The Secret of the Ages is a very important self-improvement book and one I am sure you will enjoy. It is powerful, significant, and meaningful and it will open up to you an understanding of what is possible in your life and career.
–Harrison
The Secret of the Ages Robert Collier Contents VOLUME ONE I The World’s Greatest Discovery In the Beginning The Purpose of Existence The “Open Sesame!” of Life II The Genie-of-Your-Mind The Conscious Mind The Subconscious Mind The Universal Mind VOLUME TWO III The Primal Cause Matter – Dream or Reality? The Philosopher’s Charm The Kingdom of Heaven “To Him That Hath”- “To the Manner Born” IV Desire – The First Law of Gain The Magic Secret “The Soul’s Sincere Desire” VOLUME THREE V Aladdin & Company VI See Yourself Doing It VII “As a Man Thinketh” VIII The Law of Supply The World Belongs to You “Wanted” VOLUME FOUR IX The Formula of Success The Talisman of Napoleon “It Couldn’t Be Done” X “This Freedom” The Only Power XI The Law of Attraction A Blank Check XII The Three Requisites XIII That Old Witch-Bad Luck He Whom a Dream Hath Possessed The Bars of Fate Exercise VOLUME FIVE XIV Your Needs Are Met The Ark of the Covenant The Science of Thought XV The Master of Your Fate The Acre of Diamonds XVI Unappropriated Millions XVII The Secret of Power XVIII This One Thing I Do VOLUME SIX XIX The Master Mind XX What Do You Lack? XXI The Sculptor and the Clay XXII Why Grow Old? The Fountain of Youth VOLUME SEVEN XXIII The Medicine Delusion XXIV The Gift of the Magic “Suffer Little Children to Come Unto Me” L’Envoi “A fire-mist and a planet, A crystal and a cell, A jellyfish and a saurian, A cave where the cave men dwell; Then a sense of law and order, A face upturned from the clod; Some call it Evolution, And others call it God.” -Reprinted from The New England Journal. Foreword If you had more money than time, more millions than you knew how to spend, what would be your pet philanthropy? Libraries? Hospitals? Churches? Homes for the Blind, Crippled or Aged? Mine would be “Homes”-but not for the aged or infirm. For young married couples! I have often thought that, if ever I got into the “Philanthropic Billionaire” class, I’d like to start an Endowment Fund for helping young married couples over the rough spots in those first and second years of married life-especially the second year, when the real troubles come. Take a boy and a girl and a cozy little nest-add a cunning, healthy baby-and there’s nothing happier on God’s green footstool. But instead of a healthy babe, fill in a fretful, sickly baby-a wan, tired, worn-out little mother-a worried, dejected, heartsick father-and, there’s nothing more pitiful. A nurse for a month, a few weeks at the shore or mountains, a “lift” on that heavy doctor’s bill–any one of these things would spell H-E-A-V-E-N to that tiny family. But do they get it? Not often! And the reason? Because they are not poor enough for charity. They are not rich enough to afford it themselves. They belong to that great “Middle Class” which has to bear the burdens of both the poor and the rich- and take what is left for itself. It is to them that I should like to dedicate this book. If I cannot endow libraries or colleges for them, perhaps I can point the way to get all good gifts for them. For men and women like them do not need “charity” – or even sympathy. What they do need is inspiration-and opportunity-the kind of inspiration that makes a man go out and create his own opportunity. And that, after all, is the greatest good one can do anyone. Few people appreciate free gifts. They are like the man whom admiring townsfolk presented with a watch. He looked it over critically for a minute. Then-”Where’s the chain?” he asked. But a way to win for themselves the full measure of success they’ve dreamed of but almost stopped hoping for-that is something every young couple would welcome with open arms. And it is something that, if I can do it justice, will make the “Eternal Triangle” as rare as it is today common, for it will enable husband and wife to work together-not merely for domestic happiness, but for business success as well. ROBERT COLLIER. The Secret of the Ages In Seven Volumes VOLUME ONE I The World’s Greatest Discovery “You can do as much as you think you can, But you’ll never accomplish more; If you’re afraid of yourself, young man, There’s little for you in store. For failure comes from the inside first, It’s there if we only knew it, And you can win, though you face the worst, If you feel that you’re going to do it.” -EDGAR A. GUEST.* What, in your opinion, is the most significant discovery of this modern age? The finding of dinosaur eggs on the plains of Mongolia, laid-so scientists assert-some 10,000,000 years ago? The unearthing of the Tomb of Tutankh-Amen, with its matchless specimens of a bygone civilization? The radioactive time clock by which Professor Lane of Tufts College estimates the age of the earth at 1,250,000,000 years? Wireless? The Aeroplane? Man-made thunderbolts? No-not any of these. The really significant thing about them is that from all this vast research, from the study of all these bygone ages, men are for the first time beginning to get an understanding of that “Life Principle” which-somehow, some way-was brought to this earth thousands or millions of years ago. They are beginning to get an inkling of the infinite power it puts in their hands-to glimpse the untold possibilities it opens up. This is the greatest discovery of modern times-that every man can call upon this “Life Principle” at will, that it is as much the servant of his mind as was ever Aladdin’s fabled “genie-of-the-lamp” of old; that he has but to understand it and work in harmony with it to get from it anything he may need- health or happiness, riches or success. To realize the truth of this, you have but to go back for a moment to the beginning of things. * From “A Heap o’ Livin’.” The Reilly & Lee Co. In the Beginning It matters not whether you believe that mankind dates back to the primitive ape-man of 500,000 years ago, or sprang full-grown from the mind of the creator. In either event, there had to be a first cause-a creator. Some power had to bring to this earth the first germ of life, and the creation is no less wonderful if it started with the lowliest form of plant life and worked up through countless ages into the highest product of today’s civilization, than if the whole were created in six days. In the beginning, this earth was just a fire mist-six thousand or a billion years ago-what does it matter which? The one thing that does matter is that some time, some way, there came to this planet the germ of life-the life principle that animates all nature-plant, animal, and man. If we accept the scientists’ version of it, the first form in which life appeared upon earth was the humble algae-a jelly-like mass that floated upon the waters. This, according to the scientists, was the beginning, the dawn of life upon the earth. Next came the first bit of animal life- the lowly amoeba, a sort of jelly fish, consisting of a single cell, without vertebrae, and with very little else to distinguish it from the water round about. But it had life-the first bit of animal life-and from that life, according to the scientists, we could trace everything we have and are today. All the millions of forms and shapes and varieties of plants and animals that have since appeared are but different manifestations of life–formed to meet differing conditions. For millions of years this “Life Germ” was threatened by every kind of danger-from floods, from earthquakes, from droughts, from desert heat, from glacial cold, from volcanic eruptions-but to it each new danger was merely an incentive to finding a new resource, to putting forth Life in some new shape. To meet one set of needs, it formed the dinosaur-to meet another, the butterfly. Long before it worked up to man, we see its unlimited resourcefulness shown in a thousand ways. To escape danger in the water, it sought land. Pursued on land, it took to the air. To breathe in the sea, it developed gills. Stranded on land, it perfected lungs. To meet one kind of danger it grew a shell. For another, a sting. To protect itself from glacial cold, it grew fur, in temperate climates, hair. Subject to alternate heat and cold, it produced feathers. But ever, from the beginning, it showed its power to meet every changing condition, to answer every creature need. Had it been possible to kill this “Life Idea,” it would have perished ages ago, when fire and flood, drought and famine followed each other in quick succession. But obstacles, misfortunes, cataclysms, were to it merely new opportunities to assert its power. In fact, it required obstacles to awaken it, to show its energy and resource. The great reptiles, the monster beasts of antiquity passed on. But the “Life Principle” stayed, changing as each age changed, always developing, and always improving. Whatever power it was that brought this “Life Idea” to the earth, it came endowed with unlimited resource, unlimited energy, unlimited LIFE! No other force can defeat it. No obstacle can hold it back. All through the history of life and mankind you can see its directing intelligence-call it nature, call it providence, call it what you will-rising to meet every need of life. The Purpose of Existence No one can follow it down through the ages without realizing that the whole purpose of existence is GROWTH. Life is dynamic-not static. It is ever moving forward-not standing still. The one unpardonable sin of nature is to stand still, to stagnate. The Giganotosaurus, that was over a hundred feet long and as big as a house; the Tyrannosaurus, that had the strength of a locomotive and was the last word in frightfulness; the Pterodactyl or Flying Dragon-all the giant monsters of Prehistoric Ages-are gone. They ceased to serve a useful purpose. They did not know how to meet the changing conditions. They stood still-stagnated-while the life around them passed them by. Egypt and Persia, Greece and Rome, all the great Empires of antiquity, perished when they ceased to grow. China built a wall about her and stood still for a thousand years. Today she is the football of the powers. In all nature, to cease to grow is to perish. It is for men and women who are not ready to stand still, who refuse to cease to grow, that this book is written. It will give you a clearer understanding of your own potentialities, show you how to work with and take advantage of the infinite energy all about you. The terror of the man at the crossways, not knowing which road to take, will be no terror to you. Your future is of your own making. For the only law of infinite energy is the law of supply. The “Life Principle” is your principle. To survive, to win through, and to triumphantly surmount all obstacles has been its everyday practice since the beginning of time. It is no less resourceful now than ever it was. You have but to supply the urge, to work in harmony with it, to get from it anything you may need. For if this “Life Principle” is so strong in the lowest forms of animal life that it can develop a shell or a poison to meet a need; if it can teach the bird to circle and dart, to balance and fly; if it can grow a new limb on a spider to replace a lost one, how much more can it do for you- a reasoning, rational being, with a mind able to work with this “Life Principle,” with an energy and an initiative to urge it on! The evidence of this is all about you. Take up some violent form of exercise- rowing, tennis, and swimming, riding. In the beginning your muscles are weak, easily tired. But keep on for a few days. The “Life Principle” promptly strengthens them, toughens them, to meet their new need. Do rough manual labor-and what happens? The skin of your hands becomes tender, blisters, and hurts. Keep it up, and does the skin all wear off? On the contrary, the “Life Principle” provides extra thicknesses, extra toughness- calluses, we call them-to meet your need. All through your daily life you will find this “Life Principle” steadily at work. Embrace it, work with it, take it to yourself, and there is nothing you cannot do. The mere fact that you have obstacles to overcome is in your favor, for when there is nothing to be done, when things run along too smoothly; this “Life Principle” seems to sleep. It is when you need it, when you call upon it ur-gently, that it is most on the job. It differs from “Luck” in this, that fortune is a fickle jade that smiles most often on those who need her least. Stake your last penny on the turn of a card- have nothing between you and ruin but the spin of a wheel or the speed of a horse-and its a thousand to one “Luck” will desert you! But it is just the opposite with the “Life Principle.” As long as things run smoothly, as long as life flows along like a song, this “Life Principle” seems to slumber, secure in the knowledge that your affairs can take care of themselves. But let things start going wrong, let ruin and disgrace stare you in the face- then is the time this “Life Principle” will assert itself if you but give it a chance. The “Open, Sesame!” of Life There is a Napoleonic feeling of power that insures success in the knowledge that this invincible “Life Principle” is behind your every act. Knowing that you have working with you a force, which never yet has failed in anything it has undertaken, you can go ahead in the confident knowledge that it will not fail in your case, either. The ingenuity, which overcame every obstacle in making you what you are, is not likely to fall short when you have immediate need for it. It is the reserve strength of the athlete, the “second wind” of the runner, the power that, in moments of great stress or excite-ment, you unconsciously call upon to do the deeds which you ever after look upon as superhuman. But they are in no wise superhuman. They are merely beyond the capacity of your conscious self. Ally your conscious self with that sleeping giant within you, rouse him daily to the task, and those “superhuman” deeds will become your ordinary, everyday accomplishments. W. L. Cain, of Oakland, Oregon, writes: “I know that there is such a power, for I once saw two boys, 16 and 18 years of age, lift a great log off their brother, who had been caught under it. The next day, the same two boys, with another man and me, tried to lift the end of the log, but could not even budge it.” How was it that the two boys could do at need what the four were unable to do later on, when the need had passed? Because they never stopped to question whether or not it could be done. They saw only the urgent need. They concentrated all their thought, all their energy on that one thing-never doubting, never fearing-and the genie which is in all of us waiting only for such a call, answered their summons and gave them the strength-not of two men, but of ten! It matters not whether you are banker or lawyer, businessman or clerk. Whether you are the custodian of millions, or have to struggle for your daily bread. This “Life Principle” makes no distinction between rich and poor, high and low. The greater your need, the more readily will it respond to your call. Wherever there is an unusual task, wherever there is poverty or hardship or sickness or despair, there is this servant of your mind, ready and willing to help, asking only that you call upon him. And not only is it ready and willing, but it is always ABLE to help. Its ingenuity and resource are without limit. It is Mind. It is thought. It is the Telepathy that carries messages without the spoken or written word. It is the Sixth Sense that warns you of unseen dangers. No matter how stupendous and complicated, nor how simple your problem may be-the solution of it is somewhere in Mind, in Thought. And since the solution does exist, this Mental Giant can find it for you. It can KNOW, and it can DO, every right thing. Whatever it is necessary for you to know, whatever it is necessary for you to do, you can know and you can do if you will but seek the help of this genie-of-your-mind and work with it in the right way. II The Genie-of-Your-Mind “It matters not how strait the gate, How charged with punishment the scroll, I am the Master of my Fate; I am the Captain of my Soul.” -HENLEY. First came the Stone Age, when life was for the strong of arm or the fleet of foot. Then there was the Iron Age-and while life was more precious, still the strong lorded it over the weak. Later came the Golden Age, and riches took the place of strength-but the poor found little choice between the slave drivers’ whips of olden days and the grim weapons of poverty and starvation. Now we are entering a new age-the Mental Age-when every man can be his own master, when poverty and circumstance no longer hold power and the lowliest creature in the land can win a place side by side with the highest. To those who do not know the resources of mind these will sound like rash statements; but science proves beyond question that in the wellsprings of every man’s mind are unplumbed depths-undiscovered deposits of energy, wisdom and ability. Sound these depths-bring these treasures to the surface-and you gain an astounding wealth of new power. From the rude catamaran of the savages to the giant liners of today, carrying their thousands from continent to continent is but a step in the development of Mind. From the lowly cave man, cow-ering in his burrow in fear of lightning or fire or water, to the engineer of today, making servants of all the forces of Nature, is but a measure of difference in mental development. Man, without reasoning mind, would be as the monkeys are-prey of any creature fast enough and strong enough to pull him to pieces. At the mercy of wind and weather. A poor timid creature, living for the moment only, fearful of every shadow. Through his superior mind, he learned to make fire to keep himself warm; weapons with which to defend himself from the savage creatures round about; habitations to protect himself from the elements. Through mind he conquered the forces of Nature. Through mind he has made machinery do the work of millions of horses and billions of hands. What he will do next, no man knows, for man is just beginning to awaken to his own powers. He is just getting an inkling of the unfathomed riches buried deep in his own mind. Like the gold seekers of ‘49, he has panned the surface gravel for the gold swept down by the streams. Now he is starting to dig deeper to the pure vein beneath. We bemoan the loss of our forests. We worry over our dwindling resources of coal and oil. We decry the waste in our factories. But the greatest waste of all, we pay no attention to-the waste of our own potential mind power. Professor Wm. James, the world-famous Harvard psychologist, estimated that the average man uses only 10% of his mental power. He has unlimited power-yet he uses but a tithe of it. Unlimited wealth all about him-and he doesn’t know how to take hold of it. With God-like powers slumbering within him, he is content to continue in his daily grind – eating, sleeping, working-plodding through an existence little more eventful than the animals, while all of Nature, all of life, calls upon him to awaken, to bestir himself. The power to be what you want to be, to get what you desire, to accomplish whatever you are striving for, abides within you. It rests with you only to bring it forth and put it to work. Of course you must know how to do that, but before you can learn how to use it, you must realize that you possess this power. So our first objective is to get acquainted with this power. For Psychologists and Metaphysicians the world over, are agreed in this-that Mind is all that counts. You can be whatever you make up your mind to be. You need not be sick. You need not be unhappy. You need not be poor. You need not be unsuccessful. You are not a mere clod. You are not a beast of burden, doomed to spend your days in unremitting labor in return for food and housing. You are one of the Lords of the Earth, with unlimited potentialities. Within you is a power, which, properly grasped and directed, can lift you out of the rut of mediocrity and place you among the Elect of the earth-the lawyers, the writers, the statesmen, the big business men-the DOERS and the THINKERS. It rests with you only to learn to use this power, which is yours-this Mind that can do all things. Your body is for all practical purposes merely a machine, which the mind uses. This mind is usually thought of as con-sciousness; but the conscious part of your mind is in fact the very smallest part of it. Ninety per cent of your mental life is subconscious, so when you make active use of only the conscious part of your mind you are using but a fraction of your real ability; you are running on low gear. And the reason why more people do not achieve success in life is because so many of them are content to run on low gear all their lives – on SURFACE ENERGY. If these same people would only throw into the fight the resistless force of their subconscious minds they would be amazed at their undreamed of capacity for winning success. Conscious and subconscious are, of course, integral parts of the one mind. But for convenience sake let us divide your mind into three parts-the conscious mind, the subconscious mind, and the Infinite, Subliminal or Universal Mind. The Conscious Mind When you say, “I see-I hear-I smell-I touch,” it is your conscious mind that is saying this, for it is the force governing the five physical senses. It is the phase of mind with which you feel and reason-the phase of mind with which everyone is familiar. It is the mind with which you do business. It controls, to a great extent, all your voluntary muscles. It discriminates between right and wrong, wise and foolish. It is the generalissimo, in charge of all your mental forces. It can plan ahead-and get things done as it plans. Or it can drift along haphazardly, a creature of impulse, at the mercy of events-a mere bit of flotsam in the current of life. For it is only through your conscious mind that you can reach the subconscious and the Universal Mind. Your conscious mind is the porter at the door, the watchman at the gate. It is to the conscious mind that the subconscious looks for all its impressions. It is on it that the subconscious mind must depend for the teamwork necessary to get successful results. You wouldn’t expect much from an army, no matter how fine its soldiers, whose general never planned ahead, who distrusted his own ability and that of his men, and who spent all his time worrying about the enemy instead of planning how he might conquer them. You wouldn’t look for good scores from a ball team whose pitcher was at odds with the catcher. In the same way, you can’t expect results from the subconscious when your conscious mind is full of fear or worry, or when it does not know what it wants. The one most important province of your conscious mind is to center your thoughts on the thing you want, and to shut the door on every suggestion of fear or worry or disease. If you once gain the ability to do that, nothing else is impossible to you. For the subconscious mind does not reason inductively. It takes the thoughts you send in to it and works them out to their logical conclusion. Send to it thoughts of health and strength, and it will work out health and strength in your body. Let suggestions of disease, fear of sickness or accident, penetrate to it, either through your own thoughts or the talk of those around you, and you are very likely to see the manifestation of disease working out in yourself. Your mind is master of your body. It directs and controls every function of your body. Your body is in effect a little universe in itself, and mind is its radiating center-the sun that gives light and life to all your system, and around which the whole revolves. And your conscious thought is master of this sun center. As Emile Coué puts it-”The conscious can put the subconscious mind over the hurdles.” The Subconscious Mind Can you tell me how much water, how much salt, how much of each different element there should be in your blood to maintain its proper specific gravity if you are leading an ordinary sedentary life? How much and how quickly these proportions must be changed if you play a fast game of tennis, or run for your car, or chop wood, or indulge in any other violent exercise? Do you know how much water you should drink to neutralize the excess salt in salt fish? How much you lose through perspiration? Do you know how much water, how much salt, how much of each different element in your food should be absorbed into your blood each day to maintain perfect health? No? Well, it need not worry you. Neither does any one else. Not even the greatest physicists and chemists and math-ematicians. But your subconscious mind knows. And it doesn’t have to stop to figure it out. It does it almost automatically. It is one of those “Lightning Calculators.” And this is but one of thousands of such jobs it performs every hour of the day. The greatest mathematicians in the land, the most [Read more]
Never Overlook the Obvious
When I was in my third year of college in Chicago, I received a notice from the City of St. Claire Shores, Michigan, that I owed them $18,000 and needed to report to court, because I might actually be responsible for owing them even more money. St. Claire Shores is a working class suburb outside of Detroit. In addition, the City was deciding whether to bring more serious criminal charges against me in the preliminary hearing that had been scheduled during spring break. This was a lot of money and I knew exactly what the entire thing was about. I [Read more]
The Old Man, the Radiator Shop, and Integrity
In the summer of 1989, a man put a 5,000 gallon tank of asphalt sealer in an unused bay of his radiator repair shop. Instead of servicing cars, the mechanic had chosen to place a gigantic tank of asphalt sealer within that space. Somehow a large asphalt company from God-knows-where had decided that he was in a good location and, to his astonishment, had set him up in business. It was a good thing too because as a mechanic he did not have a lot of customers, and the longer I dealt with him the [Read more]
He Who Sees True Opportunities Shall Always Prosper
People lose their jobs. Often people are released, even from the best jobs they might have ever had. People may find themselves in a position where they cannot find a job that is as good as the one they lost. What is important, however, is what people do when they are in this position. I cannot tell you the number of people I have seen completely blow it when it came to reestablishing their careers, after losing their prior jobs. I do not want you to be one of these people. I grew [Read more]
