Week 2: Learn How to Live Your Own Life

You will never find peace of mind by allowing other people to live your life for you.
The most profound fact concerning humanity is this: The Creator gave us the complete, unchallengeable right of perogative over one thing, and only one thing- our own mind. It must have been the Creator's purpose to encourage us to live our own lives, to think our own thoughts, without interference from others. Otherwise we would not have been provided with such a clear dominion over our minds.
Simply by exercising this projound perogative over your own mind and life, you may lift yourself to great heights of achievement in any field of endeavor you choose. Exercising this perogative is the only real approach to genius. A genius is simply one who has taken full possession of this own mind and directed it toward objectives of his own choosing, whithout permitting outside influences to discourage or mislead him.
We all know stories about famous people who turned adversity into advantage, who overcame great obstacles to become rich and famous. They are the successful people who converted stumbling blocks into stepping-stones. They become the geniuses of industry, the Henry Fords, the Thomas Edisons, the Andrew Carnegies, and the Wilbur and Orville Wrights.
But there is a far greater number of lesser-known mortals who refuse to accept defeat. They simply refuse to become one of the vast majority who do little more than eke out a living and experience mostly misery, disappointment and failure.
Many years ago, a young army veteran came to see me about a job. He told me he was disillusioned and discouraged; all he wanted out of life was a meal ticket, a place to sleep, and enough to eat.
He had a look in his eyes- a sort of glassy stare- that told me he thought hope was dead. Here was a perfectly capable young man who was willing to settle for practically nothing when i knoew very well that if he changed his attitude he could earn a fortune.
There was something about him, an almost hidden spark that prompted me to ask, "How yould you like to become a multimillionaire? Why settle for a meager existence when you can just as easily settle for millions?
"Don't joke with me," he replied. "I'm hungry and I need a job."
"I am not making fun," I replied. "I am dead serious. You can earn millions if you only are willing to use the assets you now have."
"What do you mean, assets?" he exclaimed. "I have nothing but the clothes on my back!"
Gradually, over the course of our conversation, I learned that this young man had been a Fuller Brush salesman before he went into the army; While in the service he had done considerable K.P. duty, and had learned to cook rather well. In other words, besides the natural attributes of a healthy body and a potentially positive mind, his total assets consisted of the fact that he could cook food and he could sell.
Generally, of course, neither selling nor cooking will propel a person into the ranks of multimillionaires, but this veteran took himself out of the ordinary walks of life. He was introduced to his own mind and the posibilities that existed when he took control of it.
In the two hours i spent with this young man, I watched him change from a person lost in a sea of despair into a possibility thinker. He did it all with the strength of one idea. "Why don't you use your selling ability to persuade housewives to invite their neighbors over for a home-cooked dinner, then sell them all cookware?"
I advanced him enough money to buy some clothes, and the first outfit of cooking utensils, then turned him loose. During his first week, he cleared nearly $100 selling cookware. The next week he doubled that amount. Then he began to train other salespeople who worked for him selling the same cookware.
At the end of four years, he was earning more than a million dollars a year and had set inmotion a new selling plan that has since evolved into an industry in its own right. When the ties that bind a human mind are broken and a man is introduced to himself- the real self that has no limitations- I fancy that the gates of hell shake with fear and the bells of heaven ring with joy!

Week 1: No One Drifts to Success

You don't have to be a futurist or a fortune-teller to be able to predict someone's future. You can do so by asking him or her one simple question: "What is your one definite purpose in life- and what plans have you made to attain it?"
If you ask a hundred people that question, ninety-eight of them will answer with something like, "I'd like o make a good living and become as successful as I can." While the answer sounds good on the surface, if you dig a little deeper, you will find a drifter who will never get anything out of life except the leftovers of truly successful people- those who have a definite purpose and a plan for attaining it. To be successful, you must at this moment decide exactly what your goal is and lay out the steps by which you intend to reach it.
Years ago I worked with a fellow named Stuart Austin Wier of Dallas. He was a contributor to a magazine I edited and was just getting by financially. He would probably have remained a starving writer if a story hewas writing about an inventor hadn't suddenly inspired him to change his life.
Much to the sruprsse of those who knew him, he announced he was giving up journalism and going back to school to become a patent attorney. He wasn't going to be just any patent attorney, he was going to become "the top patent attorney in the United States." He put his plan into action with such fervor that he completed law school in record time.
When he began his practice, he deliberately sought out the toughest cases. Soon his reputuation spread throughout the country and his services were in such high demand that even though his fees reached astronomical levels, he was turning away more clients than he accepted.
The person who acts with purpose anda plan attracts opportunities. How can life give you anything if you don't know what you want yourself? How can others help you to succeed if you haven't decided how to get there yourself? Only with definiteness of purpose will you be able to overcome the defeats and adversities that will stand in your way.
One of America's earliest and most successful franchisers was Lee Maranz, a man who knew what he wanted and how to get it. A mechanical engineer, Maranz invented an automatic ice cream freezer that made soft ice cream. He envisioned a chain of ice cream stores from coast to coast and worked out a plan to make his dream become a reality.
He, like many others since, built his own success by helping others achieve theirs. He helped people set up ice cream shops by furnishing construction and design plans, a revolutionary idea at the time. He sold the ice cream machines at cost and made his profit from the sale of the ice cream mix. The result? That chain of stores Maranz was determined to create across the country.
"If you have a strong belief in yourself, in what you are doing, and what you want to do, no adversity is too difficult to overcome," he said.
If you want to achieve success, make today the day you stop drifting. Decide upon a definite goal. Write it down. Commit it to memory. Decide exactly how you plan to achieve it. Then begin by putting the plan into action immediately.
Your future is what you make it. Decide now what it shall be.

Napoleon Hill's A Year of Growing Rich

52 steps to achieving life's rewards. The instructions for the book are to read each week's short story every day of the week, and to write it down. So, i will start writing them here for all who would like to benefit from this book as well.