मृत्यु और मुक्ति क्या है?

मृत्यु और मुक्ति क्या है?

●   स्वार्थ परायण कर्मो छोड देने का नाम है कर्म बंधन से मुक्ति,,,

●  स्वार्थ कर्म छोडकर, परमार्थ कर्म करना ही है, कर्म बंधन से मुक्ति,,,

● शरीर के साथ जीवात्मा का संबंध छूटने का नाम है जीवात्मा की मुक्ति

● जीवात्मा की शरीर बंधन से मुक्ति को मृत्यु कहते है,,,

● मृत्यु के बाद जीवात्मा की गति उस ने किए कर्म अनुसार होती है,,, वो जीवात्मा ही जानता है,,,

गरुड़पुराण के अनुसार मृत्यु के आठ प्रहर तक जीवात्मा अपना जीवन मे किए हुए कर्मो देखता है, फिर ग्यारह दिन तक सूक्ष्म अद्रश्य शरीर मृत्यु स्थान पर रहता है, ( लोगो का एक शक यह है कि जहाँ मरता है वहाँ आत्मा रहती है तो  मरनेवाले की उत्तरक्रिया का विधि विधान घर पर क्युँ ???

तो विधि विधान मे मंत्रो के द्वारा आत्मा को बुलाया जाता है, इस लिए मरे कहीं पर भी मगर विधि विधान घर पर कराया जाता है और परिवार भी  पिंडदान विधि मे सामिल होने से उस के ऋण से मुक्त होते है )

मृत्यु के बारहवा दिन की विधि विधान के बाद उन की गति किस योनि मे हुई वो जानने के लिए, एक बडी थाली मे आटा रखकर, उस के उपर जालीदार ढक्कन लगाकर, एकांत मे रातभर रख देते है, तो सुबह वो थाली मे देखने से दो पगा, चो पगा जानवर पगला ( पैरो के निशान ) देखने मिलेगा,,, उसे देखकर माना जाते है कि वो किस योनि मे गया,,,

ज्योतिष के अनुसार भी जान सकते है, मृत्यु का समय पक्का होना चाहिए,,,  ( ज्योतिष मे सच्चाई तभी होती है, जब किसी भी घटना का समय, तिथि, स्थल निश्चित हो,,, नाम राशि एक आश्वसन है,,, )

● मृत्युपानेवाले को लोकबोली मे स्वर्गवासी कहते है,,,  मगर जीवात्मा का कर्म अनुसार ही गति होती है, तब कोई गेरंटी नही की मरनेवाला सवर्गवासी ही हो गया,,,, ( लगता है कि कुछ कर्महीन लोगो का जीवन को ही लोग नर्क समजते होंगे,,, तभी स्वर्गवासी हो गया ऐसा कहते होंगे,,,    ह ह ह ह ह ह )

●   कोई अंतेवासी हो गए कहते है,,,

● कोई शांत हो गए कहते है,,,

● कोई धार्मिकता का महत्व जोडकर, मृत्यु पानेवाले के लिए अलग अलग शब्द जोडते है,,,
 #_विष्णु_उपासक_पंथ मे,,,

▪  संत का मृत्यु होने पर गौ लोकवासी हो गए कहते है अथवा वैकुंठवासी हो गए कहते है,,,
#_शिव_उपासक_पंथ मे,,,

▪   साधु-संत मृत्यु होने पर शिवलोकवासी हो गये  कहते है अथवा कैलाशवासी हो गए कहते है,,,

▪  योगी तपस्वी साधु का मृत्यु होने पर
ब्रह्मनिष्ठ हो गए कहते है,,,

▪  मगर कोई योगेश्वर साधु अखंड तपस्या करने जीन्दा समाधि लेता है तो उसे ब्रह्मलिन कहते है ।

यह पृथ्वि को शास्त्रो मे मृत्यु लोक कहा है,,, यह मृत्युलोक जीवात्मा की कर्म भूमि है,,, जन्म और मृत्यु के बीच मे रहा जीवन जीवात्मा का कर्मकाल है, अपने कर्मकाल मे चेतन-जागृत होकर कर्म करे, तो अपने कर्मो से जीवात्मा मुक्ति, बंधन या काल पर विजय पाकर सकता है, अरे ! अजर अमर भी हो सकता है ।

भारत भूमि मे अजर अमर साधु संतो की कई जगह जीन्दा समाधि है ।

अपने प्राणो पर विजय पानेवाला ही अजर अमर हो सकता है, प्राण को आत्मा कहा गया है, तो प्राण को वायु भी कहा गया है । श्वास लेते है,,, वो वायु प्राण वायु है, श्वास छोडते है, वो वायु अपान ( अभोग्य ) वायु कहते है,,, योग सिध्ध महा पुरूष प्राणवायु को अपने योग से स्थिर कर देते है उर युगो तक जीवित रहते है । अपनी योग माया से सुक्ष्म शरीर से मायावी दुसरा स्वरूप से लोगो को दर्शन भी देते है । यह रहस्यमय होनेसे आप चमत्कार कहोगे,,, आत्मबल से यह होत है ।

 योग्य गुरू से शीखकर यह क्रिया आप भी शीख सकते है,,,  ( यहाँ यह कार्य के लिए सरकारी  पेन्सन लेनेवाला और विध्यार्थी को गोखणपट्टी का टेन्सन देनेवाला शिक्षक नही चलता है, क्योकि शिक्षक शरीर को सुख दे सकता है, जब गुरू आत्मा को शांति देता है )

 जीवात्मा का उध्धार के लिए सत्य सनातन धर्म के धर्मशास्त्रो मे कई मार्ग बताए है । मगर कर्महीन मनुष्य धर्म मे भी सरलता ढुँढता है, तभी तो कर्महीन लोगो की यहाँ कोई कमी भी नही है, ऐसा कर्महीन लोगो का जीवन ही नर्क समान होता है, तब ऐसा कर्महीन व्यक्ति का मृत्यु को कोई स्वर्गवासी कह भी दे तो कौन बुरा मानेगा,,,,,,,,,,,,ह ह ह ह ह ह,,,,,,,,,,

 मृत्यु के बाद की गति को ( सामन्य मनुष्य ) कोई नही जानता है, सिर्फ सिर्फ मरनेवाला जीवात्मा ही जानता है,,, स्वार्थ परायण जीव स्वर्ग कैसे पा सकता है ???

स्वर्ग तो परमार्थ करनेवाले देवता पुरूषो के लिए होता है,,, परमार्थ करनेवाला जीव मृत्युलोक मे पूजनिय होता है, जो यहा पूजा जाता है, वहाँ भी पूजा जाता है, पूजाजानेवाला जीव देवता होता है, जिस का स्वर्ग मे स्वागत होता है ।

 घर परिवार के लिए जीनेवाला, घर परिवार मे पूजा जाएगा, समाज के लिए जीनेवाला, समाज मे पूजा जाएगा, क्योकि वो सिर्फ घर परिवार के लिए या समाज के लिए जीया है,,, सूक्ष्म रूप से वो एक स्वार्थ पराणय जीवन है,,, क्योकि वो सब के लिए नही, समग्र के लिए नही, सभी के लिए नही जीया है,,, राजा और महाराजा सब के लिए, सभी के लिए, समग्र के लिए जीते है, तभी वो पूजनिय है ।

( महाराजा का अर्थ साधु- ब्राह्मण करना क्योकि धर्म की दिक्षा और शिक्षा लेकर वो धर्म-कर्म जाननेवाला होता है,  राजा सदैव राजगुरू और राजगोर का सन्मान करता था,,, इन्ही महाराजाओ की आज्ञा सदैव मानता था )

नारी सदैव पूजनिय माना जाए क्योकि अपने माँ-बाप का घर परिवार का त्याग कर के दूसरो के लिए, परोपकार के लिए छोडकर जीवन व्यतित करती है, उन के स्वार्थ मे भी आंशिक परमार्थ है, त्यागी और परमार्थी होने के बाद भी उन का जीवन घर परिवार तक ही सीमित होता है । तब वो भी बंधन युक्त है ।

       भारत भूमि चेतना की भूमि है, क्योकि यह भूमि मे अनेको जीन्दा समाधि है,,, इस भूमि को पवित्र रखना हमारा धर्म है,,,

 पुराणो मे पढो,,, तो राक्षस खुन और हड्डिया जहाँ तहाँ फेककर देवताओ का कर्म नष्ट करते थे, आज भी ऐसा ही अपना धर्म नष्ट करने का प्रयास हो रहा है,,,

आज भी देव गुरू बृहस्पति द्वारा बताया हुआ दक्षिण मार्ग अहिंसक और पवित्रता का है, तो दूसरी तरफ दानव गुरू शुक्राचार्य द्वारा बताया हुआ वाममार्ग हिंसक और निंदनिय है । दौनो मार्ग धर्म का माने लैकिन अपना कुलधर्म को भूलकर नही,,,

भगवान श्री कृष्णने भी कहा है कि कैसा भी हो, मगर अपने कुल धर्म को हमे नही भूलना चाहिए,,, क्षत्रिय को क्षत्रिय का धर्म नही भूलना चाहिए,,, ब्राह्मण को, ब्राह्मणो का धर्म नही भूलना चाहिए,,, वैश्य को वैश्य का धर्म नही भूलना चाहिए,,, शुद्र को शुद्र का धर्म नही भूलना चाहिए,,,

वाल्मिक ऋषि के वंश को आज भंगी समाज से जानते है, वो जीते जी भी किसी के शरीर मे प्रवेश करने की विद्या आज भी कोई कोई जानते है, नीति नियम पालनेवाला भंगी किसी के आंगन मे, घर मे भोजन नही पाएगा,,, यह बात क्या बताती है,,, यही की वो अपने कुलधर्म के कर्म को वफादार है,,,

 भगवान श्री कुष्ण सरल रूप मे मृत्यु और पुनर्जन्म के बारे मे समझाते है, कि जो जिस को भजता है,वो उसी को पाता है और मृत्यु समये जो जिस का ध्यान धरता है, वो उसी को पाता है,,,  मंदिर मे नित्य जाने का नियम इसलिए था, ताकी देवता के गुणो को गुरू मानकर हम हमारा धर्म भूल ना जाए,,, तभी तो मै बार बार यही सीखाता हुँ, कि जो मरना सीख गए, वो जीना सीख गए,,,

हरि ॐ तत् सत्
धर्म रक्षति रक्षितः
सनातनम् जयति शासनम्

मैं युवाओं से कहना चाहता हूँ

मैं युवाओं से कहना चाहता हूँ

मित्रों, इस आध्यात्मिक प्रस्तुति से मैं युवाओं से कहना चाहता हूँ कि भक्ति के साथ कर्मयोग करें, आपकी सफलता पक्की हैं, भक्ति का मतलब यह नहीं है कि माला लेकर बैंठ जाय, बल्कि भगवद्गीता में तो कर्म को ही योग से जोड़ दिया हैं, कर्म यानी कार्य तो करना ही पड़ेगा, लेकिन कार्य के साथ धर्म को रखकर करेंगे तो कार्य एक योग हुआ, हम नोकरी करे तो पूजा के तुल्य, धंधा करे तो धर्म का पुट हो, हमने गीता में पढ़ा है कि धन्धे में मुनाफा छुपाना पड़ता, कभी-कभी धंधे में थोड़ा-बहुत झूठ चलता है, लेकिन फरेब और गलत कार्यों की इजाजत नहीं हैं, यही धर्म के साथ किया हुआ कर्म आज के युवाओं के लिये भक्ति हैं।

आज के युवाओं को मन में विश्वास बैठा लेना चाहिये कि हम सफलता के लिये ही पैदा हुये हैं और सफलता प्राप्त करके ही रहेंगे, मनमस्तिष्क में जैसा हम सोच लेते हैं वैसे ही हम बन जाते हैं, सफलता प्राप्त करने के लिए हमें सकारात्मक सोचना चाहिये और स्वयं को महत्व देते हुये खुद को मूल्यवान समझना चाहिये,  इस तरह का विश्वास करने वालों को ही सफलता मिलती है, सफल लोगों में ही आत्मविश्वास व आत्मसम्मान होता है, जो उन्हें अपने भीतर की शक्तियों का आभास कराता है, सफल लोग बाकी लोगों की अपेक्षा अपना स्वयं का आत्मसम्मान करते हैं, आशावादी व खुशमिजाज रहते हैं, बुरी खबर या बुरे दिनों को अपने ऊपर हावी नहीं होने देते। 

आत्मसम्मान से ही आत्मविश्वास उत्पन्न होता है, किसी विषय पर निर्णय लेने में स्वयं पर भरोसा करके उसके बारे में अच्छा सोचना जरुरी हैं, भक्ति के साथ कर्म करने वाले को अगर असफलता भी मिली तो उस असफलता पर निराश नहीं होते, बल्कि दुगुनी शक्ति के साथ वही कार्य व्यवस्थित तरीके से करने पर सफलता अवश्य मिलती हैं, क्योंकि असफलता से आत्मविश्वास की कमी होने लगती है इसमें बदलाव की कुंजी हमारे मस्तिष्क के अंदर है, हम अपनी इच्छा शक्ति के द्वारा ही अपने सोचने के तरीकों को बदल सकते हैं, नकारात्मक विचार को हटाकर इच्छा शक्ति को प्रबल बनाया जा सकता है, क्योंकि इच्छा शक्ति नकारात्मक विचारों पर हावी होती है।

हमें अपनी असफलता के लिये किसी ओर को या प्रतिकूल परिस्थितियों का बहाना नहीं देना चाहिये, बल्कि असफलता पर पलटवार करने और सफलता हासिल करने का आत्मबल हमारे अन्दर हैं, जिसके कारण सामने वाला विरोधी व्यक्ति आपको मार्ग से हिला नहीं सकता, अपने आप पर भरोसा अपने कार्यों के द्वारा दिखाई देगा, जो यह साबित करता है कि हम कितने विश्वास से भरे हुये हैं, हम अपने आप को जैसा सोचते हैं वैसा ही ढालिये, हमारा आत्मविश्वास ही ईश्वर प्रदत्त वास्तविक स्वरूप है, हमारे जीवन की घटनायें हमारे सकारात्मक नजरिये और आत्मसम्मान को बताती है, ये घटनायें हमें प्रोत्साहित भी कर सकती है और निरूत्साहित भी, सुखी भी और दुखी भी, लक्ष्य तक पहुँचने के लिये प्रतिकूल परिस्थियों का डटकर मुकाबला करना चाहिये।

ऐसा तभी होगा जब हम नकारात्मक विचारों को निकालकर, असफलता को परे कर, संकल्प, समर्पण व कठिन मेहनत से लक्ष्य भेदे, हमें अपनी निराशा जनक व मित्रहीन स्थिति से उबरकर आत्मसुधार करना चाहिये, क्योंकि हमारे अंदर छिपी हुई रहस्यमयी शक्ति होती है , जिसके आह्वान पर अजेय बाधाओं को जीत सकते हैं, समर्पण भाव से कोशिश करे, स्वयं से प्रेम करे, भरोसा रखें, सकारात्मक सोच को लायें, अपने आप को प्रोत्साहित करें, आत्मसम्मान बनायें रखें, हमें अपने आप को भी प्रेरित करते रहना चाहिये, ताकि जिससे अवचेतन मन में जङे मजबूत बन जायें।

भाईब-बहनों! यह जीवन आत्मसम्मान से जीवन के अंतिम क्षण तक चलने वाली प्रक्रिया है जो युवावस्था में आगे धकेलता है, प्रौढावस्था में सबलता प्रदान करता है और आने वाले वर्षों में नवीनता प्रदान करता है, इसलिये हमें नकारात्मक, निराशा, असफलता के शब्दों की जगह सकारात्मक, आशावादी शब्दों को बोये और सृजन करे, विजयी शब्द ही सोचें, प्रोत्साहन के शब्दों को जोडे, उत्साह के शब्द ही प्रयुक्त करें, प्रेम के शब्दों का प्रयोग करे, आत्मप्रताङना को स्थान नहीं दें, कूल मिलाकर स्थितियाँ कैसी भी हो आत्मविश्वास डगमगाना नहीं चाहिये, इसी संदेश के साथ आज के शुभदिवस की आप सभी को बहुत बहुत शुभकामनायें।

How to Avoid Bad Or Inferior Peoples

How to Avoid Bad Or Inferior Peoples

Introduction

Toxic people have always been a drag, but research shows they can physically harm your brain. In this, we show you how to keep your gray matter safe.

Toxic people defy logic. Some are blissfully unaware of the negative impact that they have on those around them, and others seem to derive satisfaction from creating chaos and pushing other people’s buttons. Either way, they create unnecessary complexity, strife and, worst of all, stress. Studies have long shown that stress can have a lasting, negative impact on the brain.

Exposure to even a few days of stress compromises the effectiveness of neurons in the hippocampus—an important brain area responsible for reasoning and memory. Weeks of stress cause reversible damage to neuronal dendrites (the small “arms” that brain cells use to communicate with each other), and months of stress can permanently destroy neurons. Stress is a formidable threat to your success—when stress gets out of control, your brain and your performance suffer.

Most sources of stress at work are easy to identify. If your nonprofit is working to land a grant that your organization needs to function, you’re bound to feel stress and likely know how to manage it. It’s the unexpected sources of stress that take you by surprise and harm you the most.

Recent research from the Department of Biological and Clinical Psychology at Friedrich Schiller University in Germany found that exposure to stimuli that cause strong negative emotions—the same kind of exposure you get when dealing with toxic people—caused subjects’ brains to have a massive stress response. Whether it’s negativity, cruelty, the victim syndrome or just plain craziness, toxic people drive your brain into a stressed-out state that should be avoided at all costs. The ability to manage your emotions and remain calm under pressure has a direct link to your performance.

TalentSmart has conducted research with more than a million people, and we’ve found that 90 percent of top performers are skilled at managing their emotions in times of stress in order to remain calm and in control. One of their greatest gifts is the ability to neutralize toxic people. Top performers have well-honed coping strategies that they employ to keep toxic people at bay.

While I’ve run across numerous effective strategies that successful people employ when dealing with toxic people, what follows are 12 of the best. To deal with toxic people effectively, you need an approach that enables you, across the board, to control what you can and eliminate what you can’t. The important thing to remember is that you are in control of far more than you realize.

1.They set limits (especially with complainers).
Complainers and negative people are bad news because they wallow in their problems and fail to focus on solutions. They want people to join their pity party so that they can feel better about themselves. People often feel pressure to listen to complainers because they don’t want to be seen as callous or rude, but there’s a fine line between lending a sympathetic ear and getting sucked into their negative emotional spiral. You can avoid this only by setting limits and distancing yourself when necessary.

Think of it this way: If the complainer were smoking, would you sit there all afternoon inhaling the secondhand smoke? You’d distance yourself, and you should do the same with complainers. A great way to set limits is to ask complainers how they intend to fix the problem. They will either quiet down or redirect the conversation in a productive direction.

2. They don’t die in the fight.
Successful people know how important it is to live to fight another day, especially when your foe is a toxic individual. In conflict, unchecked emotion makes you dig your heels in and fight the kind of battle that can leave you severely damaged. When you read and respond to your emotions, you’re able to choose your battles wisely and only stand your ground when the time is right.

3. They rise above.
Toxic people drive you crazy because their behavior is so irrational. Make no mistake about it—their behavior truly goes against reason. So why do you allow yourself to respond to them emotionally and get sucked into the mix? The more irrational and off-base someone is, the easier it should be for you to remove yourself from their traps.

Quit trying to beat them at their own game. Distance yourself from them emotionally and approach your interactions like they’re a science project (or you’re their shrink, if you prefer the analogy). You don’t need to respond to the emotional chaos—only the facts.

4. They stay aware of their emotions.
Maintaining an emotional distance requires awareness. You can’t stop someone from pushing your buttons if you don’t recognize when it’s happening. Sometimes you’ll find yourself in situations where you’ll need to regroup and choose the best way forward. This is fine and you shouldn’t be afraid to buy yourself some time to do so. Think of it this way: If a mentally unstable person approaches you on the street and tells you he’s John F. Kennedy, you’re unlikely to set him straight.

When you find yourself with a co-worker who is engaged in similarly derailed thinking, sometimes it’s best to just smile and nod. If you’re going to have to straighten them out, it’s better to give yourself some time to plan the best way to go about it.

5. They establish boundaries.
This is the area where most people tend to sell themselves short. They feel like because they work or live with someone, they have no way to control the chaos. This couldn’t be further from the truth. Once you’ve found your way to rise above a person, you’ll begin to find their behavior more predictable and easier to understand. This will equip you to think rationally about when and where you have to put up with them and when you don’t. For example, even if you work with someone closely on a project team, that doesn’t mean that you need to have the same level of one-on-one interaction with them that you have with other team members.

You can establish a boundary, but you’ll have to do so consciously and proactively. If you let things happen naturally, you are bound to find yourself constantly embroiled in difficult conversations. If you set boundaries and decide when and where you’ll engage a difficult person, you can control much of the chaos. The only trick is to stick to your guns and keep boundaries in place when the person tries to encroach upon them, which they will.

6. They won’t let anyone limit their joy.
When your sense of pleasure and satisfaction are derived from the opinions of other people, you are no longer the master of your own happiness. When emotionally intelligent people feel good about something that they’ve done, they won’t let anyone’s opinions or snide remarks take that away from them.

While it’s impossible to turn off your reactions to what others think of you, you don’t have to compare yourself to others, and you can always take people’s opinions with a grain of salt. That way, no matter what toxic people are thinking or doing, your self-worth comes from within. Regardless of what people think of you at any particular moment, one thing is certain: You’re never as good or bad as they say you are.

7. They don’t focus on problems—only solutions.
Where you focus your attention determines your emotional state. When you fixate on the problems you’re facing, you create and prolong negative emotions and stress. When you focus on actions to better yourself and your circumstances, you create a sense of personal efficacy that produces positive emotions and reduces stress. When it comes to toxic people, fixating on how crazy and difficult they are gives them power over you.

Quit thinking about how troubling your difficult person is, and focus instead on how you’re going to go about handling them. This makes you more effective by putting you in control, and it will reduce the amount of stress you experience when interacting with them.

8. They don’t forget.
Emotionally intelligent people are quick to forgive, but that doesn’t mean that they forget. Forgiveness requires letting go of what’s happened so that you can move on. It doesn’t mean you’ll give a wrongdoer another chance. Successful people are unwilling to be bogged down unnecessarily by others’ mistakes, so they let them go quickly and are assertive in protecting themselves from future harm.

9. They squash negative self-talk.
Sometimes you absorb the negativity of other people. There’s nothing wrong with feeling bad about how someone is treating you, but your self-talk (the thoughts you have about your feelings) can either intensify the negativity or help you move past it. Negative self-talk is unrealistic, unnecessary and self-defeating. It sends you into a downward emotional spiral that is difficult to pull out of. You should avoid negative self-talk at all costs.

10. They limit their caffeine intake.
Drinking caffeine triggers the release of adrenaline. Adrenaline is the source of the “fight-or-flight” response, a survival mechanism that forces you to stand up and fight or run for the hills when faced with a threat. The fight-or-flight mechanism sidesteps rational thinking in favor of a faster response. This is great when a bear is chasing you, but not so great when you’re surprised in the hallway by an angry co-worker.

11. They get some sleep.
I’ve beaten this one to death over the years and can’t say enough about the importance of sleep to increasing your emotional intelligence and managing your stress levels. When you sleep, your brain literally recharges, shuffling through the day’s memories and storing or discarding them (which causes dreams), so that you wake up alert and clear-headed.

Your self-control, attention and memory are all reduced when you don’t get enough—or the right kind—of sleep. Sleep deprivation raises stress hormone levels on its own, even without a stressor present. A good night’s sleep makes you more positive, creative and proactive in your approach to toxic people, giving you the perspective you need to deal effectively with them.

12. They use their support system.
It’s tempting, yet entirely ineffective, to attempt tackling everything by yourself. To deal with toxic people, you need to recognize the weaknesses in your approach to them. This means tapping into your support system to gain perspective on a challenging person.

Everyone has someone at work and/or outside work who is on their team, rooting for them and ready to help them get the best from a difficult situation. Identify these individuals in your life and make an effort to seek their insight and assistance when you need it. Something as simple as explaining the situation can lead to a new perspective. Most of the time, other people can see a solution that you can’t because they are not as emotionally invested in the situation.

Before you get this system to work brilliantly, you’re going to have to pass some tests. Most of the time, you will find yourself tested by touchy interactions with problem people. Thankfully, the plasticity of the brain allows it to mold and change as you practice new behaviors, even when you fail. Implementing these healthy, stress-relieving techniques for dealing with difficult people will train your brain to handle stress more effectively and decrease the likelihood of ill effects.

Decide to Become Rich

Decide to Become Rich

Thought is the original source of all wealth, all success, all material gain, all great discoveries and inventions, and of all achievement.

- Claude M. Bristol



We have passed from a world based on material limitations into a world that is determined by mental concepts.We have moved from the age of things into the ''Psychozoic Age,'' the age of the mind. Wealth and opportunities are contained more in the person you are and the way you think than in the assets you have acquired in life so far.Your future lies more in your ability to apply your mind and intelligence to your work and your life than it does in your current job or situation.

       Because health, wealth, and happiness are essentially mental, there are very few limits on how much of them you can acquire for yourself. In this chapter, and in subsequent chapters, you will learn many of the simple, practical, proven methods, techniques, and strategies used by high-achieving men and women in every field to accomplish far more than they, or the people around them, ever dreamed possible.You will learn how to break the bonds of limited, conventional thinking, expanding your desires and ambitions so dramatically that you will be able accomplish any goal that you could ever set for yourself.


THREE MAJOR FORCES

There are three major forces reverberating through our world today, transforming everything they touch and creating unlimited opportunities for the creative minority. These three forces are the incredible growth in information, technology, and competition.


THREE MAJOR FORCES
Information and Knowledge Explosion

       The information revolution, combined with the speed of computerized information processing, the Internet, and wireless communications, is enabling knowledge in every field to double every two or three years. Fully 90 percent of all the thinkers, inventors, engineers, scientists, writers, entrepreneurs, and creators of all kinds who ever existed are living and working today. The results of their efforts are becoming almost instantaneously available to each other, thereby doubling and tripling their outputs.

Technological Advances

       The explosion in technology and high-speed computers is literally breathtaking.Today, you can e-mail a message around the world to dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of people simultaneously, in a matter of seconds, at a cost of pennies. The World Wide Web gives you access to tens of millions of other Internet users, as well as to the accumulated knowledge stored in more than 50,000 libraries and research institutes. Instantaneous transmission of data enables the money markets to move a trillion dollars per day, sometimes in seconds, making it impossible for countries to control their currencies, much less their economies.

       In the twenty-first century, you will own a laptop computer with a microchip that can process one billion commands per second. It will have a long-life battery and a built-in cellular telephone, connected to cells and satellites that will enable you to communicate instantaneously with almost anyone, almost anywhere in the world. You will have your own personal telephone number that will enable anyone in the world, anywhere, to telephone you, wherever you are, whether or not they even know what country you are in. And this telephone technology will probably fit on your wrist like a large digital watch does today.

Thriving Competition

       The third major factor driving our lives is competition. Every business organization wants to generate sales and make profits, locally, nationally, and internationally, if possible. To survive and thrive, each person and business must be continually seeking faster, better, newer, cheaper, easier ways to deliver value to their customers.

       Every advance in knowledge and technology creates opportunities that fleet-footed competitors can grab and run with to create new products and services to leapfrog each other in their markets. All three forces- information, technology, and competition- are multiplying times each other to create the greatest rate of change in human history. And if anything, the rate of change is going to increase in the years ahead.


CHANGE CREATES OPPORTUNITIES

Fully 80 percent of the products and services that you will be using five years from now will be brand-new or completely transformed from today. Probably 80 percent of the jobs being done in five years will be new jobs or jobs that have been completely transformed by the onrush of information, technology, and competition. And the good news is that every single change that takes place opens up more opportunities and possibilities for you to achieve your goals and make greater progress, faster than ever before.

       The forces of change impact everything you do. The rate of change is accelerating week by week and month by month. The speed and variety of change is something over which you have no control, and about which you have no choice. The only decision you have to make is whether you are going to be a ''master of change'' or a ''victim of change.'' Are you going to be a creator of circumstances or a creature of circumstances? Are you going to ride the wave and stay ahead of the curve of change, or are you going to be bowled over by it and left in its wake? It will be one or the other, but the impact of change will be forced upon you, whatever you do.


LEARN FROM THE EXPERTS

If you want to learn how to cook, you study cooking. If you want to be a lawyer, you study law. If you want to be an engineer or an architect, you study engineering or architecture. And if you want to be financially successful, you study others who have become financially successful before you.You find out what they did, and you do the same things, over and over, until you get the same results.

       Making money is a skill, like riding a bicycle or operating a computer. Because it is a skill, it is therefore learnable by anyone who wants to acquire wealth. If in the past you have accepted the false idea that you cannot make or keep all the money you want, it is now time for you to get rid of that idea. It is a false belief. It is time for you to decide to become financially independent.


THE GREAT LAW

The Greek philosopher Aristotle first articulated the foundation principle of Western philosophy in about 350 B.C. It became known as the Aristotelian Principle of Causality.Today, we call it the Law of Cause and Effect. This law says that for every effect in your life, there are specific causes. It says that everything happens for a reason. Success is not an accident. Failure is not an accident, either. What happens to you is not determined by luck or by coincidence. It is the result of unchanging law.

       My journey from unemployment and poverty to success and financial independence started when I began to study the most successful people in our society. My idea was simple: I would find out what they had done to accomplish so much, and then I would do the same things. Why reinvent the wheel? What I discovered changed my life. It will change yours as well.


MILLIONS OF MILLIONAIRES

When I began my reading and research in the 1960s, there were seven hundred thousand millionaires in the United States, mostly self-made, having started with nothing. By 1980, according to the IRS, there were 1,800,000 families or individuals with a net worth of more than one million dollars. Today, there are more than five million millionaires, an increase of 277 percent in 22 years. And most of them are self-made as well.These are men and women who started with little or nothing, often broke or deeply in debt, and who gradually accumulated enough money to become financially independent.

       Self-made millionaires come from every walk of life, with every level of education and skill, and with every difficulty, obstacle, handicap, and challenge to overcome that you could ever dream of.

       Some are young and some are old. Some are new immigrants who arrived in America unable to speak English, and some are from families that have been in America for generations. Some have excellent educations from the finest universities, and some are high school dropouts. Some have superb physical health and others are in wheelchairs, hard of hearing, blind, or have other physical limitations.

       The most important thing to remember is that no matter what difficulties you have, no matter what problems you feel are holding you back, someone else, and probably thousands of other people, have had far greater obstacles to overcome than you could possibly dream of, and they have gone on to become successful nonetheless. And what others have done, you can do as well.


EXHAUSTIVE RESEARCH

Dr. Thomas Stanley of the University of Georgia spent more than 30 years studying self-made millionaires. He interviewed thousands of them and compiled his findings into a variety of books, research studies, and reports, including two best-selling books, The Millionaire Next Door and The Millionaire Mind. His research shows that every single kind of person, from every walk of life, has been able to start from nothing and pass the magic million-dollar mark by doing certain things in certain ways, over and over again.


START WHERE YOU ARE

When I began studying self-made millionaires, I was living in a rented apartment with rented furniture. I had a used car that was not paid for and I was deeply in debt. I was between jobs and living off credit cards.

       The first thing I found was that self-made millionaires did things differently from average people, and I was tired of being average. I therefore decided to stop doing what I was doing, which wasn't working, and to start doing what they were doing. My life has never been the same since this decision.

       It wasn't easy to change my thinking about money and my financial future, but eventually these efforts began to pay off. Like a large ocean liner changing direction, one degree at a time,my habits began to change. Within five years, I was out of debt and making good money. In another five years, I passed the million-dollar mark. When I look back, I see that it was no miracle. All I really did was to learn what other successful people had done before me and then do the same things until I got the same results.


GET RID OF THE MYTHS

There are a great many myths about self-made millionaires. If you want to become a self-made millionaire yourself, you must dispel these myths from your own mind. Remember, as the humorist Josh Billings once said, ''It's not what a man knows that hurts him; it's what he knows that isn't true.''

       Many people have fixed ideas or beliefs about themselves and money that are holding them back. These ideas may be completely untrue, but they will cut off your chances of success nonetheless. You must get over them. To achieve something you've never achieved before, you will have to think in ways that you have never thought before.

       One myth is that you have to have a great education to become rich. Another myth is that you have to start off with a lot of money. Some people are convinced that financial success depends on getting a lucky break of some kind, like picking a hot stock in the stock market.

       None of these myths are true. In fact, a survey of members of the Forbes 400, the 400 richest men and women in the United States, found that high school dropouts in the group who made it to the list were worth, on average, $300 million more than university graduates on the list.


THE LAND OF OPPORTUNITY

The most successful immigrant group per capita in the United States, in terms of starting and building successful businesses, are Russians.Why is this so? It is because the Russians have come from a system where it has been so extraordinarily difficult to succeed that when they arrive in America, believing that America is the land of opportunity, they find that it is much easier to succeed than they have ever experienced.

       As a result, Russians start business after business and achieve successes that the average American continually claims are no longer possible. Because they absolutely believe that it is possible for them, they make their dreams come true. Their beliefs become their realities.


THE REALITY PRINCIPLE

The past president of General Electric Company, Jack Welch, was considered to be one of the best business executives in the world. He said that the most important single quality of leadership is what he calls the ''reality principle.'' The reality principle says that you must deal with the world as it is, not as you wish it would be.You must strive to be completely honest with yourself and your situation.You must refuse to engage in self-delusion and the hope that things will work out whether or not you do anything about them.

       Especially when it comes to building wealth, you must be totally honest with yourself. You cannot afford to play games with your own mind if you truly want to be wealthy.You cannot wish and hope and pray that somehow you are going to win the lottery or strike it rich as a result of luck or some remarkable external circumstance.


YOU CREATE YOUR OWN LUCK

Often people ask me about the role of luck in success.They are convinced that luck is a critical factor in achieving anything worthwhile. They feel that some people are just lucky and some are not. They talk about luck as if it were a matter of fate or destiny, largely inexplicable. They insist that a person gets to the top of his field largely as the result of getting lucky breaks, which they, of course, did not get.

       I have studied the concept of luck for many years. My conclusion is that luck is a word that people use to explain away things that turn out much better than could have been expected. If a person achieves great financial success at a young age, people say he was ''just lucky.''

       Some people use luck to describe something remarkably good that happens that is out of the ordinary. But it is not luck at all.The fact is that all so-called lucky outcomes are really the result of probabilities. There is no such thing as luck.

       The Law of Probabilities says that there is a probability for everything that happens. These probabilities can often be determined with considerable accuracy. The entire insurance and underwriting industry is based on probabilities, which are expressed in actuarial tables.


BECOMING A MILLIONAIRE

There is a probability that you will become a millionaire in the course of your working lifetime. Today in America, one family in 20 has a net worth of more than one million dollars. This means that your likelihood of acquiring a million dollars is one in 20, or 5 percent.

       However, this also means that your likelihood of not acquiring one million dollars, should that be your goal, is 95 percent. These are not good odds.Your job must be to improve the odds in your favor. Your aim should be to dramatically increase the probabilities of achieving financial independence by doing more and more of those things that will help you to achieve your goal. This principle applies to anything you want to accomplish.

       The more different things you do that are likely to help you to achieve your goal, the more likely it is you will do the right thing at the right time. If you set clear, written goals, make detailed plans, and continually upgrade your skills to increase your income, you increase the probabilities that you will earn a good living.

       If you study money and investments, save and put aside 10 percent to 20 percent of your income every month, keep tight control over your expenses, and think long-term about your financial life, you will eventually become a millionaire. It is not a matter of luck. It is just a matter of probabilities.


PROBABILITIES ARE EVERYTHING

Imagine you are an inexperienced dart thrower, slightly inebriated, in a darkened room, standing some distance from the dartboard. Even under these conditions, if you throw enough darts in the direction of the dartboard, you would eventually hit it. And if you continued to throw darts, almost in spite of yourself you would become more accurate. As a result, by the law of probabilities, you would eventually hit a bull's-eye.

       This metaphor explains why people who start off with high levels of desire and determination ultimately succeed. They just keep trying. And by the law of probabilities, they finally win. It is not luck. They create their own luck by what they do, or what they fail to do.

       Now, imagine the conditions are different. Imagine that you are a skilled dart thrower, and that you practice every day to get better. In addition, you are fully rested, clear-headed, and completely prepared. The lights in the room are bright and you stand at a reasonable distance from the dartboard. Under these conditions, all of which are under your control, the time it would take you to hit a bull's-eye would be greatly reduced. And of course, when you do hit a bull's-eye, everyone would tell you how ''lucky'' you were. But you made your own luck.

       Throughout your life, you must be constantly thinking about all the things you can do, in every area, to increase the probabilities that you will be successful in achieving your goals. You should leave nothing to chance. You should refuse to wish or hope, or trust to luck.You must take control of your situation.You are responsible.


YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE

You will achieve financial success only after you accept that everything that you ever become is completely up to you.You are responsible. No one is going to do it for you. Keep repeating, ''If it's to be, it's up to me!''

       Fortunately, in America there are more opportunities for wealth creation and personal success than have ever existed previously in all of human history.The United States is the only country on earth that is commonly referred to overseas as ''the land of dreams.'' In 2003, it was rated as the most entrepreneurial country in the world. This means that it is easier to start and build a successful business in the United States than it is anywhere else on earth.

       As information and technology continue to expand and multiply times each other, and competition continues to intensify, more and more opportunities are opening up every day for the creative minority who are willing to take advantage of them.Your job is to find these opportunities, and if you don't find them, create them for yourself.


THE COMMON DENOMINATOR

One of the discoveries in the research on self-made millionaires is the finding that most of them start off with little or no money. Most of them start off by saving their money carefully for a long time until they have enough to start a small enterprise or business. Some of the biggest companies in America were started on a kitchen table or in a garage, like the Hewlett-Packard Company or Apple Computer. Some of the newest millionaires in America come from the field of multilevel marketing.Working from home, they paid $50 for a sample kit and went out to work. They sold something, made a profit, reinvested their profits, grew larger, and eventually achieved financial independence.

       In Dr. Thomas Stanley's interviews with self-made millionaires, he discovered their common denominator of success. The most important quality that self-made millionaires used to explain their success was the habit of hard, hard work.

       Self-made millionaires work much harder than the average person. They start earlier, work harder, and stay later. According to many studies and interviews, self-made millionaires work an average of 59 hours per week. Some work considerably more, especially at the beginning.


WASTING TIME AT WORK

The average employed person puts in about 40 hours per week on the job, but only about 32 hours of that is officially working time. Fully 50 percent of time spent at work is wasted in idle socializing with co-workers, personal telephone calls, and personal business. Average employees start a little later, take long coffee breaks and lunch hours, and leave a little earlier. Even managers privately report that they spend fully half of the time they are at work doing things that have absolutely nothing whatever to do with the job.

       Only about 5 percent of people working today work full-time on their jobs from the time they begin each day until the time they finish. These people are the ones on the fast track in their careers.They are moving upward and onward, getting paid more and being promoted faster. They are the movers and shakers in every business, and everyone knows who they are.


LOW-VALUE ACTIVITIES

The saddest part of the research into employee work habits is not just that people waste a lot of time at work. It is that in the other 50 percent of the time, when people are actually working on company tasks and responsibilities, they tend to work on low-value, low-priority tasks. As a result, they contribute little of value to their companies. Low productivity leads to lower wages and fewer opportunities.

       Every year, hundreds of thousands of people are laid off from large and small corporations, often from white-collar, midmanagement jobs.Why is this? The answer is simple. The companies have finally learned that they are paying high salaries to people who are producing very little of value. No company can survive very long under these conditions, and these companies are determined to survive. So the redundant staff has to go.


YOU CAN DO IT

If you are serious about becoming financially independent, or even better, becoming a self-made millionaire over the course of your career, here are two facts: First, it is definitely possible. Hundreds of thousands of men and women become financially independent each year after having started from nothing.Whatever others have done, within reason, you can do as well. The very fact that someone else has achieved a particular financial goal is proof it is possible for you. The only question is, how badly do you want it?

       Second, the reality principle says that if you want to be successful in any area, you have to find out what other successful people have done to succeed in that area, and then do the same things over and over until you get the same results. As long as you don't try to fool yourself and look for shortcuts, you are virtually assured of eventually achieving, and even exceeding, your goals.


THE 40 PLUS FORMULA

Begin today to apply the ''40 Plus Formula'' to your work and your career. This formula says that you work 40 hours per week in the United States for survival. If you work only 40 hours per week - if you work only the number of hours that are required of you - then all you will ever do is survive.You will tread water financially.You will make enough to pay your bills and perhaps a little more besides, but you will never get ahead and you will never be successful.

       According to the 40 Plus Formula, every hour that you put in over 40 hours on your job, or on yourself, is an investment in your future success.You can tell where you are going to be five years from now by simply looking at how many hours per week you put in on your job. Every hour over 40 that you invest in getting more results for your employer and your customers adds up and contributes to your long-term success.


GIVE YOURSELF AN EDGE

If you work 45 to 50 hours per week, you give yourself an edge over your co-workers. If you work 55 to 60 hours per week, your longterm success is virtually guaranteed.You put yourself on the side of the angels. Many self-made millionaires work 70 to 80 hours per week to get established in their careers. There are no shortcuts to lasting success.

       I have studied successful men and women in America for more than 25 years. I have never found a single successful person who got there working only 40 hours, or five days per week. The idea of the five-day week, which was promoted by the labor unions as a great advance in the life of the working person, has been the cause of more financial underachievement and failure than perhaps any other single myth.

       The fact is that, especially at the beginning of their careers, all really successful people work much harder than the average person. They work 10 to 12 hours per day, six days per week. They work at this rate for many months and years, before they reach the point where they can slow down. The average self-made millionaire has taken 22 years to get from being broke to having a net worth of more than one million dollars. It is not easy and it is not quick. But it is definitely possible if you want it badly enough.


WORK ALL THE TIME YOU WORK

A key part of success at work is to use your time well, to focus on results, and avoid the time-wasting social activities of the poor performers. In correlation with this is the need for you to ''work all the time you work.''

       This is a remarkable idea for many people. Often employees think about work as if it was an extension of school.When they were growing up, they came to think of school as a place where you go to socialize. You take the required courses, but the most important part is spending time with your friends between classes. School becomes a form of play.

       Many people think, when they take their first job, that work is also a place where you go to spend time with your friends. This is why fully half of the working day is spent socializing, and in idle conversation on the telephone with friends and family.Work is seen as a giant sandbox where you continue to play as you did in school. You do a little work when the boss is watching, get a paycheck, and then go home.

       But this is not for you. If you are determined to succeed greatly and be paid the very most, you must work all the time you work. When you go to work, you must put your head down and work wholeheartedly.


SOCIALIZING WITH CO-WORKERS

Many people believe the myth that you have to spend a lot of time getting along with your co-workers. They say, ''Work is supposed to be fun!'' And this is true up to a point.

       Of course, it is important for you to be positive and agreeable person to work with. But you can accomplish this in a few minutes of pleasant interaction each day. You don't have to spend endless hours chatting about sports, television shows, and family activities. Your job is to work all the time you work.

       When you work, you work.You do not pick up your dry cleaning or drop off your laundry during working hours.You do not socialize with your friends or chat on the phone with your family.You do not take long coffee breaks and extended lunch hours.You work all the time you work.You commit yourself to getting the very most done that you possibly can in the time that you have available to you.


GET BACK TO WORK

Your goal is to earn the reputation around your company as being the hardest-working person in the organization. If someone wants to shoot the breeze with you, explain to him or her that you would be pleased to chat after work, but right now you have to get back to work. Keep repeating to yourself, ''Back to work, back to work, back to work!''

       People who achieve great financial success, either in their own businesses or working for other organizations, are people who very early develop a reputation for hard, hard work. There is a saying in business: ''Everyone knows everything.'' There are no secrets. Everyone knows who works the hardest in every organization, and who doesn't.

       There is no quality that will bring you to the attention of people who can help you faster than your developing a reputation for being one of the hardest-working people in your company.


START EARLIER, STAY LATER

Napoleon Hill, the author of Think and Grow Rich, once told the story of a young man who started at the bottom of a large organization and eventually moved up into the top ranks of executives, passing all the people who had started with him at the same level. His strategy was simple. He noticed that his boss came in a little earlier than the rest of the staff, stayed to finish up his work, and left a little later than the others. This young man therefore resolved to arrive 15 minutes before his boss and to leave 15 minutes after his boss left.

       He put his resolution into action the next day. This is another hallmark of high achievers:They don't procrastinate when they have a good idea; they take action immediately. The young man began coming in 15 minutes before his boss and going straight to work, continuing all day. When his boss left he would still be at his desk, working away.


BE PATIENT AND PERSISTENT

The boss said nothing for several weeks. Finally, after work one evening, his boss came over to his desk and asked him why he always seemed to be there, even though all his co-workers had left. The young man said it was because he was really determined to be successful in this company, and he knew he couldn't be successful unless he was willing to work harder than anyone else.

       The boss smiled and nodded and went on his way. Soon after that, the boss asked him to do something that was not part of his job description. He did it quickly and well, delivered it to his boss, and went back to his desk. Soon after, he was given another assignment, which he also completed quickly. Within a year, the young man had been given several additional responsibilities, each one of which he accepted and fulfilled immediately.

       In his second year, he was promoted to a higher position. He studied, upgraded his skills, and continued to work hard. Within a couple of years he had surpassed all of his rivals. He had earned the respect and esteem of the other managers.They soon promoted him so that he was one of them, rather than one of the staff. His career took off. Eventually he became a vice president of the company.

       This is a simple strategy that works for anyone who is willing to do more than is expected of him or her. It works for almost anyone, anywhere, over and over again, year after year.


LOOK FOR WAYS TO ADD VALUE

If your goal is to become wealthy, you have to know how wealth is created. The answer is contained in two words: ''add value.'' All wealth comes from adding value in some way. All wealth comes from serving and satisfying your customers better than they could be served and satisfied by someone else. Wealth is the result of adding value to them in a way that no one else can match.

       In your job, you should be looking for ways every day and every week to add value and to become more valuable than you were before. Throughout your career, your main focus must be to constantly seek out ways that you can add value to your boss, to your co-workers, to your customers, to your suppliers, and to everyone else and anyone upon whom you rely for your success. This should become your motto: ''Add value, add value, add value!''


THE NEW PARADIGM OF WORK

One of the major revolutions in thought that has taken place in the world of work in the past few years is the idea that you must justify your position anew every day.

       It used to be that a person would work hard for a few years until he had achieved a certain level in his job. He could then coast along at that level for many years, if not for the rest of his career. His attitude was, ''Well, I've paid my dues. I earned my position. I did a great job. Now I am entitled to this job indefinitely.''

       But this is no longer good enough. Today, everybody wants to know, ''What have you accomplished lately?'' In the fast-moving, highly competitive business world of today, your boss wants to know what you have done to add value recently.You have already been paid for what you did last year, last month, and even last week. Now you must earn and justify your paycheck anew. There is a race on and you are in it, whether you know it or not.


TWO SOURCES OF VALUE

There are two major sources of value in the world of work today. The first is time and the second is knowledge. Today, time is the currency of modern business. Everyone must be focused on reducing the amount of time that it takes to get the same results. Customers will pay dearly for anyone who can reduce the time needed to get them the products and services they want. People will pay more for someone who can satisfy their needs faster than someone else. This is why most of the major improvements in modern management are those that reduce the amount of time that it takes to get the job done.

       The most important measure of time is speed. The most important quality that you can develop with regard to time is a ''sense of urgency.'' This is the habit of moving fast when opportunity presents itself to you. Develop a bias for action. Fast tempo is essential to success. All successful people not only work hard, hard, hard, but they work fast, fast, fast!


DO IT NOW!

Procrastination is not only the thief of time; it is the thief of life.To outperform your competition, both inside and outside your organization, you must develop the habit of moving quickly when something needs to be done. You must develop a reputation for speed and dependability. Study after study shows that those individuals with the best reputations for speed and dependability are the most valued in any organization. They are very quickly promoted onto the fast track in their careers.

       The wonderful advantage of developing the habit of moving fast is that the faster you move, the better you get. This is because the faster you move, the more experience you get. The faster you move, the more you learn and the more competent you become.The faster you move, the more energy and enthusiasm you have. People who move fast as a way of life soon develop a totally different temperament and personality than people who move slowly or who take a casual attitude toward their work.


WORK IN REAL TIME

Whenever possible, do your work in ''real time,'' as soon as it comes up. Do it now. It is amazing how much time you can waste by picking up a task, looking at it or starting it, and then putting it down and coming back to it again and again. As a general rule, small tasks should be done immediately, as soon as they appear.This habit of taking action quickly will enable you to get through an enormous amount of work in a day. It will earn you a reputation for being the kind of person to give jobs to when someone needs them done quickly.


SUCCESS COMES FROM GOOD HABITS

Fully 95 percent of everything you do throughout your day is based on habit. Successful people are those who have developed the habits of success. Successful people form good habits and ensure that those habits govern their behaviors. Unsuccessful people allow bad habits to form, and these bad habits then lead to frustration and failure.

       My friend Ed Foreman says, ''Good habits are hard to form but easy to live with. Bad habits, on the other hand, are easy to form but hard to live with.''

       A habit is defined as ''a conditioned response to stimuli.'' It is an automatic way of responding or reacting in a particular situation. You develop a habit by repeating a specific act or way of thinking and reacting. Once it becomes a habit, it becomes easier to do it that way than to do it some other way.What kind of habits do you have?

       Successful people are simply those who developed successful habits. They have trained themselves, like athletes, to do certain things in a certain way, over and over again, until they do them automatically, without even thinking about them.You may have heard the old saying:

Sow a thought and you reap an action; Sow an action and you reap a habit; Sow a habit and you reap a character; Sow a character and you reap a destiny.



A KEY SUCCESS HABIT

One of the habits of success is that of early rising. Successful people get up a little bit earlier, read and prepare, plan and organize their day on paper in advance, and get going before the average person has even started.Thomas Jefferson said, ''The sun has never caught me in my bed.''

       A woman in one of my seminars some years ago told me that she discovered the magic of early rising. She had found that by going to bed early she could get up at four o'clock in the morning. She could then do the equivalent of a full day's work by seven or eight o'clock, before the average person even got started. In no time at all, she was producing and earning double the amount of her coworkers. She was continually promoted and paid more money because she was getting far more done than anyone else.

       Successful people make a habit of getting up early, usually by 6:00 or 6:30 in the morning, sometimes earlier, and then getting going immediately. This gives them a great jump on the day.

       The average person, on the other hand, takes a full hour to get up and get going in the morning. Then they drag themselves off to work, thinking about lunchtime, and what they are going to do in the evening.

       When your alarm clock goes off, get up immediately and get going right away. Start moving. Develop the habit of rising early and starting right to work on your most important task. This habit can do as much to assure your success as any other habit you develop.


PRACTICE LOMBARDI TIME

When Vince Lombardi took over the Green Bay Packers, the players had developed the habit of not showing up until the last moment for games or buses. Often they were late, and everyone had to wait. So Lombardi introduced ''Lombardi time.'' This was defined as 15 minutes earlier than the scheduled time. Eventually everyone began arriving early, and the problem was solved.

       You should go onto Lombardi time as well. Make a habit of punctuality by resolving to be on time, and then practicing it over and over until is natural and easy. Less than 2 percent of people are punctual, and everybody notices it, one way or the other. Make it a game to be on time - or better yet, early - for every appointment.


MAKE EVERY MINUTE COUNT

Get into work before anyone else gets there, and when you do arrive, begin working immediately. Don't waste time reading the newspaper, drinking coffee, or socializing with co-workers. Develop a reputation for being the kind of person who is always working, and always working on high-priority tasks.

       Work all the time you work. Discipline yourself to keep yourself focused on the most valuable use of your time. Don't allow other people to put you ''off your game.''When you have coffee breaks or lunches, have them when they best suit you, not when they best suit the clock.


MAKE EVERY MINUTE COUNT

Here is a powerful three-step formula you can use to double your productivity and perhaps even double your income over the next 12 months. It is simple and powerful, and it works for anyone who uses it.

       First, make a decision to come into work an hour earlier. This does not take very much effort, and it allows you to beat the traffic. Have your work planned out for the day so that when you get into work you can then put your head down and go full blast.You will be amazed at how much you can get done before anyone else comes in. Research proves that you can do three hours of office work in one hour of uninterrupted time.

       Second, work through lunch, using the hour when your coworkers are all off together eating to get ahead of your work. Resist the tendency to take an hour off at ''lunchtime'' or to go for lunch with whoever is standing there.

       Third, work one hour later, after everyone has left. This third uninterrupted hour will enable you to wrap up your work from the day and plan the next day in detail. Also, by working later, you will miss the rush hour traffic.

       By starting one hour early, working through the usual lunch hour, and staying one hour later, you will double your productive working time each day.When you combine this with working all the time you work and focusing on high-value tasks, you will more than double the amount of work you get done.You will quickly become one of the most valuable people in your organization.


SCHEDULE YOUR FIRST APPOINTMENT EARLY

If you are in sales, schedule your first appointment as early as possible. Many of the most important people you could want to see get into the office at 7:00 and 7:30 in the morning. Arrange to meet them at that time.

       A salesman friend of mine, who is at the top of his field, found that the key to getting appointments with the key decision makers was to call their offices at 7:00 or 7:30 in the morning or 6:30 or 7:00 in the evening. He discovered that at these times all the staff either weren't in yet or had gone home. The only people working were the key people. They would answer the phone personally and he would get an opportunity to talk to them and arrange to see them later.


CREATE YOUR OWN OPPORTUNITIES

Develop the habit of moving fast. Successful people in every field have a sense of urgency. Only a small percentage of the population moves quickly when opportunity or responsibility presents itself. You must be a member of this small percentage.

       When I was younger, I used to think that when my opportunity came along I would take advantage of it at that time. I soon learned that your opportunity never does just come along.

       Russell Conwell made this point in his famous story, Acres of Diamonds (Berkley, 1986). In summary, it says that in most cases your greatest opportunities lie under your own feet. They are right where you are. They lie within your current talents, skills, ability, and experience. They lie within your own business or industry. They lie within your own background or career.Your acres of diamonds are very close at hand, and that is where you should begin your search.


TAKE ACTION RIGHT WHERE YOU ARE

Theodore Roosevelt once said, ''Do what you can, with what you have, right where you are.'' This is the key to success. ''Do what you can, with what you have, right where you are.''

       Focus on the present moment and on your current situation. Don't wait for things to be ''just right.'' It is you who will make things just right. By throwing your whole heart into what you are doing every minute, you will open up doors of opportunity that are not now visible to you.

       Look around you at this very moment and ask yourself, ''What could I do to add value to the most important people in my work life?''What could you do to make things faster, easier, or better for the people who are depending on you? Be proactive rather than reactive. Be the kind of person who reaches out and grabs opportunities, and if you don't have any opportunities, create them personally through your own efforts.


MAKE YOURSELF INDISPENSABLE

A secretary in Boca Raton, Florida, told me an interesting story at one of my seminars. She had listened to one of my audio programs on personal achievement. As a result, she had set a goal to increase her income by 50 percent over the coming year from her current income of $1,500 per month. She told me that she didn't really think it was possible to earn that much more because she was part of a large secretarial pool where salaries were fixed. Everyone made almost exactly the same.

       Nonetheless, she decided to look for ways to add value to her boss. She noticed that he spent a lot of time replying to routine correspondence. One day, she took all of his regular mail and wrote replies to them. She then took the finished letters to him to edit and sign. He was delighted with her work and encouraged her to do more of it. Soon, she was handling 90 percent of his routine correspondence.

       She then began to take additional courses to upgrade her skills in word processing, page making, and report preparation. Bit by bit, she began to take his smaller tasks and handle them herself. Each time she took over a smaller task, she freed her boss to work on more important tasks. And he noticed.


MAKE YOURSELF INDISPENSABLE

After about three months her boss called her in and closed the door. He said that he really appreciated the work that she was doing for him, and he wanted to increase her pay. He asked her not to tell anyone else so that it didn't create any waves around the office. He then raised her salary from $1,500 to $1,750 per month.

       She thanked him, and continued looking for ways to help him in his job. Three months later, he increased her pay again, and three months later, he increased her salary once more. By the end of the year, she was earning $2,250 per month, a 50 percent increase, while the other secretaries around her were still earning an average of $1,500.

       She said it was absolutely amazing what happened when she began to focus all of her energies on adding value to her boss and to her company. And this same strategy can work for you.


SERVE PEOPLE BETTER

Every job is an opportunity for you to solve problems and to satisfy the needs of other people. Since the problems and needs that people have are unlimited, your opportunities to create value are unlimited as well.

       Every fortune begins with an idea to serve people better in some way. Almost all entrepreneurs who start and build successful companies have worked for other organizations where they continually looked for ways to increase their value to the company.

       The primary sources of value, the keys to wealth building, are time and knowledge.Your job is to continually increase your knowledge so that the value of what you do becomes greater and greater. Over 400 years ago Francis Bacon said that knowledge is power. But this is only partially true. Only when knowledge is applied to some good purpose is it power.Your job is to gather the knowledge that you need so that you can do your job fast and well.

       There is a saying in Texas that goes, ''It's not the size of the dog in the fight; it's the size of the fight in the dog.''

       What is most important is not the hours you put in, but the value of the work you put into those hours.Your success is determined by your ability to contribute value to your current job, either as an employee or as an employer, as a company worker or a company owner, that determines your income and your financial future.


PRODUCE MORE VALUE

In its simplest terms, successful people are more productive than unsuccessful people. Successful people have better habits. They dream bigger dreams.They work from written goals.They do what they love to do, and they concentrate on getting better and better at it. They use their natural abilities to the fullest. They are continually generating ideas to solve problems and to achieve company goals.They focus on using every minute of their time to get maximum results.

       Above all, they are constantly looking around them for opportunities to add value to everything they do. They have a sense of urgency and a bias for action.They work all the time they work.They develop and maintain a sense of forward momentum. As a result, they soon become unstoppable.

       ACTION EXERCISES



Identify the most valuable things you do at work. How could you organize your time so that you do more of them?

Resolve today to develop the habit of punctuality. Go on Lombardi time, and start arriving 15 minutes early for appointments.

Organize your day so that you come in and get started one hour earlier than your co-workers.Work through lunchtime, and stay one hour later.

Work all the time you work. Don't waste a minute. If someone tries to distract you, say you have to get back to work, and then do it.

Look under your own feet for your personal acres of diamonds, opportunities to add more value right where you are. What could they be?

Resolve today to become financially independent. Become a student of money, wealth accumulation, and wealth creation. Becoming rich is a skill that you can learn.

Begin today to implement the 40 Plus Formula in your daily work life.Work on your job, or work on yourself to get better at what you do, 50 to 60 hours each week. Put yourself on the side of the angels.

Dream Big Dreams

Dream Big Dreams

Dream lofty dreams, and as you dream, so shall you become. Your vision is the promise of you shall at last unveil.

- John Ruskin



Your mind can be your best friend or your worst enemy. Your thoughts alone have the power to make you healthy or sick, rich or poor, popular or unpopular.Your mind is like a powerful force that can be turned in any direction to bring about wonderful results, or wreak havoc and destruction.Your main goal in life must be to harness your amazing powers and direct them intelligently and systematically toward achieving everything you really want.

A JOURNEY THROUGH ITALY

Let me tell you a story. Some years ago, I took my family to Italy on vacation.We toured several of the great art museums of Rome and Florence. In Florence, there is a special museum that was built to house the statue of David created by Michelangelo several hundred years ago. This is perhaps the most beautiful piece of sculpture in the world.The actual physical experience of being in the same room with it is something that none of us has ever forgotten.

       The story of the creation of the David is very interesting and contains a lesson for all of us. Michelangelo was commissioned by the Medicis to create a statue for the main square in Florence. The Medicis were the wealthiest and most powerful family of Italy at the time. A commission for a statue from the Medicis was not only a great honor; it was also a task that could not be refused. For two years, Michelangelo searched for a block of stone out of which he could create the kind of masterpiece the Medicis were looking for.

       Finally, on a side street of Florence, partially overgrown with weeds and covered with dirt, he found a huge slab of marble lying on wooden trestles. It had been hauled down from the mountains years before and had never been used.

       Michelangelo had walked past this street many times, but this time he stopped and looked more closely. As he walked back and forth studying the block of marble, he actually envisioned the statue of David and saw it in its entirety.

GREAT SUCCESS REQUIRES LONG, HARD WORK

The sculptor quickly arranged to have workmen haul the block of marble to his studio some distance away. He then began the long, hard job of hammering and chiseling. It took him two solid years of work to create the rough outline of the statue. He then put his hammers and chisels aside and spent two more years polishing and sanding before the statue was complete.

       Michelangelo was already famous as a sculptor, and the news that he was working on a major commission for the Medicis spread all over Italy. When the day came for its first public viewing, thousands of people came from all over Italy and gathered in the main square.When it was unveiled, the crowd stood gaping in awe. It was breathtakingly beautiful. People cheered.Women fainted. The audience was amazed at the incredible beauty of the enormous statue. Michelangelo was immediately recognized as the greatest sculptor of his age.

       Afterward, when Michelangelo was asked how he was able to create such a masterpiece, he replied by saying that he saw the David complete and perfect in the marble. All he did was to remove everything that was not the David.

YOU ARE A MASTERPIECE

There are many parallels between yourself and the David.You are very much like a great masterpiece enclosed in marble as well. But the marble that envelops you, and most other people, is the marble of small, limited thinking and excessive worry about the possibilities of loss or failure, rather than an excited anticipation of the rewards of success and achievement.

       To realize your full potential, your greatest need is to break out of your limited thinking by dreaming big dreams and imagining unlimited possibilities.You need to remove all the negative beliefs that hold you back from becoming all you are capable of becoming.

       But remember, even after the David had been released from the marble, it took Michelangelo two solid years of sanding and polishing to turn it into a masterpiece. In the same way, you also have to work on yourself, sanding and polishing, learning and practicing, for days, weeks, months, and even years, to develop and bring out all the talents and abilities that lie deep inside of you.

YOU CAN BECOME UNSTOPPABLE

The central purpose of this book is to help you change your thinking in such a way that you become absolutely unstoppable in achieving any goal you can set for yourself.Your goal is to develop yourself to the point psychologically where you become like an irresistible force of nature.You will be like the tide coming in, or like a powerful storm that sweeps across the land.

       Your aim is to become so confident, courageous, strong, and resolute that you can set any goal for yourself with the firm knowledge that you can learn what you need to learn, and do what you need to do, to eventually achieve it.You will become so persistent and determined that nothing and no one can slow you down or alter your course.You will become truly unstoppable!

DREAM BIG DREAMS

You begin the process of becoming unstoppable by dreaming big dreams. Since everything you create in your world begins with a thought, the bigger the dreams you dream, the bigger the goals you will achieve. All successful men and women are dreamers. All peak performers are what are called ''blue-sky thinkers.'' They continually allow their minds to float freely when they think about what is possible for them. They look at the unlimited blue sky above them as the only limit to everything and anything that they could possibly be, or have or do.

       Successful people continually practice ''back from the future'' thinking. They project into the future several years and imagine what their lives would look like if they had achieved all of their goals. They look back to the present, from the mental vantage point of the future, like looking from the top of a high mountain down to where they are actually standing in the valley, in the present. They then look at the path that they would have to take to get to where they want to be in the future.

       By the law of correspondence, whatever you can clearly see on the inside, you will eventually experience on the outside.You should therefore visualize your goals with as much clarity and vividness as possible. Visualize your goals intensely and create within yourself the same feeling that you would have if you had already achieved your goals. Visualize your goals frequently. Replay a picture of your goal, as if you had already realized it, on the screen of your mind as many times a day as you possibly can. Visualize your goals for as long as you possibly can, preferably just before falling asleep each night.

       Repeat these exercises of visualization-vividness, intensity, frequency, and duration-until your goals become absolutely clear, living, breathing, exciting, clear pictures in your mind. The more skilled you become at moving from the dream through the goal to the visualization, the more motivated and determined you will be. The more clarity you develop, the more courage and confidence you will have, and the more unstoppable you will become.
CREATE YOUR IDEAL FUTURE VISION


       The most important part of dreaming big dreams is for you to define your ideal future vision. It is for you to think about what you want before you begin to think about what is possible for you.You dream big dreams by looking into the future and imagining that you have no limitations holding you back from achieving anything you set your mind on.

       Detach yourself from your current situation and allow yourself to dream. Pretend for the moment that you have all the time and money you need. Imagine that you have all the connections and contacts, all the resources and opportunities, all the education and knowledge, all the skills and experience that you require to be, have, or do anything that you could dream of.

       Imagine your ideal lifestyle. Imagine your ideal job or income. Imagine where you would like to live and how you would like to spend each day, each week, each month. Imagine your ideal family life. Imagine your ideal state of health. Design your perfect life in every respect.

MAKE YOUR OWN DREAM LIST

Here is an exercise for you.Take out a piece of paper and at the top write the words ''Dream List.'' Underline these words and then write down everything that you can think of that you could ever possibly want if you had no limitations whatsoever.

       Most people are held back by their self-limiting beliefs.The way you burst these mental chains is with a dream list.The very fact that you can write down something that you would love to have someday means that you probably have within you, right now, the ability to achieve it. Let your mind float freely as you write. There will be lots of time to organize and evaluate your dreams later.

WHAT WOULD YOU DARE TO DREAM?

Here is a great question: ''What one great thing would you dare to dream if you knew you could not fail?''

       If you were absolutely guaranteed of success in the achievement of any one goal, big or small, long-term or short-term, what would it be? If a billionaire took a liking to you and offered to write you a check to cover any goal that you could clearly define, what one goal would you choose?

       If you could have any job, what would it be? If you could work for any kind of company, what kind of a company would you select? Where would it be, and what would it be doing? If your family life and your relationships could be perfect in every respect, what would they look like? Answer these questions clearly. Write them down.

START WORK ON YOUR FUTURE

You begin the creation of your ideal future by making up your dream list.You write down everything that you would want to be, do and have, exactly as if you had no limitations at all.You make up your list as if you were absolutely guaranteed of success. Then you can begin refining your list, step by step to develop a detailed blueprint for your life.

       Henry David Thoreau once wrote, ''Have you built your castles in the air? Good, that's where they should be built. Now, go to work and build foundations under them.'' Once you have broken free from your limited thinking, like a balloon casting loose its moorings and rising high into the sky, you can begin to turn your dreams and fantasies into concrete practical goals with specific plans of action.

       Your ability to set goals and to make plans for their accomplishment is the ''master skill'' of success.With this master skill, there are no limits on what you can accomplish. Putting your goals on paper is the next step in the process.

HOW TO ACHIEVE ANY GOAL

There is a seven-step method for goal setting and achievement that you can use, over and over, in any situation, to accomplish anything you could ever want for yourself. These seven steps constitute a powerful, proven formula that you can use to change your life immediately.

STEP ONE: DECIDE EXACTLY WHAT YOU WANT

A real goal is clear, specific, measurable, and time bounded. A nongoal- a wish or a hope-is fuzzy and unclear. It is a fantasy that floats in the air. People with clear, specific goals, who know exactly what they want, are very different from people who are going through life hoping for the best.Your ability to decide exactly what it is you want in each area of your life is one of the most important responsibilities of adult life.

       People often approach me at my seminars and ask what their goals should be. I reply that only they can decide. It is amazing how many of them tell me how hard it is to set goals, and I agree with them. It is hard, but it is also essential. With clear goals, you can do almost anything. Without them, you can do virtually nothing.

       One of the major reasons that people fail in life is because they waste so much of their time doing things of low value or no value at all. And the reason they waste so much time is because they have no real idea of what they really want. Once you have clear goals, your ability to manage your time improves dramatically.

USE YOUR TIME WELL

Here is a way to decide whether something is a good use of your time. Just ask, ''Does this move me toward the achievement of one of my goals?'' If the activity helps you to achieve a goal you have set for yourself, it is a good use of time. If it doesn't, it is a poor use of time.

       When you get into the habit of only doing those things that move you toward your goals, your life will take off.Your results will improve.You will soon find yourself busy every hour of every day doing things that are helping you in some way.You will have no time left to spend on activities that aren't helping you to achieve one of your goals.

       When you set clear goals for yourself, and you know exactly what you want, you will become increasingly impatient with activities that are not helping you in some way.You will watch less television. You will listen to less radio. You will read the newspapers quickly, if at all. You will become far more selective with your friends and your social activities.You will spend time only with people you enjoy, people you can learn and benefit from. But, as the old saying goes, ''If you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there.''
STEP TWO: WRITE DOWN YOUR GOALS


       Write your goals down on paper. There is something quite incredible that happens between the brain and the hand. When you take a paper and pen and write down your goals, you activate the Laws of Expectation, Attraction, and Correspondence simultaneously. You intensify your belief and deepen your conviction that your goals are possible for you. The very act of writing down your goals gives you a sense of control and personal power.Written goals increase your resolve and determination to do whatever is necessary to achieve them.

       The speed at which you will begin to achieve your goals after you have written them down is nothing short of miraculous. The very act of writing out your goals increases the likelihood of your achieving them by as much as 10 times-1,000 percent!

       Many thousands of my graduates have written or come back to tell me about the amazing things that have happened in their lives that started immediately after they began putting their goals in writing.

STEP THREE: BE WILLING TO PAY THE PRICE

Determine the price you are going to have to pay to achieve your goal. Make a list of everything that you are going to have to do if you want to make your goal a reality.

       Are you going to have to start each day's work a little earlier, work a little harder, and stay a little later? Write it down. Are you going to have to upgrade your knowledge and skills, and take additional courses? Again, write it down. Are you going to have to change jobs, change industries, or change careers in order to achieve everything that is possible for you? Write it down.

       The Law of Cause and Effect is the iron law of the universe. For everything that you want, there is a price that must be paid. This price must be paid in full and in advance. The Law of Sowing and Reaping is not the Law of Reaping and Sowing.You have to put in before you get out.You have to give before you receive.You have to pay the price before you enjoy the reward.

       Your willingness to do whatever you need to do, pay whatever price is required, go whatever distance is necessary, and make whatever sacrifice is demanded is the measure of how badly you really want your goal.

       Many people sabotage their own success by deciding that they want a particular goal, and although they are willing to pay a high price for it, they are not quite willing to pay the full price that the goal demands. This is like wanting to win in a poker game but not being willing to match the final bet made by the other player.You end up losing the whole hand, just as by failing to make a total commitment people end up losing the entire goal.

STEP FOUR: MAKE A DETAILED PLAN

Make a plan, in writing. Remember, the ability to develop written goals and create plans for their achievement is the master skill of success. A plan begins with your making a list of all the things that you can think of that you are going to have to do to achieve your goal. Once you have made your list, you can add new items as they occur to you.

       You then organize your list in terms of priority and sequence. What are the most important things on the list that you will have to do to achieve your goal? What are the things that you will have to do before you do something else? Which items on your list are dependent on your completing other items first?

       A plan of action gives you a track to run on. It increases your level of belief and intensifies your desire for the goal.You gradually become convinced that your goal is actually possible and achievable for you.You begin to see possibilities that you may not even have been aware of in the absence of a written plan.

STEP FIVE: TAKE ACTION ON YOUR PLAN

Take action of some kind in the direction of your goal. Once you have set a goal, written it down, determined the price that you are going to have to pay, and made a plan, you must take some action immediately. Even if you only make one phone call or collect one piece of information, be sure to do something. In the Bible it says, ''Faith without deeds is dead.''

       There is something powerful in your willingness to take a specific action, in faith, in the direction of your goal, with no guarantee of success.Your action itself seems to trigger all kinds of other powers and forces in the universe.You activate the Law of Attraction to help you.When you take action, you demonstrate to yourself, and to others for that matter, that you are really serious about your goal.

       Until you have taken a specific, irrevocable action of some kind, you have merely engaged in an enjoyable exercise, like daydreaming. You have put your key into the ignition but you haven't turned it on.

STEP SIX: DO SOMETHING EVERY DAY

Do something every day that moves you toward your most important goal. This is a vital success principle that generates energy and enthusiasm. For you to maintain your courage, confidence, and selfmotivation, you must be doing something every single day that gives you a feeling of forward motion and progress.Your job is to build yourself up to the point where you genuinely feel unstoppable, and the only way that you can do this is by refusing to stop, by doing something daily.

STEP SEVEN: NEVER GIVE UP

Resolve in advance that you will never quit once you have started toward your goal. No matter how many setbacks or obstacles you experience, make the decision that you will keep on picking yourself up and persisting until you eventually succeed.

       By deciding in advance that you will persist, no matter what the difficulty, you give yourself a psychological edge. When the difficulties do arise, you will be mentally prepared to plow through them rather than quitting.Your willingness and ability to persist are what will eventually guarantee your success.

SECRETS OF SELF-MADE MILLIONAIRES

If money is your goal, remember that most of the people who are wealthy today started out with no money at all, or even deeply in debt. Almost everyone who is on the top today was once at the bottom. Almost everyone who is at the front of the line of life was once at the back of the line. Almost everyone who is wealthy today was once poor.

       Most of the five million millionaires in the United States are self-made. That is, they started out with nothing and worked their way up. Our world today has more than 300 self-made billionaires and multibillionaires as well. Many of these are people who started with little or nothing, and by changing their thinking, they unleashed their own inner potentials to achieve extraordinary financial results. And almost anything that anyone else has done, within reason, you can do as well.What are your goals?

THE POWER OF COMMITMENT

One of my favorite quotations is from the mountain climber Charles Murray.

Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative and creation, there is an elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans; that the moment that one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too.

       All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred.A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favor all manner of unforeseen incidences and meetings and material assistance that no man could have dreamed would have come his way.



He finishes off his statement with these words from Goethe:

Are you in earnest? Seek this very minute, Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Only engage and the mind grows heated. Begin and then the task will be completed.



       ACTION EXERCISES


What one great goal would you set for yourself if you were absolutely guaranteed success?

Make out a ''dream list''; write down everything you would like to have in your life someday, exactly as if you had no limitations.

Imagine your perfect lifestyle; if you were financially independent and you could live any way and anywhere you wanted, what would you change?

Make a list of 10 goals you would like to accomplish in the next year. From that list, select the one goal that would have the greatest positive impact on your life if you could achieve it right now.

Write your most important goal on a separate piece of paper. Make it measurable and set a deadline for its accomplishment.

Make a written plan to achieve this one goal.Write out a list of everything you can think of that you will have to do to accomplish it.

Take action on your plan immediately. Once you have started, discipline yourself to do something every day that moves you toward that goal. Never miss a day until you have achieved it.