12 SOME OTHER THINGS

It has been said before that desire is the controlling force of your destiny. By this it is not to be inferred that simply because one desires wealth it will come, but rather if one relieves the mind of all passion, untruth and fear, leaving freedom of mental action, that desire controlled by will, which is in turn guided by wisdom, will attract to you, through the strengthened personality, all needful things.

If, in this condition, thoughts of trouble and poverty come (and they attract to you those most undesirable things; try to avoid such thoughts), you could easily turn your mind into thoughts of success which would then be attracted instead. There is but little value in constant admonitions, such as to choose good company, to avoid people who are failures and not to worry, to expect success, etc. If the desire for good company and prosperity honestly deserved can be instilled into a mind, the resulting self-purging and purifying will build up that mind into a pure man who unconsciously gravitates toward similar people.

All arguing is valueless, since, for example, a child's mind not being on the same mental plane as the parent's cannot see things from the same viewpoint. Tell the boy not to smoke; he sees others apparently enjoying a good smoke and desires to try it himself. After he has grown up and finds what a nuisance it is, he tells his son not to smoke and carefully explains how he did not obey his father and is now sorry for it, and his son immediately gets a cigar and tries it. The source of all wisdom cannot make a mistake.

The human being having the quality of wisdom adulterated by his imperfections, for the stagnant pool will taint the purest rivulet, does not see things as clearly and accordingly makes many mistakes for which he suffers. Again, the quality of truth enables one to detect error, inasmuch as in any idea advanced, containing part truth and part error, the truthful portion would appeal to the mind having the quality of truth developed as being true, while the error would not occupy a prominent position and would fall away and fade from sight from lack of attention.

If, however, that mind has but little truth in it, then the error in any proposition seems to be the truth, and an unsuccessful mind is likewise attracted to a plan promising more probability of failure than of success, and, if its possessor was going into business, would adopt such a plan; while the successful mind would feel and know the probabilities of success were small and reject the proposition, but immediately embrace the plan rejected by the unsuccessful mind. Cultivate, therefore, truth for self-protection.

If one sees all the faults in another, it is because those same faults are in one's self. If not, the qualities of mind would attract the attention to the better side of the criticized nature. There is no one so low but there remains some good qualities, and if the critic were absolutely pure, those good qualities would occupy such a prominent position that the imperfections would escape his notice. If, therefore, you gossip, putting in circulation the element of ill will and literally destroying the mentality of your neighbor as well as building up through the reaction of your own thought those very defects in your character, would it not be well for you to cultivate good will to all, when all desire to find defects in others would disappear?

Then build up peace, justice and love in yourself in order to be able to see them in others. The simple desire in your soul will start you on the road, for know you that desire is prayer. Long set forms of words, repeated hurriedly, on your knees, in a cold room, in conformity to duty as laid down by some sect, as outlined in their creed, is not prayer, and will bring no response. But the warm soul pulse of earnest desire starts in vibration all those qualities desired, and builds up the individual through their inflow. We hold that all nature prays. Trees, flowers, birds, all animals, inclusive of man, send out their desires for life, love and happiness, and such prayer is answered.

Learn to control yourself that your desires may be entirely for love, peace, purity, strength, justice, decision, force, and these things will be added to you and money will follow as fast as you allow your personality to develop. In your weak state you find money hard to get. You strive and struggle for it. It seems almost impossible for you to accumulate anything, and it is hard for you to acquire if your parents were poor and you have always been in poverty, because in your mind this educated you to set material value on a pedestal and mentally worship it as being above you.

If the greatest self-control has been reached, the amount of revenue derived from your efforts depends on the amount of force in you and on how you look upon monetary values. Force is obtained by conserving your energy; by never being anxious or worrying; by not throwing your whole power into whatever you do, but using only as much as is required to do it well; by not flinging your thoughts around at random; by alternating leisure and labor, for, be it known, the person who devotes his whole time to pleasure is farther from happiness than he who is ground down by cares.

As before stated, you can no more regulate these things in yourself without great labor and protracted effort than you can stop the progress of the midday sun. But constant endeavors and forceful demands for the deficient qualities will attract them to you, until at last absolute self-control will result and you will be able to use just the required amount of mental effort to accomplish results, and even then a man of small caliber will only do little things. Some never rise above a peanut stand, others sigh for more worlds to conquer; there is the difference. Any particular individual will, therefore, attract to himself results in accordance with the caliber. If a peanut man, he will get peanut results, i.e., if he thinks in pennies, the result is pennies; if in millions, the result is millions. The law is as clearly demonstrated in the one case as the other. Both drew to themselves in accordance with their force. If the little mind receives force and power, pennies become too small to seek, and broader fields of effort follow bringing greater returns.

But, you say, "Why does not the little mind think in millions at once?" Simply because he cannot think beyond his caliber. When his force is built up he finds his ideas have in some way undergone a change and things come in greater volume. This acquisition of force is assisted by aspiration, inasmuch as the idea of greater things is constantly held before the mind's eye, and growth results. Without this desire for constant improvement, retrogression sets in and the progress is backward. No one can stand still in mentality. It is push forward or slip backward.

Aspiration attracts both ways - to you, bringing power and force, and from you, lifting you upwards, just as the earth and a falling stone are mutually attracted towards each other in proportion to their volumes. The larger the stone, the greater is the effect on the earth; so the greater your force, the greater your attraction towards better things. It is just as easy for the forceful man to attract millions as for the peanut man to attract nickels, and both are governed by the same law. Build up, therefore, your ability to expect thousands instead of dollars, and thousands you will get.

This fact is further exemplified when it is remembered that an honest man is seldom cheated. We mean a man who would not take advantage in a business transaction when he could. His pure mind brings him in contact with honest people, and, if another tries to take advantage of him, some instinctive voice holds him from accepting the transaction. The old adage that honesty is the best policy is based on a scientific fact. Cultivate it. This quality, force, is the sustaining power that enables one to laugh at trouble, the mental attribute that causes others to recognize its possessor as a strong man.

If any character be strongly endowed with it, some degree of success would be obtained, even if the great part of it was wasted in violence, and self-control is only valuable in a business sense as it enables the mind to use all its powers to the very best advantage; to stop the worrying thought and substitute instead the strong, vigorous ideas of pushing on to the desired end. A weak man (one lacking in force and power) having perfect self-control will accomplish more by properly directing his force and retaining his energy than the strong man who wastes his energy in driving numberless projects towards, but never to, completion, in worrying over his failures, in anger and other modes of mental dissipation, for it uses the same energy to worry that would be used for pushing forward a successful business.

One idea carried to a successful conclusion will produce larger returns, even if it be but a poor idea, than a half dozen imperfectly carried out. The less irons a weak character has in the fire the better for him, since he requires the concentrative energy of all his power to carry one plan forward. On the other hand, a strong, vigorous man can carry several plans to as great a success as the other fellow can his simple purpose, but not to as great success as he could if his whole power was given to one large project.

The little fellow attempts sometimes to carry out great things on the principle that the higher the aim the greater the results, which is true in so far that great aspirations bring force of character which enables one to increase his power, but until that increased power is obtained there is danger of his being, assailed in mind by his own doubts and lack of confidence in his ability to carry it out, which invariably leads to failure. This lack of confidence is shown by the expression, "I know I can do it," while, if confidence prevailed, the question as to whether or not he could, would not occur to him, and, if the question were asked, he would probably answer abruptly, "Why not?"

Now do not understand that a perfect state of confidence must be developed before any degree of success can be obtained, for, if that were true, the most of us would never be successful; only, one should do those things which he can do without being assailed by doubts and fear of failure, and, in the meantime, build up the qualities of force, courage, confidence and determination; and as they are acquired he will find himself doing work of such caliber that the idea of it would alone have frightened him off some time before, while carrying with him the intention of doing some larger line of business will accustom his mind to the idea and he will not "scare at the cars" so easily. In time he will grow into such confidence in himself that it will be no longer a great idea, but just a commonplace affair when he is ready for its projection.

The lack of education will not be a bar to success. Wisdom and knowledge are not synonymous; neither are refinement and polish. Some of the most refined, gentle and estimable people are wholly without polish; while some of the smart set are puppets and snobs. If, however, the mind puts a limit on itself because of a lack of education and says, "Oh, he has a good education; of course he can do it; but I did not have that advantage and there is no use of my trying," that thought will put a bar to all great progress. In general terms, we are just what we assume ourselves to be, but may be whatever we determine to be.

If you have a child of whom you desire to make a failure, just teach him that education, alone will make him a success, and nothing else will be required. You establish a limitation for him, and he will never, can never make the necessary effort to be a man unless his own power of observation shows him the David Harums of life and proves your teachings erroneous. By great men we do not refer to statesmen or noted people in any sense, but to the quiet, strong, forceful, and self-controlled man who always has enough and to spare of this world's goods and who has conquered his spirit.

Neither does age prove any bar. Lack of youthful elasticity may make progress slow until confidence is acquired; but the sober judgment of mature years will counterbalance it. Spirit, your spirit, has always existed, will always exist in some form, and the time limit called age is only a measure of the length of existence in this body.

People whose minds never rise above the round of petty trifles, who constantly think of themselves instead of losing the consciousness of their own identity by thinking of their work entirely - concentrating on it - are apt to talk of themselves or of some one else instead of discussing matters of greater import. They are also apt to talk incessantly with but little to say and nothing worth hearing. If you are loquacious, find the cause; it will be in your mental condition.

If you receive a thought, you send it out again, reinforced, to be absorbed by another mind. If you think hate towards some fellow man, you add to your stock of hate and increase your thought current of hate, and that is sin. Attending theaters, ball games and similar places of amusement is not a sin, but rather a rest and recreation which add to your strength and should be cultivated. Low resorts, such as cheap variety theaters, with barroom attachment and female attendants, or the pistol-firing, blood-curdling drama of the hero rescuing the maiden and similar rot, contain a vulgar thought atmosphere and you, by absorbing it, weaken and degrade yourself. But a high-grade actor, from thinking strong thoughts (and he cannot be such an actor without vigorous thought) becomes strong, and his influence adds to your strength and improves your mind aside from the relaxation, which also benefits you.

Goodness, godliness, holiness, consist in building up the qualities of good will, strength, judgment, determination, confidence, courage, power, justice, gentleness, order, precision, force, calmness, and the resulting self-control; in short, of being a gentleman in the best sense of the word.

Fathers, mothers, what kind of justice would you show if you deliberately chose one child and said, "He shall have money, health, happiness," and of the other, "He shall have cares, worry, poverty, misery"? Yet that is just what the Supreme Life says to us if the doctrine of predestination is true. Can you believe such a fearful thing could come from a mind in which lies exact, unfaltering justice? Would you do it? And yet some believe that the Universal Life is less just than the human being. The law is there, and that law says, in unmistakable terms: you make your own life by the thoughts you think.

Every thought received in your mind is in accordance with the attitude of that mind and that attitude is governed entirely by your desire, - as a man thinketh, etc. Though that desire may be beyond control, through years of heredity and your own uncontrolled thought, that does not change it, and you must suffer the same. If you desire to hate anyone, your mind is immediately filled with thoughts of hate, which you send out again reinforced by the strength of your own personality. This hateful thought meets and mingles with the great body of hateful thoughts which has been generated through countless years, and, reacting, comes back to your own mind, establishing a connection between the great body of hate and yourself from which a current constantly comes to you, degrading, weakening, eventually destroying you.

On the other hand it works precisely the same way if your mind desires love. Love others and others will love you, and your ability to love will grow, constantly adding strength to your mind. Anyone can bring the hate or love of the entire world on himself, as he chooses, by building up the quality in his own mind. As now constituted, the minds of most people desire to love their friends and hate their enemies. Now don't you know you have no enemies excepting as you make them by considering them as such? You send them hating thought, they return it; this establishes a connection between you, constantly taking your strength to keep up the war. You cannot afford to do this; it is destroying your money making power.

Just reverse your plan and imagine him in mind as a friend; think of him as such; feel friendly towards him. That is strength. Then the current he generates will rebound from you like the sunrays from a plate of polished steel and do no harm, while he will feel your friendship and accept it heartily. Such a course requires mental strength, and by saying and thinking good will to all you can reach it.

That is controlling people. Acting ugly when they are ugly, fighting people, compelling them to do your bidding, is but a crude physical control at best; but when some violent tempered, infuriated man stands before you and you look into his eyes kindly, unflinchingly, absolutely fearless, the anger will fade away, the hostile attitude dissolve, your own look of good will and courage supplanting it, and you feel his hearty grasp of your extended hand. That is the mastery. That is self-control.

But if you become affected by his anger, lose your temper, act as ugly as he, then self-control is lost and he is your master and troubles are accumulating for you. The Indians with whom William Penn traded were affected by his mental condition. He meant to be just and they felt his honesty, and as a reward for holding the right mental attitude the Quaker garb was the best life insurance a person could have in Indian war times. If you master yourself first, hold yourself absolutely obedient to your desire for peace; you can control anyone, savage or civilized.

The passengers on a through train from Chicago to New York were disturbed by the constant crying of a little babe in its mother's arms. She walked along the aisle of the car, tossed the babe up and down, laid it face downward on her lap, and her nerves were evidently at a tension. At last a gentleman asked her to permit him to try to quiet the child, and, in a few minutes, it was peacefully sleeping, and he did nothing but hold it in his arms. Evidently knowing the effects of the mental condition of the mother upon the baby, he would not allow her to take the child until both obtained a restful sleep. Poor baby! Poor mother! What a difference inherited or cultivated calmness in the mother would have made in the lives of both.

Had she been quiet in mind, which means that thoughts pass through one at a time, deliberately and not in droves (each crowding and jostling the other and more pushing from behind), the child would have been stronger, more courageous and healthful, and bright smiles of happy contentment would have shown in the baby face instead of the constant nervous crying.

Now, briefly, to summarize: Build yourself into a calm, determined, courageous, forceful man by the aid of autosuggestion, and the attractive force of your mentality will bring success to you. You need not seek it. It will seek you. Use the methods given for any quality desired, eloquence, wisdom, health, anything - you will get results.

Faith is a dead letter unless accompanied with active, progressive thoughts and actions.

Cowards cannot concentrate