The Law of Success: In Sixteen Lessons

by Napoleon Hill

Memorize your definite chief aim so you can repeat it without looking at the written page, then make a practice of fixing your attention on it at least twice a day, proceeding as follows:

Learn to fix your attention on a given subject, at will, for whatever length of time you choose, and you will have learned the secret passageway to power and plenty!

The human body can be imprisoned or controlled by physical force, but it is not so with the human mind.

There is a crowd of separate individuals, and a composite crowd in which the emotional natures of the units seem to blend and fuse.

the power of mental contagion.

Error, like truth, flourishes in crowds. At the heart of sympathy each finds a home... No form of contagion is so insidious in its outset, so difficult to check in its advance, so certain to leave germs that may at any moment reveal their pernicious power, as a mental contagion–the contagion of fear, of panic, of fanaticism, of lawlessness, of superstition, of error....In

The conjurer finds it easy to perform to a large audience, because, among other reasons, it is easier to arouse their admiration and sympathy, easier to make them forget themselves and enter into the uncritical spirit of wonderland.

Isolated, he may be a cultured individual; in a crowd, he is a barbarian–that is, a creature acting by instinct. He possesses the spontaneity, the violence, the ferocity, and also the enthusiasm and heroism of primitive beings, whom he further tends to resemble by the facility with which he allows himself to be induced to commit acts contrary to his most obvious interests and his best-known habits.

An individual in a crowd is a grain of sand amid other grains of sand, which the wind stirs up at will.”

This is not an exaggeration– human beings, in times of panic, fright, or deep emotion of any kind, manifest the imitative tendency of the sheep, and the tendency of cattle and horses to “stampede” under imitation.

power is developed only through organized effort.

The three most important factors that enter into the process of organizing effort are: Concentration, Co-operation, and Co-ordination.

The man who had no conception of the potential power of these principles would probably select his associates by the usual “hit or miss” method, basing his selections more upon personality or acquaintanceship than consideration of the particular type of legal talent that each possessed.

Mr. Hill understood the principles of organized effort and co-operation; therefore, he surrounded himself with men who possessed all this necessary ability which he lacked.

Let us keep in mind the fact that all success is based upon power, and power grows out of knowledge, that has been organized and expressed in terms of ACTION.

Lack of action has caused them to slip backward until they got into a “rut,” where they will remain unless, through accident, they are forced out into the open road of struggle where unusual action will become necessary.

man who wants a chance may create it through action, but if he waits for someone to hand it to him on a silver platter he will meet with disappointment.

Here was a man who might have been at the head of some great business, or the outstanding figure in one of the professions had he not built his house upon the sands of procrastination and held to the false belief that the world should pay him for what he knew!

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Modern

What the world really pays you for is what you do or what you can get others to do.

Too often the mistake is made, in the selection of a life-work, of engaging in the work which seems to be the most profitable from a monetary viewpoint, without consideration of native ability.

“Do not tell them what you can do; show them!”

“Tomorrow I will do everything that should be done, when it should be done, and as it should be done. I will perform the most difficult tasks first because this will destroy the habit of procrastination and develop the habit of action in its place.”

There are three major motivating forces to which man responds in practically all of his efforts. These are: The motive of self-preservation The motive of sexual contact The motive of financial and social power

Vitalize your mind with a DEFINITE PURPOSE and immediately your mind becomes a magnet which attracts everything that harmonizes with that purpose.

Before you can have power you must have a DEFINITE PURPOSE; you must have SELF-CONFIDENCE with which to back up that purpose; you must have INITIATIVE and LEADERSHIP with which to exercise your self-confidence; you must have IMAGINATION in creating your definite purpose and in building the plans with which to transform that purpose into reality and put your plans into action. You must mix ENTHUSIASM with your action or it will be insipid and without “kick.” You must exercise SELF-CONTROL. You must form the habit of DOING MORE THAN PAID FOR. You must cultivate a PLEASING PERSONALITY. You must acquire the HABIT OF SAVING. You must become an ACCURATE THINKER, remembering, as you develop this quality, that accurate thought is based upon FACTS and not upon hearsay evidence or mere information. You must form the habit of CONCENTRATION by giving your undivided attention to but one task at a time. You must acquire the habit of CO-OPERATION and practice it in all your plans. You must profit by FAILURE, your own and that of others. You must cultivate the habit of TOLERANCE. Last, but by no means the least important, you must make the GOLDEN RULE the foundation of all you do that affects other people.

FAILURE comes to all at one time or another. Make sure, when it comes your way, that you will learn something of value from its visit.

You are the sum total of that which was born in you and that which you have picked up from your experiences, what you have thought and what you have been taught, since birth.

he

Be

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But

we human beings often take unto ourselves credit for intelligence to which we are not entitled. I fear we too often assume credit for wisdom and for results that accrue from causes over which we have absolutely no control.

Self-approval is a dangerous state of mind. This is a great truth which many people do not learn until the softening hand of Time has rested upon their shoulders for the better part of a life-time.

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Hear

You can get along with but little schooling; you can get along with but little capital; you can overcome almost any obstacle with which you are confronted, if you are honestly and earnestly willing to do the best work of which you are capable, regardless of the amount of money you receive for it....

And that thought was to render the world the best service of which I was capable, whether my efforts brought me a penny in return or not!

In view of what I have learned of the value of enemies, if I had none I would feel it my duty to create a few. They would discover my defects and point them out to me, whereas my friends, if they saw my weaknesses at all, would say nothing about them.

Our conception of religion, politics, economics, philosophy and other subjects of a similar nature, including war, is entirely the result of those dominating forces of our environment and training.

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Modern

Through physical heredity, man inherits those early tendencies to destroy his fellow man out of self-protection. This Practice is a holdover from the age when the struggle for existence was so great that only the physically strong could survive.

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governor of that

of “pranking” with a power which may destroy as well as create.

The Golden Rule means, substantially, to do unto others as you would wish them to do unto you if your positions were reversed.

There is an eternal law through the operation of which we reap that which we sow.

Therefore, not alone is it advisable to “do unto others as you wish them to do unto you,” but to avail yourself fully of the benefits of this great Universal Law you must “think of others as you wish them to think of you.”

passive attitude toward the Golden Rule will bring no results; it is not enough merely to believe in the philosophy, while, at the same time, failing to apply it in your relationships with others.

When you apply the Golden Rule, you become, at one and the same time, both the judge and the judged–the accused and the accuser.

But when honesty means either a temporary or a permanent material loss, then it becomes an honor of the highest degree to all who practice it.

You cannot indulge in an act toward another person without having first created the nature of that act in your own thought, and you cannot release a thought without planting the sum and substance and nature of it in your own subconscious mind, there to become a part and parcel of your own character.

When I render service to another, or indulge in an act of kindness, I store away in my subconscious mind the effect of my efforts, which may be likened to the “charging” of an electric battery. By and by, if I indulge in a sufficient number of such acts I will have developed a positive, dynamic character that will attract to me people who harmonize with or resemble my own character.

Nothing can bring you peace but yourself. Nothing can bring you peace but the triumph of principles.”