How to become successful

The Strangest Secret Article by: Earl Nightingale
Transcribed from The Strangest Secret audio program by Earl Nightingale

Some years ago, the late Nobel prize-winning Dr. Albert Schweitzer was asked by a reporter, ?Doctor, whats wrong with men today? The great doctor was silent a moment, and then he said, ?Men simply dont think!
Its about this that I want to talk with you. We live today in a golden age. This is an era that humanity has looked forward to, dreamed of, and worked toward for thousands of years. We live in the richest era that ever existed on the face of the earth a land of abundant opportunity for everyone.

However, if you take 100 individuals who start even at the age of 25, do you have any idea what will happen to those men and women by the time theyre 65? These 100 people believe theyre going to be successful. They are eager toward life, there is a certain sparkle in their eye, an erectness to their carriage, and life seems like a pretty interesting adventure to them.
But by the time theyre 65, only one will be rich, four will be financially independent, five will still be working, and 54 will be broke and depending on others for lifes necessities.

Only five out of 100 make the grade! Why do so many fail? What has happened to the sparkle that was there when they were 25? What has become of the dreams, the hopes, the plans and why is there such a large disparity between what these people intended to do and what they actually accomplished?

THE DEFINITION OF SUCCESS

First, we have to define success and here is the best definition Ive ever been able to find: ?Success is the progressive realization of a worthy ideal.

A success is the school teacher who is teaching because thats what he or she wants to do. A success is the entrepreneur who start his own company because that was his dream and thats what he wanted to do. A success is the salesperson who wants to become the best salesperson in his or her company and sets forth on the pursuit of that goal.

A success is anyone who is realizing a worthy predetermined ideal, because thats what he or she decided to do deliberately. But only one out of 20 does that! The rest are ?failures.

Rollo May, the distinguished psychiatrist, wrote a wonderful book called Mans Search for Himself, and in this book he says: ?The opposite of courage in our society is not cowardice it is conformity. And there you have the reason for so many failures. Conformity and people acting like everyone else, without knowing why or where they are going.

We learn to read by the time were seven. We learn to make a living by the time were 30. Often by that time were not only making a living, were supporting a family. And yet by the time were 65, we havent learned how to become financially independent in the richest land that has ever been known. Why? We conform! Most of us are acting like the wrong percentage group and the 95 who dont succeed.

GOALS

Have you ever wondered why so many people work so hard and honestly without ever achieving anything in particular, and why others dont seem to work hard, yet seem to get everything? They seem to have the ?magic touch. Youve heard people say, ?Everything he touches turns to gold. Have you ever noticed that a person who becomes successful tends to continue to become more successful? And, on the other hand, have you noticed how someone whos a failure tends to continue to fail?
The difference is goals. People with goals succeed because they know where theyre going. Its that simple. Failures, on the other hand, believe that their lives are shaped by circumstances by things that happen to them by exterior forces.

Think of a ship with the complete voyage mapped out and planned. The captain and crew know exactly where the ship is going and how long it will take and it has a definite goal. And 9,999 times out of 10,000, it will get there.

Now lets take another ship and just like the first and only lets not put a crew on it, or a captain at the helm. Lets give it no aiming point, no goal, and no destination. We just start the engines and let it go. I think youll agree that if it gets out of the harbor at all, it will either sink or wind up on some deserted beach and a derelict. It cant go anyplace because it has no destination and no guidance.

Its the same with a human being. However, the human race is fixed, not to prevent the strong from winning, but to prevent the weak from losing. Society today can be likened to a convoy in time of war. The entire society is slowed down to protect its weakest link, just as the naval convoy has to go at the speed that will permit its slowest vessel to remain in formation.
Thats why its so easy to make a living today. It takes no particular brains or talent to make a living and support a family today. We have a plateau of so-called ?security. So, to succeed, all we must do is decide how high above this plateau we want to aim.

Throughout history, the great wise men and teachers, philosophers, and prophets have disagreed with one another on many different things. It is only on this one point that they are in complete and unanimous agreement and the key to success and the key to failure is this:

WE BECOME WHATWE THINK ABOUT

This is The Strangest Secret! Now, why do I say its strange, and why do I call it a secret? Actually, it isnt a secret at all. It was first promulgated by some of the earliest wise men, and it appears again and again throughout the Bible. But very few people have learned it or understand it. Thats why its strange, and why for some equally strange reason it virtually remains a secret.

Marcus Aurelius, the great Roman Emperor, said: ?A mans life is what his thoughts make of it.
Disraeli said this: ?Everything comes if a man will only wait a human being with a settled purpose must accomplish it, and nothing can resist a will that will stake even existence for its fulfillment.

William James said: ?We need only in cold blood act as if the thing in question were real, and it will become infallibly real by growing into such a connection with our life that it will become real. It will become so knit with habit and emotion that our interests in it will be those which characterize belief. He continues, only you must, then, really wish these things, and wish them exclusively, and not wish at the same time a hundred other incompatible things just as strongly.

My old friend Dr. Norman Vincent Peale put it this way: ?If you think in negative terms, you will get negative results. If you think in positive terms, you will achieve positive results. George Bernard Shaw said: ?People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I dont believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and if they cant find them, make them.

Well, its pretty apparent, isnt it? We become what we think about. A person who is thinking about a concrete and worthwhile goal is going to reach it, because thats what hes thinking about. Conversely, the person who has no goal, who doesnt know where hes going, and whose thoughts must therefore be thoughts of confusion, anxiety, fear, and worry will thereby create a life of frustration, fear, anxiety and worry. And if he thinks about nothing he becomes nothing.

AS YE SOW and SO SHALLYE REAP

The human mind is much like a farmers land. The land gives the farmer a choice. He may plant in that land whatever he chooses. The land doesnt care what is planted. Its up to the farmer to make the decision. The mind, like the land, will return what you plant, but it doesnt care what you plant. If the farmer plants too seeds and one a seed of corn, the other nightshade, a deadly poison, waters and takes care of the land, what will happen?

Remember, the land doesnt care. It will return poison in just as wonderful abundance as it will corn. So up come the two plants and one corn, one poison as its written in the Bible, ?As ye sow, so shall ye reap.
The human mind is far more fertile, far more incredible and mysterious than the land, but it works the same way. It doesnt care what we plant success or failure. A concrete, worthwhile goal or confusion, misunderstanding, fear, anxiety, and so on. But what we plant it must return to us.

The problem is that our mind comes as standard equipment at birth. Its free. And things that are given to us for nothing, we place little value on. Things that we pay money for, we value.

The paradox is that exactly the reverse is true. Everything thats really worthwhile in life came to us free and our minds, our souls, our bodies, our hopes, our dreams, our ambitions, our intelligence, our love of family and children and friends and country. All these priceless possessions are free.

But the things that cost us money are actually very cheap and can be replaced at any time. A good man can be completely wiped out and make another fortune. He can do that several times. Even if our home burns down, we can rebuild it. But the things we got for nothing, we can never replace.

Our mind can do any kind of job we assign to it, but generally speaking, we use it for little jobs instead of big ones. So decide now. What is it you want? Plant your goal in your mind. Its the most important decision youll ever make in your entire life.
Do you want to excel at your particular job? Do you want to go places in your company in your community? Do you want to get rich? All you have got to do is plant that seed in your mind, care for it, work steadily toward your goal, and it will become a reality.

It not only will, theres no way that it cannot. You see, thats a law and like the laws of Sir Isaac Newton, the laws of gravity. If you get on top of a building and jump off, youll always go down and youll never go up.
And its the same with all the other laws of nature. They always work. Theyre inflexible. Think about your goal in a relaxed, positive way. Picture yourself in your minds eye as having already achieved this goal. See yourself doing the things you will be doing when you have reached your goal.

Every one of us is the sum total of our own thoughts. We are where we are because thats exactly where we really want or feel we deserve to be and whether well admit that or not. Each of us must live off the fruit of our thoughts in the future, because what you think today and tomorrow and next month and next year and will mold your life and determine your future.

Youre guided by your mind.
I remember one time I was driving through e a s t e r n Arizona and I saw one of those giant earthmoving machines roaring along the road with what looked like 30 tons of dirt in it and a tremendous, incredible machine and and there was a little man perched way up on top with the wheel in his hands, guiding it. As I drove along I was struck by the similarity of that machine to the human mind. Just suppose youre sitting at the controls of such a vast source of energy. Are you going to sit back and fold your arms and let it run itself into a ditch? Or are you going to keep both hands firmly on the wheel and control and direct this power to a specific, worthwhile purpose? Its up to you. Youre in the drivers seat. You see, the very law that gives us success is a doubleedged sword. We must control our thinking. The same rule that can lead people to lives of success, wealth, happiness, and all the things they ever dreamed of and that very same law can lead them into the gutter. Its all in how they use it for good or for bad. That is The Strangest Secret!

Do what the experts since the dawn of recorded history have told us to do: pay the price, by becoming the person you want to become. Its not nearly as difficult as living unsuccessfully.

The moment you decide on a goal to work toward, youre immediately a successful person and you are then in that rare group of people who know where theyre going. Out of every hundred people, you belong to the top five. Dont concern yourself too much with how you are going to achieve your goal and leave that completely to a power greater than yourself. All you have to do is know where youre going. The answers will come to you of their own accord, and at the right time.
Start today. You have nothing to lose and but you have your whole life to win.


30-DAYACTION IDEAS FOR PUTTING THE STRANGEST SECRET TO WORK FOR YOU

For the next 30-days follow each of these steps every day until you have achieved your goal.
1. Write on a card what it is you want more that anything else. It may be more money. Perhaps youd like to double your income or make a specific amount of money. It may be a beautiful home. It may be success at your job. It may be a particular position in life. It could be a more harmonious family.
Write down on your card specifically what it is you want. Make sure its a single goal and clearly defined. You neednt show it to anyone, but carry it with you so that you can look at it several times a day. Think about it in a cheerful, relaxed, positive way each morning when you get up, and immediately you have something to work for and something to get out of bed for, something to live for.
Look at it every chance you get during the day and just before going to bed at night. As you look at it, remember that you must become what you think about, and since youre thinking about your goal, you realize that soon it will be yours. In fact, its really yours the moment you write it down and begin to think about it.



2. Stop thinking about what it is you fear. Each time a fearful or negative thought comes into your mind, replace it with a mental picture of your positive and worthwhile goal. And there will come a time when youll feel like giving up. Its easier for a human being to think negatively than positively. Thats why only five percent are successful! You must begin now to place yourself in that group.
?Act as though it were impossible to fail, as Dorothea Brande said. No matter what your goal and if youve kept your goal before you every day and youll wonder and marvel at this new life youve found.

3. Your success will always be measured by the quality and quantity of service you render. Most people will tell you that they want to make money, without understanding this law. The only people who make money work in a mint. The rest of us must earn money. This is what causes those who keep looking for something for nothing, or a free ride, to fail in life. Success is not the result of making money; earning money is the result of success and and success is in direct proportion to our service.
Most people have this law backwards. Its like the man who stands in front of the stove and says to it: ?Give me heat and then Ill add the wood. How many men and women do you know, or do you suppose there are today, who take the same attitude toward life? There are millions.

Weve got to put the fuel in before we can expect heat. Likewise, weve got to be of service first before we can expect money. Dont concern yourself with the money. Be of service build work dream create! Do this and youll find there is no limit to the prosperity and abundance that will come to you.

Dont start your test until youve made up your mind to stick with it. If you should fail during your first 30 days and by that I mean suddenly find yourself overwhelmed by negative thoughts and simply start over again from that point and go 30 more days. Gradually, your new habit will form, until you find yourself one of that wonderful minority to whom virtually nothing is impossible.

Above all dont worry! Worry brings fear, and fear is crippling. The only thing that can cause you to worry during your test is trying to do it all yourself. Know that all you have to do is hold your goal before you; everything else will take care of itself.
Take this 30-day test, then repeat it then repeat it again. Each time it will become more a part of you until youll wonder how you could have ever have lived any other way. Live this new way and the floodgates of abundance will open and pour over you more riches than you may have dreamed existed. Money? Yes, lots of it. But whats more important, youll have peace youll be in that wonderful minority who lead calm, cheerful, successful lives.