CHAPTER 5
The Inner Game of Self-Confidence
Confidence doesn’t come out of nowhere. It’s a result of something . . . hours and days and weeks and years of constant work and dedication. —Roger Staubach
Aristotle wrote in his famous Nichomachean Ethics that the common aim of mankind is to be happy, however each person defines happiness. One thing we know is that the more confident and the better we feel about ourselves, the happier we are and the more effective we seem to be in everything we do. Self-confidence, however, is really a state of mind based on your belief systems. Belief, or faith, enables you to act boldly in the face of uncertainty. Confidence enables you to face changes and difficulties and unexpected setbacks with calmness and clarity, and allows you to respond more effectively under any circumstances.
The Law of Belief-The law of belief, an important corollary of the law of cause and effect, says that “your beliefs become your realities.” You do not believe what you see, but you see what you believe. William James of Harvard said that “Belief creates the actual fact.” In the Bible, it says, “According to your belief, it is done unto you.” If you believe strongly enough and confidently enough, your outer world will tend to conform to a pattern consistent with these beliefs. In fact, your world today is largely an out-picturing of your innermost beliefs and convictions. You behave on the outside based on your beliefs on the inside. You see the world around you based on your beliefs about reality, regardless of whether they are correct.How can you determine you true beliefs? Simple. You can tell what you really believe by observing what you do and what you don’t do. You can tell what you believe by listening to your opinions, your conversations, and by noting your decisions. When you truly believe yourself to be an exceptional human being, possessed of remarkable capabilities, you will walk and talk and act that way, and your inner convictions will become your outer realities. As the Bible says, “All things are possible to him that believeth.”
The Power of Belief-There is a story about a man, many years ago, whose business was in serious trouble. He had lost some big sales, he was deeply in debt, and his suppliers and creditors were closing in on him. He didn’t know whether he should continue struggling or just declare bankruptcy and let his business fold. He decided to go for a walk in the park that evening to think it over and decide what to do. He was standing in the park on a small bridge looking down at the water, when an older man appeared out of the darkness. Seeing his downcast look, the older man stopped and demanded to know what the matter was. For some reason, the businessman told him about all his financial problems and how close his business was to collapsing, even though it was a good business and had a good potential future. The older man listened intently, and then said, “I think I can help you.” He pulled a checkbook out of his pocket, asked the man his name, and wrote out a check for him, pushed it into his hand, and said, “Take this money. Meet me here exactly one year from today and you can pay me back at that time.” Then, the older man turned and disappeared into the darkness.
The $500,000 Check-When the businessman returned to his office, he opened up the check and found that it was for $500,000. He thought it was just a joke until he read the signature. The signature read, “John D. Rockefeller.” He had received a check for half a million dollars from the richest man in the world, at that time, the man who had formed the Standard Oil Company and who was well known for giving money away to others. At first, he thought he would cash the check and solve all his financial problems. But then he decided that instead, he would put the check in his safe, knowing that he could draw upon it any time. He would use this knowledge of having this amount of money to deal more confidently with his suppliers and creditors, and to turn his business around. With renewed enthusiasm, he plunged back into his business and made deals, negotiated settlements, extended terms of payment, and closed several large sales. Within a few months, his business was back on top, out of debt, and making money.
The Man on the Bridge-One year later, he went back to the bridge in the park with the uncashed check still in his hand. He could hardly wait to tell the older man what had happened. At exactly the agreed time, the older man emerged from the darkness once more. Just as the businessman was about to give him back his check and tell him his exciting story of success and achievement over the previous 12 months, a nurse came running out of the darkness up to the old man and grabbed his arm. She apologized to the businessman, saying, “I’m so glad I caught him. I hope he hasn’t been bothering you. He’s always escaping from the rest home and going around telling people that he is John D. Rockefeller.” She took the old man’s arm and led him away. The businessman just stood there, stunned. All year long he had been wheeling and dealing, buying and selling, and building his business with the calm, confident knowledge that he had a $500,000 check in his safe that he could cash at any time. It suddenly dawned on him that he had made his business successful based on his beliefs, even though the information on which his beliefs were based was false. It had been his self-confidence in action that was responsible for the turnaround in his affairs.
First Convince Yourself-First Convince Yourself Your job is to achieve the same level of confidence and belief as that possessed by that businessman. The world will largely accept you at your own estimation. It is yourself that you have to convince, before you can convince anyone else. But once you are absolutely sure that you have what it takes to master any situation, you will act in such a way that your beliefs will become your reality. We are really talking here about what we call mental fitness or the hardy, resilient personality. Mental fitness is subject to the law of cause and effect. You can develop the kind of unshakable self-confidence that you desire by simply repeating certain thoughts and actions over and over, until they are driven deep into your subconscious mind and take on a power of their own. You can build your level of mental fitness just as you would build your level of physical fitness by working on your “mental muscles” in a specific way until they are as strong and effective as you want.
The Power of Suggestion-Perhaps the most powerful influence in determining your mental and emotional state at any time is the power of suggestion. The power of suggestion begins influencing you even before you are born, and continues from infancy and throughout your life, making you the kind of person you are today. Experts say that fully 95 percent of what you do, say, think, and feel is determined by environmental and psychological suggestive influences around you. For example, the average person is so susceptible to suggestive influences, that a rude word from another person may cause him or her to be upset and angry for hours. On the other hand, a kind word of praise or recognition may cause him or her to be positive and happy for the rest of the day. We are all very susceptible to the suggestive influences that surround us.
Control Your Suggestive Environment-To enjoy high levels of self-confidence, you must be able to make up your own mind and free yourself from any influences that cause you to feel negative or unhappy for any reason. You must take full control over your own thinking and over your own suggestive environment, making sure that what you are allowing into your mind is consistent with the things you want and the person you want to be. And you must work to keep out all other influences. There are three forms of suggestion that can determine how you feel about yourself and how you think. The first is called external suggestion. These are all the activities that go on around you, from the moment you get up in the morning until your last communication or information input in the evening. Depending on how open and receptive you are, you can be inordinately influenced by television, radio, newspaper, the Internet, conversations, work experiences, feedback from superiors, interactions with members of your family, even problems in traffic or changes of temperature on the outside. The great majority of people allow much of their lives to be determined by what is going on around them; they convince themselves that they are thinking independently, whereas they are merely reacting to whatever happens instead.
Control Your Emotions-This is why the negative emotions that upset and disturb you are usually unconscious, unthinking reactions that are triggered by external events. We know this is true because no one would consciously and deliberately decide to feel negative, angry, or upset. When people are in control of their emotions, they choose to feel happy. For example, one of the most common expressions of negative emotions has to do with what are called conditioned responses. These are automatic responses that we engage in when somebody pushes one of our hot buttons. A hot button is a habitual negative way of reacting to an experience or to something that someone says. Each person has a series of these buttons, and when we know a person well, especially in an intimate relationship, we know just what buttons to push to get whatever reactions we want. When one of your buttons is pushed, such as when someone mentions someone or something that you feel very strongly about, you respond with anger and defensiveness. If you hate to get cut off in traffic and somebody cuts you off inadvertently, your hot button will be triggered and you will be talking angrily to yourself and to anyone else who will listen for the foreseeable future.
Think Before You React-One of the ways to take control of your mind is to identify, in advance, the various external factors that cause you to become angry or upset. Make a list of everything that happens that might cause you have a tendency to respond negatively. Then, consciously make the decision that, in the future, when one of these issues comes up, you will instead respond calmly and positively and not allow yourself to become upset and angry. Each time something happens that would normally trigger a negative response from you, consciously decide not to respond or not to react in any way. Smile, take a deep breath and remain calm. The more you practice this, the easier it will become. You will become more positive and optimistic. Your self-confidence will go up and you will feel more in charge of your own life. You will begin to free yourself from being a slave to external suggestions that control your mental state.
The Power of Self-Suggestion-The second form of suggestion is called “self-suggestion.” “Self-suggestion” is when you put both hands on the controls of your own mental life, or step up to the keyboard of your own mental computer, and consciously program your subconscious mind with the thoughts and feelings that you desire. Selfsuggestion is your key to building the kind of belief system deep within yourself that leads to unshakable self-confidence. The reason that selfsuggestion works so well is because of the law of substitution.The law of substitution says that your conscious mind can only hold one thought at a time; positive or negative. If you consciously choose to hold a positive word or picture in your mind, you simultaneously block out the various inputs from external sources that might cause your thinking and feeling to be negative or inconsistent with your true desires. For example, if, whenever you begin to feel tense or uneasy or angry about something, you switch your mind and start thinking about your goals, your mind will switch from negative to positive instantly, and you will feel good about yourself again. The thought of a goal, which is positive and futureoriented, is inherently uplifting. You cannot think about your goal and be upset or angry at the same time. By using the law of substitution, you take full control over your suggestive environment, and over the information that reaches your subconscious mind.
Make Self-Control into a Game- When something negative or unexpected happens to you, immediately seize the moment as an opportunity to demonstrate calmness and self-control. Make it a game. Instead of allowing yourself to feel negative, deliberately force yourself to substitute something positive. Here is an affirmation that has been very helpful to me. I repeat it over and over until it becomes automatic, in almost every situation. When something goes wrong, I immediately catch myself by saying, “Every situation is a positive situation if viewed as an opportunity for growth and self-mastery.” Whatever it is, I take a deep breath, relax, smile, and say, “Every situation is a positive situation if viewed as an opportunity for growth and selfmastery.” I then look within the situation for something that I can learn that will help me to grow and develop greater self-mastery. This is a simple “mind game” that enables me to stay relaxed and in control of my emotions. It will work for you, as well. Just give it a try.
The Power of Autosuggestion-Autosuggestion takes place when you have repeated messages to your subconscious mind so often that they take on a power of their own. They function automatically. We have found continually that happy, optimistic people have programmed themselves to respond in a happy and optimistic way to almost every situation. You can do the same thing. All of life is bound up and determined by your responses. It is not what happens to you, but how you react to what happens to you that counts. It is not the cards that you are dealt, but the way you play the cards that determines how well you do in the game of life. Your job is to consciously decide to use your willpower to keep your mind clear and to keep yourself positive and functioning at your best.
A Quick Review- In Chapter 1, we talked about how important it is for your self-confidence for you to have clear values and to organize your life so that it is consistent with those values. In Chapter 2, we talked about the importance of having goals for every part of your life and assuring that your goals and your values are congruent. In Chapter 3, we talked about how important it is for you to commit yourself to achieving mastery in your chosen field, consistent with your goals and values. In this chapter, you will learn a series of mental-fitness techniques that you can use to program your subconscious mind. You will learn how to develop the absolute conviction and confidence that you can achieve anything you set your mind to, and you will learn how to make this self-confident response an automatic reaction to anything that happens.
Take Charge of Your Life- The starting point of taking full control over your conscious and your subconscious mind is for you to accept complete responsibility for everything that you think, say, and do. You are responsible for whatever happens to you, and especially you are responsible for your responses to the inevitable ups and downs of daily life. As Eleanor Roosevelt said, “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” I used to think that setting goals and making plans was the starting point of success in life. After a while, I changed my mind because I realized that something else actually comes first. What comes first is the acceptance of complete responsibility for yourself and for everything that happens to you. Real maturity begins when you finally realize that no-one is coming to the rescue. It is only when you accept total responsibility for your life situation, with no excuses and no blaming of others, that you move into a mental position to kick the long ball in your own life. It is only when you have accepted 100 percent responsibility for yourself that you are ready to take the next step and decide exactly what it is you want and exactly what it is you want to do. Accepting responsibility is not an option that is open to the individual. It is mandatory. It is an absolute fact of human existence. You do not have the luxury of blaming others or making excuses for parts of your life that are not satisfactory. As Henry Ford II said, “Never complain, never explain.” No one makes you do anything or feel anything. You are where you are and what you are because you have decided to be there. Everything that you are or ever will be is entirely up to you. If there is any effect in your life that you’re not happy about, it is solely up to you to change the causes. You are completely responsible.
Actions Have Consequences-Fully mature people accept that their actions have consequences. A fully functioning adult knows that he or she can choose an action, but once the action is taken, both predictable and unpredictable consequences will follow. The true adult accepts that for every cause, there will be an effect. For every action, there will be a reaction. You can choose the action, before you act, but you cannot choose or control the consequence or reaction afterward. Intelligent adults are very careful about the thoughts they think and the actions that they take. They do not fool themselves or engage in self-delusion. They don’t pretend that things might happen differently, nor do they trust to luck. Inactions also have consequences. What are called “crimes of omission” are often more serious to your long-term prospects than the mistakes you make. Omitting to think through your values, set clear goals, make plans, commit to excellence, and so on, can be disastrous to your possibilities of great success.
Problems versus Facts- The starting point of success is the acceptance of reality. “What cannot be cured must be endured.” Often people will come to me with challenges they are facing, and I will ask them this simple question. “Is this a problem or is this a fact?” If it’s a problem, it’s amenable to a solution. There is something that you can do to change it. If you are not happy with the situation, it is up to you to go and do whatever you can to resolve it. A fact, however, is different from a problem. It is something that exists, like the weather, like rain or snow. There is nothing that you can do about it. You can solve problems, but the reality principle says that you have to learn to live with facts. Something unfortunate that has happened is a fact. A sale that did not go through, a business deal that collapsed, a relationship that didn’t work out— all of these are facts. Many people waste an enormous amount of emotional energy struggling with facts when they would be much better off concentrating on doing better in the future.
Accepting Responsibility Is the Beginning- Your goal is to be happy, confident, and optimistic. The way that you achieve this is by making these positive responses so automatic that you remain predominantly happy, confident, and optimistic, no matter what happens. You can achieve this result by taking specific, proven, practical steps, that have been used by millions of people and which work with virtually unfailing certainty. The starting point is accepting complete responsibility for every aspect of your life.
Control Your Thoughts- You demonstrate this attitude of responsibility by exerting your freedom to choose the thoughts you wish to hold in your conscious mind. You choose to think positive, constructive thoughts rather than negative, destructive thoughts. Psychologists refer to this as the cognitive-control method. Cognitive control simply means that you control your thoughts, keep them positive, and repeat positive messages to yourself over and over until they become automatic responses to daily life.
Positive Self-Talk- The first mental-fitness technique is that of positive self-talk or the use of positive affirmations. The way you talk to yourself has an inordinate impact on your thinking and feeling. Many researchers, including Dr. Martin Seligman of the University of Pennsylvania, have discovered that highperforming men and women talk to themselves differently from lowperforming men and women. Basically, your self-talk, or your inner dialogue, determines the tone of your emotional life. You are happy or sad, positive or negative, depending on what you say to yourself and how you interpret events to yourself as you go along. For example, if you are cut off in traffic and you immediately become angry and begin thinking about how stupid and irresponsible and what a bad driver the other person is, you will trigger a very different reaction than if, when you are cut off in traffic, you excuse the other person by thinking to yourself that he or she must be late, distracted, or must not have seen you. It may be exactly the same external event, but the way you interpret it and your ensuing conversation with yourself will determine whether you experience positive or negative emotions about the situation.
Your Interpretive Style-The starting point of using positive self-talk is to interpret everything that happens to you in a favorable way. Become what W. Clement Stone called an “inverse paranoid.” Imagine that the whole world is in a giant conspiracy to help you to be successful and happy. Imagine that everything that happens is happening to teach you something valuable and to move you closer to achieving your most important goals. Just as a paranoid is convinced that there is a conspiracy against him, an inverse paranoid is convinced that there is a conspiracy for him or her. Practice the wonderful mental quality of serendipity. In the fairy tale, the three princes of Serendip traveled around finding that every apparently negative or calamitous event they witnessed turned out to be positive and beneficial in the end. Make it a game to look for the good in every situation.
Practice Positive Expectations- The law of expectations says that whatever you expect, with confidence, becomes your own self-fulfilling prophecy. When you develop an attitude of positive self-expectancy, you become a more optimistic and cheerful person. Whatever happens, you immediately interpret it in the best way possible. In Napoleon Hill’s famous book, Think and Grow Rich (Tribeca Books, 2010), he wrote that one of the characteristics of the most successful men and women in America is that they always look for the opportunity or benefit within every setback or obstacle. Because of the law of substitution, if you are looking into every difficult situation for the lesson you can learn or for the possible opportunity it might contain, your mind will remain positive and you will continue to function at your best.
Talk to Yourself Positively- Whenever you think of an upcoming event, talk to yourself in positive language. Perhaps the most powerful affirmation of all for building selfconfidence is for you to repeat, over and over, 50–100 times per day, the words, “I can do it! I can do it! I can do it!” These simple words are the verbal antidote to the fear of failure, which, as you know, is the great destroyer of self-confidence and probably the primary reason for failure in adult life. However, you can diminish the fear of failure in any situation by repeating, “I can do it! I can do it! I can do it!” Whenever you think of an event that causes you to feel nervous or insecure, whenever you have something coming up that fills you with trepidation, exert your powers of self-talk and self-suggestion by saying, “I can do it!” to cancel out and override any negative emotions associated with it.
Control Your Thoughts and Feelings- The most powerful affirmation for building self-esteem are the words, “I like myself! I like myself! I like myself!” These simple words, repeated often enough, with energy and enthusiasm, will eventually be accepted by your subconscious mind. As your subconscious mind accepts this message of self-liking, your self-esteem goes up and your ability to perform and your levels of effectiveness improve in every area of your life. If you want to do your work better, just say, “I love my job! I love my job! I love my job!” In their best-selling book, Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude (Pocket Books, 2007), W. Clement Stone and Napoleon Hill recommend that you repeat, several times a day, the words, “I feel happy! I feel healthy! I feel terrific!” One of my favorite affirmations, whenever I’m worried about anything, is to cancel it by saying, “I believe in the perfect outcome of every situation in my life. I believe in the perfect outcome of every situation in my life.” You will find that it is almost impossible to worry and fret about anything while you are repeating this kind of positive message to yourself.
Unlimited Potential -Your potential is unlimited using affirmations. Remember that affirmations are a way of programming your subconscious mind. By repeated affirmations, you can instill within your mind powerful, positive commands that will eventually determine your automatic thoughts, feelings, and responses. In order for affirmations to work, they must be phrased using the three Ps. They must be in the present tense, positive, and personal. The affirmations, “I can do it! I like myself! I feel terrific!” are all positive, present tense, and personal. The subconscious is very literal in nature and can only accept commands phrased in the present tense. For some reason, it ignores negative commands and focuses only on the positive message. If a person says, “I will not smoke again,” the subconscious mind drops out the “will” and “not” and only accepts the message, “I smoke again. I smoke again.” It is better to say, “I am a nonsmoker.” The subconscious can form a clear picture of a nonsmoker and will eventually adjust a person’s habits and tastes to the point where they stop smoking altogether. You can create affirmations for each of your goals, and by repeating them continually, you program them deeper into your subconscious mind until they take on a power of their own. You then find yourself automatically motivated to do the things necessary to achieve them.
Written Affirmations-The second technique you can use to keep your mind positive and to achieve your goals faster, is to write out your goals in the form of affirmations on 3 × 5 index cards. Write them in large black letters, and then read and reread the cards several times each day, reciting the affirmation to yourself each time. This and every other method or technique that you use to convince yourself that your goal is achievable will also help to build your self-esteem and selfconfidence. This attitude or belief will cause you to take the specific actions that will eventually make your goals a reality.
Practice Visualization- The third technique for building self-confidence is the use of positive visualization. This is the process of creating clear mental pictures of the person that you want to be, doing the things you want to do, and achieving the goals you want to achieve. Because your subconscious mind cannot tell the difference between a real experience and one that you vividly imagine, it will give you the thoughts and feelings that would accompany your realization of your mental pictures. What determines the impact of visualization is the amount of emotion that you combine with the picture when you hold it in your conscious mind for reception by your subconscious. The more emotion with which you visualize, the faster the visualization will emerge in your reality.
Mental Rehearsal-An effective way of visualizing is a peak performance technique called “mental rehearsal.” In mental rehearsal, you go through an upcoming event in your mind, detail by detail, and imagine it happening perfectly, with you being completely successful in the end. Prior to any event of importance, you recall and relive a previous experience where you performed well. You take a few moments to replay in your mind a picture of the last time you did this particular activity successfully. If you have to write an exam of any kind, take a few moments to close your eyes, breathe deeply, and see yourself writing the exam easily, knowing all the answers. If you have to make a sales call, take a few moments prior to the sales call, close your eyes and see yourself in the sales call, perfectly relaxed, positive, calm, and in complete control. See the prospect or customer responding positively toward you and signing the contract or check at the end of your visit. If you have an interview coming up, take a few moments to rehearse the interview in your mind. Go through every stage of it, see yourself performing at your very best, and visualize the other person responding to you in a positive and productive way.
Improve Your Mental Pictures-All improvement in your life begins with an improvement in your mental pictures. If you want to wear beautiful clothes, you should purchase and read magazines filled with pictures of models wearing the kind of clothes you desire. Visit clothing stores of the very best quality and try on clothes that you eventually want to own. Flood your mind with pictures and sensations of the reality that you desire to experience. If you want to drive a better car, go and test-drive exactly the automobile that you desire. Get the brochure on the car and put pictures of the car all over your house or apartment. A friend of mine used this exact technique to get his dream car. He cut out a picture of the new BMW he wanted and put it on the steering wheel of his car. Each time he looked down, he imagined he was already driving his dream car. Within one year he had it. When you take your desired car for a test drive, fill your senses with every detail of the automobile. Touch it and smell it and look at the upholstery and the dashboard and the interior design. Your main job is to get a clear picture for your subconscious to go to work on.
Get Your Dream House-If you wish to live in a nicer home, go out to open houses in the neighborhood that you desire to live in. Walk through the homes and imagine living there. Don’t worry for the moment whether it is possible or how high the prices are. Your primary job is simply to “get the picture.” Get magazines filled with pictures of beautiful homes and read them from cover to cover. Practice the law of concentration by allowing your mind to dwell on the things you want over and over. Especially, get the feeling. The key to activating your mental powers through affirmation and visualization is for you to also imagine exactly how you would feel if you had already achieved your goal. Imagine the feelings of pride and happiness and self-esteem that you would enjoy as a result of obtaining your objectives. This emotional component is the catalyst that causes the other mental programming techniques to work more rapidly.
The End of the Movie-One of the best methods for programming your mind and building your beliefs is what is called the end-of-the-movie exercise. This is a tremendous tool for building self-confidence prior to any upcoming situation. It is very simple. Imagine that you have gone to a movie only to find that there are 10 minutes left of the movie before it begins again. Instead of waiting in the lobby, you decide to go into the theater and watch the last 10 minutes. You see how the plot works itself out, how the drama is resolved and how the movie ends satisfactorily. You then wait for a few minutes and when the movie starts again, you watch the movie from the beginning. Only now, however, you know that it turns out all right. You know how each part of the plot eventually resolves itself satisfactorily. Instead of becoming caught up in the drama and uncertainty and tension, you simply relax, peacefully, knowing how it all turns out at the end of the movie. You can apply this same technique to almost everything you do. You can manufacture your own self-confidence by imagining that no matter what your situation, everything turns out perfectly in the end. Create that “end of the movie” feeling in yourself whenever you think of an upcoming event or problem that causes you any tension or insecurity at all. Prior to a meeting or a sales call or an interview, take a few moments to get that “end of the movie” feeling. Then, just relax. No matter what happens in the interim, you don’t have to worry at all. You already know that the situation resolves itself with good for all concerned. The interesting thing is that if you do this repeatedly, not only will you experience higher levels of self-confidence, but events in your life will have a tendency to turn out as well or better than you could have asked for or expected.
Feed Your Mind-The fourth mental fitness technique, and another way to build your selfconfidence, is to continually feed your mind with books, magazines, and audio programs containing positive and uplifting messages. Just as you become what you eat, you do become what you think about, as well. Everything that you take into your conscious mind, positive or negative, is either raising or lowering your self-esteem or self-confidence. To practice “cognitive control,” you must be consciously aware of the suggestive influences around you and make every effort to assure that they are positive and consistent with your goals and desires.
Get Around Positive People- One of the most powerful suggestive influences in your life, perhaps the single influence that decides your success or failure more than any other controllable factor, is the kind of people that you associate with on a regular basis. The fifth technique to keep yourself confident and optimistic is to be around positive people, and get away from negative people. Fly with the eagles, rather than scratching with the turkeys. Resolve today to get the negative people out of your life. Because you are so inordinately influenced by other people—the people you work with and socialize with and spend time with—you must do everything to assure that you are surrounded by the kind of people you like, enjoy, and who make you feel good. Research has shown that habitual association with critical, complaining people can be enough by itself to sabotage all your chances for success and happiness. Negative people drag you down. They rob you of energy and enthusiasm.
Attract Positive People into Your Life- Fortunately, the law of attraction works very quickly when applied to people.You can begin to change your human environment by beginning, first of all, to think about the kind of people that you admire and want to be like. Think about the men and women, living or dead, whose qualities you respect and whose lives you would like to emulate. Read stories and biographies of successful men and women. Read magazine articles and interviews with people who are going somewhere with their lives. Begin associating with winners by first identifying with them mentally. As you think about people you admire, you will experience a subtle change in your thought patterns. As a result, you will begin to attract positive people into your life. At the same time, you will activate the law of repulsion, and negative people will start to move away from you. Just as positive, goal-oriented people will start to find you interesting, as you become a more positive person, negative people will tend to find you unenjoyable and uninteresting. In no time at all, your human environment will begin to change for the better.
Everything Counts-By the way, if all these exercises in mental programming seem like a lot of work, remember that both actions and inactions have consequences. Like the law of sowing and reaping, whatever you sow, or fail to sow, is going to determine what you reap in the end. The law of accumulation reminds us that everything counts. Every positive step you take is moving you toward building a great life for yourself. Every positive word or thought or image is deepening your belief and increasing your confidence in your ability to achieve wonderful things. Finally, remember the law of reversibility. If you act in a manner consistent with high performance and high self-confidence, those very actions will generate the feelings consistent with them. Every positive, constructive action that you take in the direction of your dreams and goals will reinforce your belief in yourself and in your ability to accomplish your ideals.
Take Action Continually-Keep your vision clearly before you and take continuous positive action, every hour and every day. Develop a sense of urgency. Move quickly when opportunity presents itself. Maintain a bias for action. Fast tempo is essential to success. And the faster you move, the better you will feel. The faster you move, the more energy you will have. And the faster you move, the higher will be your self-esteem and self-confidence. The world can really be divided into two categories, the talkers and the doers. The world is full of talkers who seem to be convinced that if they talk about it enough it is the same as actually doing it. But you are a doer, and it is always the doers who have been the movers and shakers throughout human history. It is the men and women who think, plan, and then take consistent, persistent action, who make things happen. When you engage in continuous action, not only will you feel terrific about yourself, but your ability to do whatever you want to do will grow by leaps and bounds. You will eventually become unstoppable! Action Exercises
1. Create a clear, exciting mental picture of your most important goal as if it already existed, in every detail.
2. Each day, act as if you were already the positive, self-confident, successful person that you are going to be.
3. Practice “mental rehearsal” prior to every event of importance. Close your eyes, take a deep breath, create a mental picture of complete success, and get the feeling of calmness and confidence you desire.
4. Resolve today to accept complete responsibility for your life, for everything you are today, and for everything that you will ever be in the future.
5. Write your main goals on 3 × 5-inch cards and review them twice each day until they are programmed deeply into your subconscious mind.
6. Make a decision to associate only with positive people, and get the negative people out of your life.
7. Feed your mind daily with a steady stream of positive books, audios, conversations, and other suggestive influences that are consistent with the best person you could possibly be....
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