Kahlil Gibran - The Prosperity & Wealth Bible

The secret of power is in understanding the infinite resources of your own mind. When you begin to realize that the power to do anything, to be anything, to have anything, is within yourself, then and then only will you take your proper place in the world.

As Bruce Barton has it in “The Man Whom Nobody Knows” — “Somewhere, at some unforgettable hour, the daring filled His (Jesus) heart. He knew that He was bigger than Nazareth.”

Again in speaking of Abraham Lincoln, Barton says — “Inside himself he felt his power, but where and when would opportunity come?” And later in the book —

“But to every man of vision the clear voice speaks. Nothing splendid has ever been achieved except by those who dared believe that something inside them was superior to circumstance.”

No doubt Jesus’ friends and neighbors all ridiculed the idea of any such power within Him. Just as most people today laugh at the thought of a power such as that within themselves.

So they go on with their daily grind, with the gaunt specters of sickness and need ever by their side, until death comes as a welcome relief. Are you going to be one of those? Or will you listen to that inner consciousness of power and find the “Kingdom of Heaven that is within you.” For whatever you become conscious of, will be quickly brought forth into tangible form.

Don’t judge your ability by what you have done in the past. Your work heretofore has been done with the help of your conscious mind alone. Add to that the infinite knowledge at the disposal of your subconscious mind, and what you have done is as nothing to what you will do in the future.

For knowledge does not apply itself. It is merely so much static energy. You must convert it into dynamic energy by the power of your thought. The difference between the $25-a-week clerk and the $25,000-a-year executive is solely one of thought. The clerk may have more brains than the executive — frequently has in actual weight of gray matter. He may even have a far better education. But he doesn’t know how to apply his thought to get the greatest good from it.

If you have brains, use them. If you have skill, apply it. The world must profit by it, and therefore you.

We all have inspired moments when we see clearly how we may do great things, how we may accomplish wonderful undertakings. But we do not believe in them enough to make them come true. An imagination, which begins and ends in daydreaming, is weakening to character.

Make the daydreams come true. Make them so clear and distinct that they impress themselves upon your subconscious mind. There’s nothing wrong with daydreaming, except that most of us stop there. We don’t try to make the dreams come true. The great inventor, Tesla, “dreams” every new machine complete and perfect in every particular before ever he begins his model for it. Mozart “dreamed” each of his wonderful symphonies complete before ever he put a note on paper. But they didn’t stop with the dreaming. They visualized those dreams, and then brought them into actuality.

We lose our capacity to have visions if we do not take steps to realize them.

Power implies service, so concentrate all your thought on making your visions of great deeds come true. Thinking is the current that runs the dynamo of power. To connect up this current so that you can draw upon universal supply through your subconscious mind is to become a Super-man. Do this, and you will have found the key to the solution of every problem of life.

Chapter 18 — This One Thing I Do

How did the Salvation Army get so much favorable publicity out of the War? They were a comparatively small part of the “Services” that catered to the boys “over there,” yet they carried off the lion’s share of the glory. Do you know how they did it?

By concentrating on just one thing — DOUGHNUTS!

They served doughnuts to the boys — and they did it well. And that is the basis of all success in business — to focus on one thing and do that thing well. Better far to do one thing pre-eminently well than to dabble in forty.

Two thousand years ago, Porcius Marcus Cato became convinced, from a visit to the rich and flourishing city of Carthage, that Rome had in her a rival who must be destroyed. His countrymen laughed at him. He was practically alone in his belief. But he persisted. He concentrated all his thought, all his faculties, to that one end. At the end of every speech, at the end of every talk, he centered his hearers’ thought on what he was trying to put over by epitomizing his whole idea in a single sentence — “Carthage must be destroyed!” And Carthage was destroyed. If one man’s concentration on a single idea could destroy a great nation, what can you not do when you apply that same principle to the building of a business?

I remember when I was first learning horsemanship, my instructor impressed this fact upon me: “Remember that a horse is an animal of one idea. You can teach him only one thing at a time.”

Looking back, I’d say the only thing wrong with his instruction was that he took in too little territory. He need not have confined himself to the horse. Most humans are the same way.

In fact, you can put ALL humans into that class if you want a thing done well. For you cannot divide your thought and do justice to any one of the different subjects you are thinking of. You’ve got to do one thing at a time. The greatest success rule I know in business — the one that should be printed over every man’s desk, is — “This One Thing I Do.” Take one piece of work at a time. Concentrate on it to the exclusion of all else. Then finish it! Don’t half-do it, and leave it around to clutter up your desk and interfere with the next job. Dispose of it completely. Pass it along wherever it is to go. Be through with it and forget it! Then your mind will be clear to consider the next matter.

“The man who is Perpetually hesitating which of two things he will do first,” says William Wirt, “will do neither. The man who resolves, but suffers his resolution to be changed by the first counter-suggestion of a friend — who fluctuates from plan to plan and veers like a weather-cock to every point of the compass with every breath of caprice that blows — can never accomplish anything real or useful. It is only the man who first consults wisely, then resolves firmly, and then executes his purpose with inflexible perseverance, undismayed by those petty difficulties that daunt a weaker spirit, that can advance to eminence in any line.”

Everything in the world, even a great business, can be resolved into atoms. And the basic principles behind the biggest business will be found to be the same as those behind the successful running of the corner newsstand. The whole practice of commerce is founded upon them. Any man can learn them, but only the alert and energetic can apply them. The trouble with most men is that they think they have done all that is required of them when they have earned their salary.

Why, that’s only the beginning. Up to that point, you are working for someone else. From then on, you begin to work for yourself. Remember, you must give to get and it is when you give that extra bit of time and attention and thought to your work that you begin to stand out above the crowd around you.

Norval Hawkins, for many years General Manager of Sales for the Ford Motor Company, wrote, “the greatest hunt in the Ford business right now is the MAN hunt.” And big men in every industrial line echo his words. ‘When it comes to a job that needs real ability, they are not looking for relatives or friends or men with “pull.” They want a MAN — and they will pay any price for the right man.