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“How
to Develop Self-Confidence
In Speech and Manner” eBook Online Version
Few people realize how important a part imagination plays in the every-day matters of life. A business man endeavors to give a prospective customer a mental picture of his products, or of what they will do for him. The physician holds before his patient an image of what he will be and can do when well. The politician describes the condition of things as he would bring them about if elected. The public speaker illuminates and illustrates his subject chiefly by means of the imagination. So in every human activity the order is first the mental picture, then the act.
Only second in importance to the image-making faculty is that of initiative, or the power of originality. Many business and professional men acknowledge that, had they known what difficulties awaited them, they could not have gone forward so hopefully. But neither had they the courage to turn back once they had put their hand to the plow. The story of almost every successful man would be a recital of uphill work at first, with many obstacles to be met and overcome, disappointments to be bravely borne, new resolutions of determination made at the beginning of each day.
There are a thousand imitators to one who can originate. A man who is constantly watching to see what others are doing in order to steal their thunder, is not true to himself nor developing his best faculties. Nothing could be more belittling to one than the inner realization that he is a mere copyist, a make-believe. We should avail ourselves, it is true, of the experience and ideas of others, and frankly acknowledge our indebtedness to them, but we can not rightly call this material our own until we have put it through our mental process and stamped it with our individuality. Let a man take to heart these inspiring words of Emerson: "Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can present every moment with the cumulative force of a whole life's cultivation; but of the adopted talent of another you have only an extemporaneous half possession. That which each can do best, none but the Maker can teach him. No man yet knows what it is, nor can, till that person has exhibited it. Where is the master who could have taught Shakespeare? Where is the master who could have instructed Franklin, or Washington, or Bacon, or Newton? Every great man is unique. The Scipionism of Scipio is precisely that part he could not borrow. Another Shakespeare will never be made by the study of Shakespeare. Do that which is assigned you, and you can not hope too much or dare too much. There is at this moment for you an utterance brave and grand as that of the colossal chisel of Phidias, or trowel of the Egyptians, or the pen of Moses or Dante, but different from all these. Not possibly will the soul, all rich, all eloquent, with thousand-cloven tongue, deign to repeat itself; but if you can hear what these patriarchs say, surely you can reply to them in the same pitch of voice; for the ear and the tongue are two organs of one nature. Abide in the simple and noble regions of thy life, obey thy heart and thou shalt reproduce the foreworld again.''
When Shakespeare says, "To thine own self be true," he indicates the way to originality. Let a man first place in the gallery of his imagination only such pictures as he would care to see materialized in his life. Then let him go bravely forth, resolved to make these a living reality, and by dint of originality, initiative, and courage, wins an enduring place among successful men.
Chapter XIV
POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE THOUGHT
Precisely what does positive thinking mean? It means habitually to dwell upon the pleasant side of things, to see the good in others, and to encourage only thoughts that are helpful and constructive. Positive thought is aggressive in character, expressing itself in the real and substantial, as opposed to negative thought that seeks rather the disagreeable and destructive. The difference between men of these two types is as great as the opposite poles.
Let us illustrate this with a concrete example. A man of negative disposition begins the day in an unpleasant frame of mind. He is irritable, ill-natured, and the scowl on his face betokens a cloudy day. The first person who happens to run into him receives a look he is not likely soon to forget. The street-car conductor takes him a block past his office, and is openly reprimanded. Our crusty friend reaches his place of business, forgets to say "good-morning" to the office-boy, and plunges discontentedly into the work of the day. Everything goes wrong. The bookkeeper is stupid, the stenographer careless and inaccurate, and the office-boy slow. Orders haven't come in as they should, money is hard to collect, and the business is going to the dogs. The man goes to lunch, eats hurriedly, snaps at the waiter, and leaves his umbrella behind him. Back at the office again he resumes his grumbling, his unhappy mood communicates itself to every one around him, and the day is set down as a black Friday. When he reaches home that night, he is tired, discouraged, crotchety, and more irritable than ever. Such is the insidious and destructive power of negative thinking.
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