One of my all-time favorite books is “Think and Grow Rich” by Napoleon Hill. It was written in 1937 and, since its release, more than 200 million copies have been sold. The book has been translated to more than 100 languages and has also been considered as the bestselling self-help book and the sixth bestselling paperback book of all time. It has inspired millions of ordinary people to extraordinary achievements. And recently, a “Think and Grow Rich” has become a movie. I highly recommend you both the book and the movie.
Over a 20-year period, Napoleon Hill interviewed more than 500 people and found common traits in their success stories. In this post and in next week’s post, I want to share with you THE 13 PRINCIPLES THAT HILL CONSIDERED AS THE KEY INGREDIENTS OF A SUCCESSFUL LIFE.
1. DESIRE. It’s the first principle. Every big achievement starts with a burning desire. The first step to achieving success is wanting something and yearning for it; it’s the desire to become successful. The desire is the most powerful motivation that a human being can have. As Napoleon Hill emphasizes, growing rich doesn’t happen with wishing, it happens with a strong, intense, and obsessive desire that is transformed into hard work.
“The starting point of all achievement is desire. Keep this constantly in mind. Weak desire brings weak results, just as a small fire makes a small amount of heat.”
2. FAITH. Faith is the belief in something before acting and working on it. No human can work seriously on something they don’t believe in and imagine how decisive faith can be when that something is successful. Napoleon Hill defines faith as “a state of mind which may be induced, or created, by affirmation, or repeated instructions to the subconscious mind, through the principles of autosuggestion”.The only way to increase faith is by, what Hill explains as. Without faith, it’s almost impossible to reach our goals and dreams.
“Repetition of affirmation of orders to your subconscious mind is the only known method of voluntary development of the emotion of faith”.
3. AUTOSUGGESTION. Every person who has great dreams, more than often will be told that their dreams are unachievable. Unfortunately, most people and circumstances around us keep suggesting (directly or indirectly) that our wishes and objectives are hard to attain. For this reason, Hill explains that we must continuously communicate with our minds to eliminate all these negative comments that can be in our minds. And we need to keep telling ourselves that we are going to reach our objectives.
“Your ability to use the principle of autosuggestion will depend, very largely, upon your capacity to concentrate upon a given desire until that desire becomes a burning obsession.”
4. SPECIALIZED KNOWLEDGE. Hill considers knowledge as a very important ingredient in success. But he also explains that knowledge alone it’s not sufficient. He discovered that, in most of the successful people he interviewed and analyzed, what was important was what he explained as “specialized” knowledge because according to him, general knowledge couldn’t make a huge difference in growing rich. By specialized knowledge, he means knowledge that can be applied to a concrete situation and very related to skills.
“An educated person is not necessarily one who has an abundance of general or specialized knowledge. Educated people have developed the faculties of their minds so that they may acquire anything they want, or its equivalent, without violating the rights of others.”
5. IMAGINATION. In this sense, Napoleon Hill points out the importance of imagination. But he explains that not all kinds of imagination, but what he calls creative imagination. And by creative imagination, Hill considers the combination of skills and knowledge in a special way that’s different from any other. He discovered that people who used creative imagination and knew how to apply them were able to achieve all their dreams.
“All the breaks you need in life wait within your imagination, imagination is the warship of your mind, capable of turning mind energy into accomplishment and wealth.”
6. ORGANIZED PLANNING. To deliver greats results you need to have a plan. You need to put your ideas, your imagination, your desire in a precise and realistic plan. It’s the only way to transform your motivation into growth and success. So, you’ll have to clearly define your objectives and what do you need to do to reach the objectives. Hill highlights the importance of having a plan with this explanation:
“95% of people who have (and daily refer to) written goals end up accomplishing them and 95% of people who do not have written goals, do not accomplish much of anything”.
In the next post I explain to you the following 7 principles of Napoleon Hill to have a successful life …
