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Initiative Psychic Energy - Warren Hilton · Your Psychic Powers and How to Develop Them

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Speaker 1: Chapter one of Initiative Psychic Energy by Warren Hilton. This
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Speaker 1: is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the
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Speaker 1: public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit
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Speaker 1: LibriVox dot org. Recording by Andrea Fiori. Initiative Psychic Energy
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Speaker 1: by Warren Hilton, Chapter one Mental second wind. Are you
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Speaker 1: an unusually persevering and persistent person, or, like most of us,
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Speaker 1: do you sometimes find it difficult to stick to the
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Speaker 1: job until it is done? What is your usual experience
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Speaker 1: in this respect? Is it not this that you work
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Speaker 1: steadily along until all of a sudden you become conscious
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Speaker 1: of a feeling of weariness, crying enough for the time being,
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Speaker 1: and then you yield to the impulse to stop. Assuming
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Speaker 1: that this is what generally happens, does this feeling of fatigue,
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Speaker 1: this impulse to rest, mean that your mental energy is exhausted.
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Speaker 1: Suppose that, by a determined effort of the will, you
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Speaker 1: force your lagging brain to take up the threat of work.
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Speaker 1: There will invariably come a new supply of energy, a
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Speaker 1: second wind, enabling you to forge ahead with a freshness
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Speaker 1: and vigor that is surprising after the previous lassitude nor
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Speaker 1: is this all. The same process may be repeated a
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Speaker 1: second time and a third time, each new effort of
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Speaker 1: the will being followed by a renewal of energy. Many
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Speaker 1: a man will tell you that he does his best
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Speaker 1: work in the wee watches of the morning, after tedious
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Speaker 1: hours of persevering but fruitless effort. Instead of being exhausted
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Speaker 1: by its long hours a persistent endeavor, the mind seems
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Speaker 1: now to rise to the acme of its power to
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Speaker 1: achieve its supreme accomplishments. Difficulties melt into thin air, Profound
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Speaker 1: problems find easy solution, Flights of genius manifest themselves. Yet
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Speaker 1: long before midnight, such a one had perhaps felt himself
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Speaker 1: yield to fatigue and had tied a wet towel around
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Speaker 1: his head, or had taken stimulants to keep himself awake.
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Speaker 1: The existence of this reserve supply of energy is manifested
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Speaker 1: in physical as well as mental effort. Men who work
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Speaker 1: with their heads and men who work with their hands.
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Speaker 1: Scholars and marathon runners must alike testify to the existence
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Speaker 1: of reserve supplies of power not ordinarily drawn upon. If
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Speaker 1: we do not always or habitually utilize this reserve power,
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Speaker 1: it is simply because we have accustomed ourselves to yield
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Speaker 1: at once to the first strong feeling of fatigue. Evidence
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Speaker 1: of this same fact appears in our feelings on different days.
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Speaker 1: How often does a man get up from his breakfast
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Speaker 1: table after a long night's rest, when he should be
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Speaker 1: feeling fresh and invigorated, and say to himself, I don't
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Speaker 1: feel like working to day, and it may take him
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Speaker 1: until afternoon to get his work a day's stride, if
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Speaker 1: indeed he reaches it at all. You cannot, yourself be
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Speaker 1: immune from the feeling on certain days that you are
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Speaker 1: not your best somehow or other. Your wits seem be fogged.
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Speaker 1: You hesitate to undertake important interviews, your interest lags, and
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Speaker 1: though crises arise in your business, you feel weighted down
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Speaker 1: and unable to meet them with that shrewd discernment and
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Speaker 1: decisiveness of action of which you know yourself capable. But
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Speaker 1: you realize in your inmost self that if you continue
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Speaker 1: to exert the will and persistently hold yourself to the
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Speaker 1: business in hand, sooner or later you will warm to
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Speaker 1: the work. Enthusiasm will come, the clouds will be dispelled,
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Speaker 1: the husks will fly. Yet you have had no rest.
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Speaker 1: On the contrary, you have, by continued conscious effort, consumed
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Speaker 1: more and more of your vital energy. Obviously, it was
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Speaker 1: not rest that you needed. What you required was the
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Speaker 1: impulse of some strong desire that should carry you over
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Speaker 1: the threshold of that first inertia and to the wide
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Speaker 1: field of reserve energy, so rarely called upon, and so
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Speaker 1: rich in power. Under the lashings of necessity or the
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Speaker 1: spur of love or ambition, men accomplished feats of mental
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Speaker 1: and physical endurance of which they would have supposed themselves incapable.
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Speaker 1: Here is what a certain lawyer says of his early struggles.
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Speaker 1: When I was twenty three years old, married and with
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Speaker 1: a family to support, I entered the law course of
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Speaker 1: a great university. Of the many students in my class,
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Speaker 1: seven including me, were making a living whilst studying law.
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Speaker 1: By special arrangement, I was relieved from attendance at lectures
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Speaker 1: and simply required to pass examinations on the various subjects,
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Speaker 1: and was thus enabled to retain my place as principal
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Speaker 1: of a large public school. During the third and last
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Speaker 1: year of my law course, I was principal of a
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Speaker 1: public school of two thousand children and an alternate night
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Speaker 1: school with an enrollment of seven hundred and fifty, and
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Speaker 1: I worked at the law three nights in the week
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Speaker 1: an all day Sunday. After eight months of this, the
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Speaker 1: final examinations came around. They consumed a full week, from
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Speaker 1: nine in the morning until five or six at night.
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Speaker 1: I had no opportunity for review, so I rented a
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Speaker 1: room near the law school to save the time going
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Speaker 1: and coming, and reviewed each night the subjects of examination
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Speaker 1: for the following day. I did not sleep more than
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Speaker 1: two hours any night in that week. On Thursday, while
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Speaker 1: bolting a bit of a luncheon, a fishbone stuck in
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Speaker 1: my throat. Fearful of losing the result of my year's effort,
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Speaker 1: I returned to my work, suffering much pain, and kept
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Speaker 1: at it until Saturday night, when the examinations were concluded.
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Speaker 1: The next day, the surgeon who removed the fishbone said
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Speaker 1: there was no reason why I should have not had
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Speaker 1: a bad case of gangrene. When I look back on
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Speaker 1: that year's work, I don't see how I stood it.
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Speaker 1: I don't see how I kept myself at it day
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Speaker 1: in day out, month after month, without rest, recreation, or relief.
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Speaker 1: I am sure I could never go through it again
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Speaker 1: even if I had the courage to undertake it. I
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Speaker 1: ranked second in a class of one hundred and eighty
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Speaker 1: in my law examinations, won the second prize for the
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Speaker 1: best graduating thesis, received a complimentary vote for class oratorship,
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Speaker 1: and much to my surprise, was soon after offered and
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Speaker 1: assist stant superintendency of the public schools by the school board,
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Speaker 1: who knew nothing of my studies and thought my work
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Speaker 1: as a teacher worthy of promotion. It was not only
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Speaker 1: the hardest year's work, but the best year's work I
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Speaker 1: ever did. It exemplifies my invariable experience that the more
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Speaker 1: we want to do, the more we can do, and
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Speaker 1: the better we can do it. The following is an
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Speaker 1: extract from a letter quoted by Professor James, as written
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Speaker 1: by Colonel Baird Smith after the Siege of Delhi in
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Speaker 1: eighteen fifty seven, to the success of which he largely contributed.
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Speaker 1: My poor wife had some reason to think that war
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Speaker 1: and disease between them had left very little of a
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Speaker 1: husband to take under nursing when she got him again.
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Speaker 1: An attack of scurvy had filled my mouth with sores,
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Speaker 1: shaken every joint in my body, and covered me all
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Speaker 1: over with scars and livid spots, so that I was
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Speaker 1: unlovely to look up pawn. A smart knock on the ankle,
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Speaker 1: joined from the splinter of a shell that burst in
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Speaker 1: my face in itself, a mere bagtelle of a wound
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Speaker 1: had been of necessity neglected under the pressing and insistent
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Speaker 1: calls upon me, and had grown worse and worse until
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Speaker 1: the whole foot below the ankle became a black mass
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Speaker 1: and seemed to threaten mortification. I insisted, however, on being
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Speaker 1: allowed to use it until the place was taken mortification
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Speaker 1: or no, And though the pain was sometimes horrible, I
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Speaker 1: carried my point and kept up to the last. On
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Speaker 1: the day after the assault, I had an unlucky fall
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Speaker 1: on some bad ground, and it was an open question
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Speaker 1: for a day or two whether I hadn't broken my
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Speaker 1: arm at the elbow. Fortunately it turned out to be
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Speaker 1: only a severe sprain, but I am still conscious of
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Speaker 1: the wretch it gave me to crown the whole pleasant catalog.
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Speaker 1: I was worn to a shadow by a constant diarrhea
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Speaker 1: and consumed as much opium as would have done credit
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Speaker 1: to my father in law, Thomas de Quincey. However, thank God,
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Speaker 1: I have a good share of tapolism in me and
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Speaker 1: come out strong under difficulties. I think I may confidently
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Speaker 1: say that no man ever saw me out of heart,
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Speaker 1: or ever heard a complaining word from me, even when
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Speaker 1: our prospects were gloomiest. We were sadly crippled by cholora,
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Speaker 1: and it was almost appalling to me to find out
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Speaker 1: of twenty five officers I could only muster fifteen for
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Speaker 1: the operations of the attack. However, it was done, and
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Speaker 1: after it was done came the collapse. Don't be horrified
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Speaker 1: when I tell you that for the whole of the
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Speaker 1: actual siege, and in truth, for some little time before,
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Speaker 1: I almost lived on brandy. Appetite for food, I had none,
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Speaker 1: and I forced myself to eat just sufficient to sustain life.
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Speaker 1: And I had an incessant craving for brandy as the
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Speaker 1: strongest stimulant I could get. Strange to say, I was
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Speaker 1: quite unconscious of its affecting me in the slightest degree.
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Speaker 1: The excitement of the work was so great that no
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Speaker 1: lesser one seemed to have any chance against it. And
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Speaker 1: I certainly never found my intellect clearer or my nerves
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Speaker 1: stronger in my life. Such is the profound resourcefulness and
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Speaker 1: enduring power of the human mind. End of chapter one
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Speaker 1: recording by Andrea Fury, Chapter two of Initiative Psychic Energy.
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Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by
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Speaker 1: Andrea Fury, Initiative Psychic Energy by Warren Hilton, Chapter two.
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Speaker 1: Reserves of power Stored up energy not in use has
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Speaker 1: been given a name by scientific men, the potential energy.
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Speaker 1: In this way, it is distinguished from kinetic or circulating energy,
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Speaker 1: by which is meant energy that is at work. For example,
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Speaker 1: a ton of coal in the bin contains a certain
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Speaker 1: amount of potential energy which is capable of being converted
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Speaker 1: into kinetic energy by combustion. You have a vast amount
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Speaker 1: of potential energy over and above what you actually use.
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Speaker 1: You have formed the habit of giving up trying a
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Speaker 1: thing as soon as you have spent the usual amount
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Speaker 1: of effort on it, and this without regard to whether
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Speaker 1: or not you have accomplished anything. While we all have
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Speaker 1: the power of sustain mental activity, not one in ten
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Speaker 1: thousand of us holds to the top pace. Worse still,
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Speaker 1: even such mental energy as we do consume is dispersed
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Speaker 1: and scattered over a multitude of trivial interest, instead of
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Speaker 1: being focused upon someone pursuing aim, we intend to show
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Speaker 1: you how you can lose yourself in your work with
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Speaker 1: an absorbing passion, and how you can, at any time
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Speaker 1: make special requisition upon your hidden stores of potential energy
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Speaker 1: and draw new supplies of power that will sweep you
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Speaker 1: on to your goal. More than anything else, it is
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Speaker 1: the ability to do this that lifts the great men
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Speaker 1: of the race above the common run of mortals. It
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Speaker 1: is this that distinguishes genius from mediocrity. The master man
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Speaker 1: transforms his vast stores of reserve or potential energy into
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Speaker 1: circulating or kinetic energy. His work glows with living fire.
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Speaker 1: Yet for every such man there are a multitude of others,
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Speaker 1: equally gifted in some respect, but wanting that mysterious open
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Speaker 1: sesame which would discover their hidden mental riches, arouse them
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Speaker 1: from their accustomed inferiority to their best selves, and transform
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Speaker 1: potentiality into accomplishment. So it comes about that most of
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Speaker 1: us are gems that shine, but to illuminate the dark,
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Speaker 1: unfathomed caves of ocean, flowers born to blush unseen. Take
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Speaker 1: an illustration of the way in which this reserve or
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Speaker 1: potential energy is transformed into circulating or kinetic energy. Suppose
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Speaker 1: that you are a countryman and come to live in
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Speaker 1: a large city. The speed with which we do things
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Speaker 1: are habits of quick decision. The whirlwind of activities of
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Speaker 1: the busy man in town appall you. You cannot see
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Speaker 1: how we live through it. A day in the business
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Speaker 1: district fills you with terror. The tumult and danger make
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Speaker 1: it seem like a permanent earthquake. But settle down to
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Speaker 1: work here, and in a year you will have caught
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Speaker 1: the pulse beat. You will vibrate to the city's rhythm.
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Speaker 1: And if only you make good in your work, you
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Speaker 1: will enjoy the strain and hurry. You will keep pace
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Speaker 1: with the best of us, and you will get more
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Speaker 1: out of your self in a day in the city
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Speaker 1: than you ever did in a week on the farm.
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Speaker 1: This change in degree of mental activity does not necessarily
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Speaker 1: mean that you are making more of a success of life.
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Speaker 1: Your activities may be ill directed, your new found powers
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Speaker 1: may be misspent and dissipated, but you are mentally more alert.
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Speaker 1: Your mental forces have been stimulated by the stirring environment
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Speaker 1: and mark this particularly a number of mental pictures will
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Speaker 1: pass across the screen of your consciousness to day in
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Speaker 1: the same time that one mental image formally required. Now
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Speaker 1: you have learned that with every idea cataloged in memory,
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Speaker 1: there is wrapped up and stowed away an associated feeling
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Speaker 1: tone and an associated impulse to some particular muscular action.
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Speaker 1: Assuming this, you must at once see that here is
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Speaker 1: an explanation of your new found energy, your quickened stack,
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Speaker 1: your new found decisiveness of action, your more observant eye,
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Speaker 1: your clear cut speech instead of the former drawling utterance,
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Speaker 1: your livelier manner, your freshened enthusiasm and enjoyment of life.
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Speaker 1: All of these are but manifestations of a quickened intelligence.
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Speaker 1: They are the working out through the motor paths of
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Speaker 1: mental impulses to muscular action. And these impulses to muscular
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Speaker 1: action come thronging into consciousness because the livelier environment brings
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Speaker 1: about a more rapid reproduction of memory pictures. And here
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Speaker 1: comes a particularly striking fact. One would naturally suppose that
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Speaker 1: the more energy a man consumed and the faster he lived,
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Speaker 1: the more quickly his vitality would be exhausted, and the
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Speaker 1: shorter his life would be as a matter of fact,
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Speaker 1: by the divine beneficence of providence, your organism is so
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Speaker 1: ordered as to adapt itself within certain wide limits to
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Speaker 1: the demands made upon it. You may call into play
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Speaker 1: all the stored up resources of your being and still
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Speaker 1: not stake everything upon a single throw. For the supply
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Speaker 1: of mental energy is as inexhaustible as the reservoir of
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Speaker 1: all past experience, while the supply of physical energy involved
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Speaker 1: in brain and nerve activity is like the immortal liver
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Speaker 1: of Prometheus, renewed as fast as depleted. Two sets of
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Speaker 1: facts that have been established by elaborate scientific experiment will
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Speaker 1: convince you of the truth of these propositions. Professor Patrick
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Speaker 1: of the State University of Iowa conducted some of these experiments.
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Speaker 1: He caused three young men to remain awake for four
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Speaker 1: successive days and nights. They were then allowed to go
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Speaker 1: to sleep, the purpose of the experiment being to determine
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Speaker 1: just how much time news nature required to recuperate from
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Speaker 1: the long vigil. They were allowed to sleep themselves out,
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Speaker 1: and all woke up thoroughly rested. Yet the one who
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Speaker 1: slept the longest slept only one third longer than his
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Speaker 1: customary night's sleep. You have doubtless had the same experience
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Speaker 1: yourself many times. It all goes to show that if
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Speaker 1: we are awake four times as long as usual, we
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Speaker 1: do not make up for it by sleeping four times
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Speaker 1: as long, but four times as soundly as customary. The
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Speaker 1: hard working mechanic requires no more hours of sleep than
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Speaker 1: the corner loafer, the active man of affairs no more
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Speaker 1: than the dawdler. The time of tissue repair is about
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Speaker 1: the same with all men under all conditions. It is
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Speaker 1: the rate of repair that varies with the demand that
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Speaker 1: has been put upon the body. Again, look at the
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Speaker 1: same subject from the standpoint of food supply. On what
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Speaker 1: you now eat and drink. You have a certain average weight, Eat, digest,
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Speaker 1: and assimilate a larger quantity of food, and your weight
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Speaker 1: will increase. This increase will be greatest at the start,
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Speaker 1: and will gradually slow up until you shall have reached
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Speaker 1: the point beyond which you can gain no more. Given
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Speaker 1: the same hygienic conditions that you have been accustomed to,
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Speaker 1: you will maintain yourself at the increased weight on the
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Speaker 1: increased food supply. Now, all this involves, clearly enough a
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Speaker 1: greatly increased rate of activity on the part of bodily
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Speaker 1: organs of assimilation and repair. It is a situation on
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Speaker 1: all fours with that of the countryman whose rate of
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Speaker 1: brain activity has been stimulated by an increased mental demand.
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Speaker 1: No man will maintain that better. More nourishing and more
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Speaker 1: liberal food rations transformed into increased bodily tissue, with a
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Speaker 1: consequent greater weight and greater muscle strength, would result in
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Speaker 1: a loss of vitality or the shortening of a man's life.
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Speaker 1: Pigmies cannot become giants physically or intellectually. But as the
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Speaker 1: puny youth can, by systematic exercise, broaden his frame and
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Speaker 1: develop his muscle into at least a semblance of an athlete,
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Speaker 1: and can then go through his healthier appetite and his
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Speaker 1: faster rate of repair, maintain himself without effort at the
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Speaker 1: new standard, so can the mentally inert call forth their
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Speaker 1: reserves of energy and maintain a higher standard of activity
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Speaker 1: and fruitfulness. Few men live on the plane of their
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Speaker 1: highest efficiency. Few search the recesses of the well springs
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Speaker 1: of power. The lives of most of us are passed
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Speaker 1: among the shallows of the mine, without thought of the
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Speaker 1: possibilities that lurk within the deeper pools. This accumulation of
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Speaker 1: potential subconscious reserve energy is a result of the evolution
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Speaker 1: of man and the growing complexity of his life. No
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Speaker 1: man could if he would respond to all the impulses
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Speaker 1: to muscular action aroused in him by sense impressions, it
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Speaker 1: would be still less possible for him to respond to
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Speaker 1: every impulse to muscular action awakened from the past, with
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Speaker 1: the remembered thought with which it is associated. Desire, interest, attention,
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Speaker 1: and the selective will. Must pick and choose among these
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Speaker 1: multitudinous tendencies to action. Here, then, is another fact that
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Speaker 1: has immediate bearing upon your ability to carry out any
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Speaker 1: ambition you may have. Your every action is the net
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Speaker 1: result of selection among a number of impulses and inhibitory
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Speaker 1: forces or tendencies. As a general thing, consciousness is made
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Speaker 1: up of a number of conflicting ideas, each with its
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Speaker 1: associated feeling and its impulse to action. Just what you
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Speaker 1: do in any particular case depends upon what mental picture
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Speaker 1: is strongest, is most vivid in consciousness, and thus able
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Speaker 1: to overcome all contrary tendencies. As life becomes more and
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Speaker 1: more complex, the number and variety of our sensory experiences
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Speaker 1: increase correspondingly, and so it comes about that we have
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Speaker 1: untold millions of sensorary experiences, carrying with them the impulses
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Speaker 1: to muscular response, none of which, on account of the
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Speaker 1: multiplicity of conflicting ideas, is ever allowed to find release
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Speaker 1: and actually take form and muscular activity. The consequence is
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Speaker 1: that only an exceedingly small proportion of the mental energy
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Speaker 1: that is developed within us is ever actually displayed. The
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Speaker 1: rest is somehow and somewhere locked up behind the inhibitory threshold.
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Speaker 1: It is stored away in subconsciousness with the sensory experiences
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Speaker 1: of the past with which it is associated. Quoting mister
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Speaker 1: Waldo P. Warren, much of the strength within men is hidden,
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Speaker 1: awaiting an occasion to reveal it. The head of a
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Speaker 1: department in a great manufacturing concern severed his connection with
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Speaker 1: the firm, his work falling upon a young man of
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Speaker 1: twenty five years. The young man rose to the occasion,
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Speaker 1: and in a very short time was conceded to be
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Speaker 1: the stronger executive of the two. He had been with
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Speaker 1: the concern for several years and was regarded as a
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Speaker 1: bright fellow, but his marked success was a surprise to
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Speaker 1: all who knew him, even to himself. The fact is
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Speaker 1: the young man had that ability all the time and
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Speaker 1: didn't know it, and his employers didn't know it. He
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Speaker 1: might have been doing greater things all along if there
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Speaker 1: had been the occasion to reveal his strength. Do your
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Speaker 1: employers and superior officers in business realized how much of
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Speaker 1: this hidden strength there is in your men? Perhaps a
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Speaker 1: word from you giving certain men more scope would liberate
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Speaker 1: that ability for the development of both your business and
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Speaker 1: your men. Do you workers know your own strength? Are
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Speaker 1: you working up to your capacity? Or are you accepting
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Speaker 1: the limits which the circumstances place about you? End of
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Speaker 1: chapter two recording by Andrea Fiori, Chapter three of Initiative
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Speaker 1: Psychic Energy. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
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Speaker 1: Recording by Andrea Fiori. Initiative Psychic Energy by Warren Hilton,
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Speaker 1: Chapter three, The Initiative Energy of success. In such instances
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Speaker 1: as we have recounted, men have found that persistent effort
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Speaker 1: along certain lines has had the effect of making presently
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Speaker 1: available what would otherwise be simply unused storage batteries of
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Speaker 1: reserve power. What was the source and inspiration for this
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Speaker 1: persistent effort. You will say that it was ambition or patriotism,
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Speaker 1: or some similar semi emotional influence, And so it was.
24:21
Speaker 1: But what is ambition? What is patriotism? What is any
24:25
Speaker 1: desire but a picturing to the mind's eye of the
24:28
Speaker 1: things desired, an awakening of a mental image of the
24:31
Speaker 1: result to be attained, the reward that is to follow
24:35
Speaker 1: certain efforts. And these mental pictures, coming into consciousness, have
24:41
Speaker 1: brought with them their associated emotions and their associated impulses
24:45
Speaker 1: to muscular action, impulses appropriate to the picture and automatically
24:51
Speaker 1: tending to work its realization. These impulses constitute the whole
24:56
Speaker 1: of man's achieving power. They are the initiative energy of
25:00
Speaker 1: all success. When you are affected with doubt and fear,
25:05
Speaker 1: timidy and lack of confidence, this means that your mental
25:09
Speaker 1: inhibitions are too numerous, too high, or too strong. Remove them,
25:14
Speaker 1: and access has had to the latent energy of accumulated
25:18
Speaker 1: and creative thought complexes. You will then become buoyant, cheerful,
25:24
Speaker 1: overflowing with enthusiasm, and ready for a fresh, definite, active
25:29
Speaker 1: part in life. Ideas. Then, when latent may be considered
25:34
Speaker 1: as possessing an energizing influence. The same idea does not
25:39
Speaker 1: necessarily have the same effect upon the same persons at
25:43
Speaker 1: different times. What its effect may be at any time
25:47
Speaker 1: or with any individual, depends upon the make up of
25:50
Speaker 1: the consciousness in which it finds itself. The setting of
25:54
Speaker 1: consciousness may be entirely different upon the present appearance of
25:58
Speaker 1: the particular idea from what it was on the occasion
26:01
Speaker 1: when this same idea last appeared yesterday. There may have
26:05
Speaker 1: been present no conflicting tendencies, and this particular idea may
26:10
Speaker 1: therefore have been allowed free and joyous expression to day.
26:15
Speaker 1: Other thoughts may be in the ascendancy, so that we
26:18
Speaker 1: look upon the idea of yesterday with a feeling of revulsion.
26:22
Speaker 1: The thought that aroused new energy in you yesterday may
26:25
Speaker 1: then sicken you at your task to day. The thought
26:28
Speaker 1: that stirs the soul of a vigorous man may shock
26:32
Speaker 1: the sensibilities of a delicate woman. Yet there are some
26:36
Speaker 1: ideas to which all men, in varying degrees seem alike
26:40
Speaker 1: to respond. How often in battle have the failing spirits
26:44
Speaker 1: of an army been revived by the appearance of the leader,
26:47
Speaker 1: shouting his battle cry and waving his shining sword. How
26:51
Speaker 1: often have men been roused to heights of heroic achievement
26:55
Speaker 1: by the strains of martial music. How often have troops,
26:59
Speaker 1: spent with exhaustion, responded to the call of such simple
27:03
Speaker 1: phrases as the flag, our country, liberty, or such songs
27:09
Speaker 1: as the marsages, God Save the King Dixie. These phrases
27:15
Speaker 1: are but the signs of ideas. Yet the sounding of
27:18
Speaker 1: these phrases has summoned these ideas into consciousness. And the
27:22
Speaker 1: summoning of these ideas into consciousness has placed undreamed of
27:27
Speaker 1: and immeasurable foot pounds of energy on the hair trigger
27:31
Speaker 1: of action. And so it is with you. Down deep
27:35
Speaker 1: in the inmost chambers of your soul are untouched stores
27:38
Speaker 1: of energy that, properly applied, will exalt your personality and
27:43
Speaker 1: illume your career. But to find and claim these hidden riches,
27:47
Speaker 1: you must persevere, You must endure. In a marathon race,
27:52
Speaker 1: it is endurance that wins. The graceful sprinter who is
27:56
Speaker 1: off with a leap at the bank of the pistol,
27:58
Speaker 1: soon falls. By the way, life is a marathon in
28:02
Speaker 1: which persistence triumphs. There are many good starters, but few
28:07
Speaker 1: strong finishers. That is why the failures so outnumber the successes.
28:13
Speaker 1: The man who travels fastest does more than he is
28:16
Speaker 1: told to do. To merely comply with a fixed routine
28:20
Speaker 1: is to fall short of one's duty. The progressive man
28:24
Speaker 1: adds to the work of today his preparation for the
28:27
Speaker 1: work of tomorrow. He delights in attempting more and more
28:31
Speaker 1: difficult tasks, because in every task he sets himself, he
28:35
Speaker 1: sees a step forward in the development of his own abilities.
28:40
Speaker 1: He loves his work more than he loves his pay,
28:43
Speaker 1: and he deals deeper than the exigencies of the moment require,
28:46
Speaker 1: because he craves the power to do more. Most men
28:50
Speaker 1: start with enthusiasm. No hours are too long, no task
28:54
Speaker 1: too difficult. But soon they tire, and, lacking will power
28:59
Speaker 1: to persist, they succumbed to the lure of distracting interests.
29:03
Speaker 1: They become disheartened and indifferent, and so they fail. A
29:08
Speaker 1: young man married. He was a proprietor of a flourishing
29:12
Speaker 1: general store in Princeton, Indiana. He and his bride Forthwith
29:17
Speaker 1: resolved that they could and would lay aside out of
29:20
Speaker 1: their income a thousand dollars a year for ten years,
29:24
Speaker 1: by which time they would have ten thousand dollars and
29:27
Speaker 1: accumulated interest, and could go into business in a big city.
29:31
Speaker 1: At the end of the first year, when they took
29:34
Speaker 1: stock of their savings, they decided that thereafter, instead of
29:38
Speaker 1: trying to save a thousand dollars a year for ten years,
29:41
Speaker 1: they would undertake to save ten dollars a year for
29:44
Speaker 1: a thousand years, and would be more apt to succeed.
29:48
Speaker 1: To day, they are just where they began. You all
29:52
Speaker 1: know such men, men who are always starting and never finishing.
29:56
Speaker 1: Ninety five percent of the men who go into business
29:59
Speaker 1: are quitter. The very first disappointment sends some scurrying to cover.
30:05
Speaker 1: They begin to look for a soft snap away from
30:08
Speaker 1: the firing line. Is it any wonder that so few
30:11
Speaker 1: reach any great success? That there is an enormous lack
30:16
Speaker 1: of appropriation of energy in most men's lives is an
30:19
Speaker 1: undoubted fact. Just where this energy is stored, and just
30:24
Speaker 1: what its eternal significance may be, is immaterial to our purpose.
30:29
Speaker 1: It may be that this reserve is nature's safeguard against
30:33
Speaker 1: our extravagance. It may be, as some philosophers contend, that
30:38
Speaker 1: the subconscious, with its vast stores of energy, is a higher,
30:42
Speaker 1: more spiritual phase of man. It may be that the
30:46
Speaker 1: subconscious is for each one of us, his individual segment
30:50
Speaker 1: of the divine Essence, that it marks our at onement
30:55
Speaker 1: with God. It may be that to evoke these latent
30:59
Speaker 1: energies is to call upon those resources of our being
31:03
Speaker 1: which are the embodiment within us of the spirit of
31:06
Speaker 1: the creator of all things. It may be that this
31:09
Speaker 1: divine essence, if adequately aroused, may exert in absolute transcendence
31:16
Speaker 1: over material things, and lift humanity to a godlike plain.
31:21
Speaker 1: What we call man, wrote Emerson, The eating, drinking, planting,
31:25
Speaker 1: counting man does not, as we know him, represent himself,
31:30
Speaker 1: but misrepresents himself. Him we do not respect, but the
31:35
Speaker 1: real soul, whose organ he is. Would he let it
31:38
Speaker 1: appear through his action, would make our knees bend, I said,
31:43
Speaker 1: ye are gods, quoth the Psalmist. But ye perfect, even
31:48
Speaker 1: as your father was the injunction of the Master. Whatever
31:52
Speaker 1: the eternal significance of your latent energy may be, the
31:56
Speaker 1: fact remains that it is yours and yours to use.
32:00
Speaker 1: If you are to succeed, if you are to do
32:03
Speaker 1: big things, you must be a man of doggedness. You
32:07
Speaker 1: must keep your eyes trained everlastingly upon the vision of
32:10
Speaker 1: the thing you want. You must stay in the race
32:14
Speaker 1: until you get your second wind. You must be a
32:17
Speaker 1: master of yourself and draw freely on your stored up powers.
32:22
Speaker 1: Do as we shall tell you in this course, and
32:24
Speaker 1: you will become a master man. The kind of man
32:27
Speaker 1: who lasts, The kind of man who works his imagination
32:31
Speaker 1: over time. The kind of man who constrain his energies
32:35
Speaker 1: to the utmost, and then, finding himself still a failure,
32:39
Speaker 1: can rise like the glow of the sun, to do
32:42
Speaker 1: bolder and bigger things. The kind of man who wins.
32:48
Speaker 1: End of chapter three. Recording by Andrea Fiury. Chapter four
32:57
Speaker 1: of Initiative Psychic Energy LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
33:03
Speaker 1: Recording by Andrea Fury. Initiative Psychic Energy by Warren Hilton.
33:09
Speaker 1: Chapter four, How to avoid wastes that drain the energy
33:14
Speaker 1: of success. We have shown you that you have within
33:18
Speaker 1: you the potentialities of success in the form of latent
33:21
Speaker 1: mental energy. We have shown you that your ability to
33:25
Speaker 1: achieve depends upon your ability to utilize to the full
33:29
Speaker 1: your underground mental resources. But success demands that you do
33:34
Speaker 1: more than merely use all your mental energies. You must
33:37
Speaker 1: use them intelligently. Most men fail because they speed the
33:41
Speaker 1: bullet without aiming. They fire at random, and so bag
33:46
Speaker 1: no game. Your pent up mental energy is the powder
33:49
Speaker 1: in the cartridge. Its usefulness depends upon the man behind
33:53
Speaker 1: the gun. To succeed in business, you must intelligently control
33:58
Speaker 1: and erect one your own mental energies two the mental
34:04
Speaker 1: energies of others. The course of the average man through
34:08
Speaker 1: life is an aimless zigzag. It has neither direction nor purpose.
34:13
Speaker 1: It represents wasted energy capriciously expended. Mental energy is like water.
34:19
Speaker 1: It has a tendency to scatter. It is diffusive, It
34:24
Speaker 1: seeks release in a thousand different directions at the same time.
34:28
Speaker 1: As a boy first learning to write, you are unable
34:31
Speaker 1: to prevent the simultaneous squirming of tongue and legs, all
34:35
Speaker 1: ludicrously irrelevant to your purpose of writing. So now, as
34:39
Speaker 1: a business man, unless you have learned the secret of
34:42
Speaker 1: self mastery, you are unable to concentrate your efforts. Your
34:47
Speaker 1: attention is easily distracted. You exhaust yourself in displays of passion.
34:52
Speaker 1: You are forever doing things during business hours that have
34:55
Speaker 1: no relation to your business. You are forever doing things
34:59
Speaker 1: in connection with your business that do not contribute to
35:02
Speaker 1: its progress. You expend just as much energy as the
35:06
Speaker 1: accomplished executive or the successful hustler, but you fritter it
35:11
Speaker 1: away in unprofitable activities. To correct this is to gain
35:15
Speaker 1: mastery and power. Concentrate your mental energies on one thing
35:20
Speaker 1: at a time, stop spreading them around. The promoter may
35:25
Speaker 1: have a dozen big enterprises under way at once, but
35:28
Speaker 1: he takes them up one at a time. He transfers
35:31
Speaker 1: his whole mind and thought from one to the next.
35:35
Speaker 1: You cannot, of course, be eternally doing the same thing,
35:38
Speaker 1: but make no mistake about it. The only way to
35:41
Speaker 1: succeed at anything is to consciously control your mental energies.
35:46
Speaker 1: You may throw them now into this attack, now into another,
35:50
Speaker 1: but you must always have a tight grip on yourself
35:53
Speaker 1: or you cannot succeed. You will often hear some live
35:57
Speaker 1: wire business man spoken of as a human dynamo. He
36:01
Speaker 1: has the faculty of turning out a stupendous amount of
36:04
Speaker 1: work in a comparatively short time. How he can carry
36:08
Speaker 1: in his mind the details of so many large projects,
36:12
Speaker 1: how he can accomplish so much in actual tangible results
36:16
Speaker 1: in many directions. How he can pull the strings of
36:19
Speaker 1: so many enterprises without getting lost in a maze of
36:22
Speaker 1: detail is the marvel of his associates. And yet this
36:27
Speaker 1: man is never hurried, nor flurried, nor worried. But every
36:32
Speaker 1: word in every act is straight to the point and
36:34
Speaker 1: productive of results worth. While a cool brain is the
36:38
Speaker 1: reverse of a hot box, it carries the business of
36:42
Speaker 1: the day along with a steady drive, and is invariably
36:45
Speaker 1: the mark of the big man. The man who dispatches
36:49
Speaker 1: his work quietly, promptly, and efficiently, with no trace of
36:53
Speaker 1: fuss and flurry, is a big man. It is not
36:56
Speaker 1: the hurrying, clattering, chattering individual who turns off the most work.
37:02
Speaker 1: He may imagine he is getting over a lot of track,
37:05
Speaker 1: but he wastes far more than the necessary amount of
37:07
Speaker 1: steam in doing it. The fable of the hare and
37:11
Speaker 1: the tortoise would not be a bad primer for a
37:14
Speaker 1: number of us, and the lesson re learned would not
37:17
Speaker 1: only be beneficial in a business producing way, but it
37:20
Speaker 1: would help us in the full enjoyment of our work.
37:24
Speaker 1: Progress and mental efficiency must result from the application of
37:28
Speaker 1: knowledge of the mental machine. Just as we watch the
37:31
Speaker 1: steam engine and the electric motor to see that they
37:34
Speaker 1: are not overloaded. So we must watch the mental machine,
37:38
Speaker 1: that no more power be turned on than can be
37:41
Speaker 1: profitably employed. This principle has already been applied to physical
37:46
Speaker 1: labor by mister Frederick W. Taylor in his groundbreaking studies
37:50
Speaker 1: in scientific management. Mister Taylor celebrated experiments in the handling
37:56
Speaker 1: of pig iron by which the quantity handled in a
37:59
Speaker 1: day by one man was increased from twelve and one
38:02
Speaker 1: half tons to forty seven and one half tons. Showed
38:06
Speaker 1: that a man engaged in such extremely heavy work could
38:09
Speaker 1: only be under load forty three percent of the working
38:12
Speaker 1: day and must be entirely free from load for fifty
38:16
Speaker 1: seven percent to attain the maximum efficiency. There is no
38:21
Speaker 1: reason why efficiency and mental effort should not be gaged
38:24
Speaker 1: just as accurately as in muscular activity. If there are
38:28
Speaker 1: times when your wits are not as keen, when you
38:31
Speaker 1: have not the grasp of fundamentals as at other times,
38:35
Speaker 1: it is because you are mentally overloaded. It may be
38:38
Speaker 1: the result of a great variety of causes. It may
38:42
Speaker 1: be from too many hours of continuous mental effort, but
38:46
Speaker 1: the probabilities are that it is the result of vexation, worry, dissipation,
38:51
Speaker 1: or allowing the mind to be burdened with the strain
38:54
Speaker 1: of vicious or at least irrelevant in distracting impulses and desires,
38:59
Speaker 1: and so no efficiency is lost. The human dynamo is
39:03
Speaker 1: a man who long ago learned the lesson of scientific
39:06
Speaker 1: management of his own mental forces. He does one thing
39:10
Speaker 1: at a time, and does it the best he knows how.
39:13
Speaker 1: He directs the whole power of his mentality to the
39:16
Speaker 1: one problem and solves it with accuracy and dispatch. There
39:21
Speaker 1: is no more of a load on his gray matter
39:23
Speaker 1: than there is on that of the fretting, fuming, finger
39:26
Speaker 1: biting fritterer. But every pound of steam is spent in
39:30
Speaker 1: useful work. Look at the victim of Saint Vitus's dance.
39:34
Speaker 1: There you have an illustration of wasted energy, and it
39:37
Speaker 1: is mental energy. For every muscular movement represents the release
39:42
Speaker 1: of thought power. The mental lives of most men are
39:45
Speaker 1: equally aimless. They are lives of ceaseless activity, producing nothing.
39:51
Speaker 1: Sometimes it happens that a man is not working to
39:53
Speaker 1: advantage because of some defect in his physical make up.
39:58
Speaker 1: He may have defective vision or some peculiarity of hearing
40:01
Speaker 1: that renders him unable to respond as quickly as he
40:04
Speaker 1: should to the demands made upon him. If these effects
40:08
Speaker 1: are ascertained, it is usually a simple matter to correct
40:12
Speaker 1: the defects by mechanical means, or readjust the relative duties
40:16
Speaker 1: of different persons so that the defects will be minimized.
40:21
Speaker 1: Where large numbers of people are employed, it is comparatively
40:24
Speaker 1: easy to use tests for discovering defects of sight or
40:28
Speaker 1: hearing by simple apparatus without requiring the services of a
40:33
Speaker 1: high priced expert. By adopting these test methods, any manager
40:37
Speaker 1: of a large industrial establishment can satisfy himself whether his
40:42
Speaker 1: employees are up to certain normal standards. He can even
40:46
Speaker 1: apply the tests to himself. Optical tests can be conducted
40:50
Speaker 1: by securing an ordinary letter chart, such as used by Oculus,
40:54
Speaker 1: and opticians seat the subject twenty feet away. If he
40:59
Speaker 1: can read all all the lines of letters from the
41:01
Speaker 1: largest down to the smallest, his eye sight is practically perfect.
41:06
Speaker 1: In a large percentage of cases, the smaller lines of
41:09
Speaker 1: type are blurred and invisible. To detect the cause and
41:13
Speaker 1: degree of defects of the eyes, it is necessary to
41:16
Speaker 1: try out the eyes by using a trial spectacle frame
41:20
Speaker 1: and inserting detached lenses before the right eye and the
41:24
Speaker 1: left eye alternatively. One of the most common forms of
41:28
Speaker 1: defective vision is a stigmatism. A chart has been designed
41:32
Speaker 1: with a series of circles and straight lines radiating from
41:35
Speaker 1: the center. If the subject is a stigmatic, he will
41:39
Speaker 1: see some of the straight lines distinctly, while others will
41:43
Speaker 1: be blurred. For instance, one or two of the vertical
41:46
Speaker 1: lines may appear very black and strong, while all others
41:50
Speaker 1: will look like a hazy network. This defect, due to
41:54
Speaker 1: unevenness of the spherical surface of the eyeball, is easily
41:58
Speaker 1: corrected with properly ground glasses. Defects in hearing can be
42:03
Speaker 1: easily determined by means of an achometer. This little instrument
42:07
Speaker 1: measures the acuteness of the hearing very accurately by means
42:11
Speaker 1: of shot dropped from varying heights upon strips of glass, copper,
42:15
Speaker 1: and cardboard. Tests with this device indicate whether the subject's
42:20
Speaker 1: hearing is above or below normal. Stop wasting your energy
42:26
Speaker 1: heretofore you have used your powers in a more or
42:29
Speaker 1: less haphazard way with a vast amount of waste. In
42:33
Speaker 1: no efficient direction. From now on you are to exercise
42:36
Speaker 1: more intelligence in this respect and make all your energies
42:40
Speaker 1: contribute to your business progress and your personal success. You
42:45
Speaker 1: are losing power and fruitless outward activities. You are losing
42:49
Speaker 1: power in the thinking of useless thoughts. You cannot stop
42:53
Speaker 1: the ceaseless activity of the mind, but you can conserve
42:57
Speaker 1: its forces by directing them into channels that are worth while.
43:02
Speaker 1: You are losing power in a turmoil of inward mental
43:05
Speaker 1: strains and in harmonies. Catch yourself at some moment when
43:09
Speaker 1: you are forging ahead in a crowded day's work. You
43:13
Speaker 1: will then see what an inner whirlwind of excitement is
43:16
Speaker 1: in progress, What stresses and strains are at work, What
43:20
Speaker 1: contrary impulses, What frictions and obstacles are being overcome. Now
43:26
Speaker 1: to the engineer, every one of these words friction, obstacle, strain,
43:31
Speaker 1: spells loss of efficiency. And in this course we shall
43:35
Speaker 1: teach you how you may do away with antagonistic impulses,
43:40
Speaker 1: may bring your combined mental forces to bear upon the
43:43
Speaker 1: common enemy, and may hurl yourself into the struggle of
43:47
Speaker 1: business and practical life with a joyful and headlong impetuosity
43:51
Speaker 1: that no obstacle can withstand. Professor Walter dill Scott of
43:56
Speaker 1: Northwestern University has said, in studying lives of contemporary business men,
44:02
Speaker 1: two facts stand out pre eminently. The first is that
44:06
Speaker 1: their labors have brought about results that to most of
44:09
Speaker 1: us would have seemed impossible. Such men appear as giants
44:13
Speaker 1: in comparison with whom ordinary men sink to the size pigmies.
44:18
Speaker 1: The second fact, which a study of successful business men,
44:22
Speaker 1: or any class of successful men reveals is that they
44:25
Speaker 1: never seem rushed for time. Such men have time to
44:29
Speaker 1: devote to objects in no way connected with their business.
44:33
Speaker 1: It cannot be regarded as accidental that this characteristic of
44:37
Speaker 1: mind is found so commonly among successful men during the
44:41
Speaker 1: years of their most fruitful labor. According to the American ideal,
44:46
Speaker 1: the man who is sure to succeed is the one
44:48
Speaker 1: who is continuously keyed up to concert pitch, who is
44:52
Speaker 1: ever alert and is always giving attention to his business
44:56
Speaker 1: or profession. And again, it is not necessarily true that
45:00
Speaker 1: the greatest and most constant display of energy accompanies the
45:04
Speaker 1: greatest presence of energy. The tug boat on the river
45:08
Speaker 1: is constantly blowing off steam and making a tremendous display
45:12
Speaker 1: of energy. While the ocean liner proceeds on its way
45:15
Speaker 1: without noise and without commotion. The man who frets and fumes,
45:20
Speaker 1: who is nervous and excited, is strung up to such
45:23
Speaker 1: a pitch that energy is being dissipated in all directions.
45:28
Speaker 1: Many business men know that they are going at a
45:31
Speaker 1: pace that kills, and at the same time they feel
45:34
Speaker 1: that they are accomplishing too little. For such the pertinent
45:37
Speaker 1: question is how may I reduce the expenditure of energy
45:42
Speaker 1: without reducing the efficiency of my labor. One of the
45:46
Speaker 1: busiest and most efficient men in England voted as having
45:49
Speaker 1: explained his own accomplishment of big results with the least
45:53
Speaker 1: expenditure of effort by organizing myself to run smoothly as
45:58
Speaker 1: well as my business, by schooling myself to keep cool
46:02
Speaker 1: and to do what I have to do without expending
46:04
Speaker 1: more nervous energy on the task than necessary, by avoiding
46:09
Speaker 1: all needless friction. In consequence, when I finish my day's work,
46:14
Speaker 1: I feel nearly as fresh as when I started. The
46:17
Speaker 1: late Professor James of Harvard University, often referred to as
46:21
Speaker 1: the founder of modern psychology, spoke thus disparagingly of untrained effort.
46:28
Speaker 1: Your convulsive worker breaks down and has bad moods so
46:32
Speaker 1: often that you never know where he may be when
46:34
Speaker 1: you most need his help. He may be having one
46:37
Speaker 1: of his bad days. We say that so many of
46:40
Speaker 1: our fellow countrymen collapse and have to be sent abroad
46:43
Speaker 1: to rest their nerves because they work so hard. I
46:47
Speaker 1: suspect that this is an immense mistake. I suspect that
46:51
Speaker 1: neither the nature nor the amount of our work is
46:53
Speaker 1: accountable for the frequency and the severity of our breakdowns,
46:58
Speaker 1: but that their cause lies rather in those absurd feelings
47:02
Speaker 1: of hurry and having no time, in the breathlessness and tension,
47:06
Speaker 1: that anxiety of feature and solicitude for results, that lack
47:10
Speaker 1: of inner harmony and ease, in short, by which with
47:14
Speaker 1: us the work is apt to be accomplished. The fact
47:17
Speaker 1: is that to be a truly busy man, you must
47:20
Speaker 1: never be in a hurry. You must work systematically, You
47:23
Speaker 1: must economize effort. You must permit no distractions and do
47:28
Speaker 1: your work leisurely. You must take time to think things
47:31
Speaker 1: over in a natural way. You must waste no thoughts
47:35
Speaker 1: in business hours on social or pleasurable pursuits that would
47:39
Speaker 1: dissipate your mental capital. You must work when you work,
47:43
Speaker 1: and you must play when you play. But your business
47:46
Speaker 1: must be the most fascinating of games, and the only
47:49
Speaker 1: one you play during business hours. Another thing you need
47:54
Speaker 1: is poise. One trouble with you now is that you
47:57
Speaker 1: waste your priceless powers in you useless anxiety. The minute
48:02
Speaker 1: business falls off, you begin to worry. You fritter your
48:06
Speaker 1: mental energies and fretting until you are incapable of real
48:09
Speaker 1: thought and being unable to think your way out. You
48:13
Speaker 1: get excited. Remember it is all just a game, and
48:17
Speaker 1: you are in it only for the fun of the thing.
48:20
Speaker 1: You will never weigh out if you persist in tearing
48:22
Speaker 1: your hair. Before he crossed the Rubicon, Julius Caesar was
48:27
Speaker 1: staggered at the greatness of the undertaking before him. The
48:31
Speaker 1: more he reflected and took counsel of his friends, the
48:34
Speaker 1: greater loomed the difficulties of the attempt, and the more
48:38
Speaker 1: appalling the calamities his passage of that river would bring
48:41
Speaker 1: upon the Roman world. But when at last, with the
48:45
Speaker 1: cry the die is cast, he plunged into the river,
48:49
Speaker 1: there was an end for him. To his mental dissension,
48:52
Speaker 1: a freedom to plan and execute, an expansion of courage
48:56
Speaker 1: and power. So it will be with you. With doubt
49:00
Speaker 1: and uncertainty. The pressure may be high in the gauge,
49:04
Speaker 1: but the engine does not move. Make up your mind
49:07
Speaker 1: and you release energies previously wasted in conflicts between opposing
49:12
Speaker 1: thought complexes struggling for supremacy. A fine illustration of this
49:18
Speaker 1: is shown in the religious experience known as conversion. To
49:22
Speaker 1: the convert, conversion means the profound acceptance of a mighty
49:27
Speaker 1: spiritual truth. It means positive knowledge taking the place of
49:31
Speaker 1: doubt or indifference. Conflicting ideas are no longer present in
49:36
Speaker 1: his consciousness. Pent up energies are released. He wants to
49:41
Speaker 1: do things. His soul is fired with overmastering impulses to action.
49:46
Speaker 1: He wants to go forth and preach the gospel of
49:49
Speaker 1: his faith. He is lifted to a high plane of exhilaration.
49:54
Speaker 1: He experiences the peace that passeth understanding in science, truth,
50:02
Speaker 1: the new thought. In similar movements, all achieve their really
50:06
Speaker 1: marvelous results in much the same way. All proclaimed doctrines
50:10
Speaker 1: of exuberant optimism, having a tendency to banish fear thoughts
50:15
Speaker 1: and self consciousness and self deprecation, and to set up
50:19
Speaker 1: in their stead ideas of courage, and of achievement and
50:23
Speaker 1: of individual power. If these teachings are successful, that is
50:28
Speaker 1: to say, if they inherently possess the right appeal for
50:32
Speaker 1: the particular individual, they have the happy effect of begetting
50:36
Speaker 1: a stoical indifference to petty physical disorders and social vexations,
50:41
Speaker 1: and bringing about a concentration upon the main business of
50:45
Speaker 1: life of the mental energies thus previously wasted. Decide the
50:49
Speaker 1: matter that is troubling. You make an end of hesitation
50:53
Speaker 1: and uncertainty, and fear. Your very act of decision will
50:57
Speaker 1: release large stores of pent upmental power and add immeasurably
51:01
Speaker 1: to your effectiveness. So long as you are in doubt
51:05
Speaker 1: and perplexity conflicting ideas and impulses balance each other, you
51:11
Speaker 1: are not then a man of action. You are a
51:13
Speaker 1: wavering coward. You are afflicted with paralysis of will and
51:17
Speaker 1: mental stagnation. Decide the matter, that is to say, let
51:23
Speaker 1: one mental picture assume a greater vividness than the other
51:27
Speaker 1: until it possesses your soul, and forthwith the banked fires
51:31
Speaker 1: of your mental energy will burst into flame another thing.
51:36
Speaker 1: Stop wasting your time? How much time do you spend
51:40
Speaker 1: in rest and relaxation? How much should you spend? Can
51:44
Speaker 1: you answer these questions accurately? Thomas A. Edison has contended
51:49
Speaker 1: for years that four hours sleep a day was sufficient
51:52
Speaker 1: for any man. He has conducted experiments with a large
51:56
Speaker 1: number of men, giving careful attention to matters of dift
52:00
Speaker 1: and exercise, and the results have seemed in a measure
52:03
Speaker 1: to support his theory. Doctor Fred W. Eastman reports that,
52:08
Speaker 1: owing to pressures of work, he was recently unable to
52:12
Speaker 1: get more than three or four hour sleep out of
52:15
Speaker 1: the twenty four hour during a period of many months,
52:18
Speaker 1: and that so far from being hurt by it, he
52:21
Speaker 1: gained five pounds. He says, if restoration during sleep is
52:26
Speaker 1: a task so relatively small, the question arises whether in
52:30
Speaker 1: order to complete restoration, it is necessary for us to
52:34
Speaker 1: spend so much time in sleep as we do. Perhaps,
52:38
Speaker 1: on account of popular opinion and personal habit, we waste
52:42
Speaker 1: much time in this jellyfish condition that could more profitably
52:46
Speaker 1: be spent in active pursuit of our ambitions. The answer,
52:50
Speaker 1: of course, depends upon the nature of our occupations. If
52:54
Speaker 1: there is muscular effort involved with a correspondingly large amount
52:58
Speaker 1: of waste in the cells and blood. Eight hours or
53:01
Speaker 1: more are probably necessary. But if the work is of
53:04
Speaker 1: a sedentary nature and mainly of the brain, there is
53:08
Speaker 1: naturally a smaller quantity of accumulated waste, and less time
53:12
Speaker 1: is required for removal. Many are the instances of great
53:16
Speaker 1: men past in present who have lived healthily and worked
53:20
Speaker 1: unceasingly and strenuously on only four or five hours sleep,
53:26
Speaker 1: or half the laborer's portion. Surely, we do not suppose
53:29
Speaker 1: that these men were or are physically different from others,
53:33
Speaker 1: but rather that by inclination or necessity, they have developed
53:37
Speaker 1: a habit of sleeping intensely for a short period, with
53:41
Speaker 1: resulting gain of time and efficiency. So far as this
53:45
Speaker 1: matter of relaxation, rest and sleep is concerned, the rule
53:49
Speaker 1: is obviously this determine accurately by experiment the proper relation
53:55
Speaker 1: between periods of work and periods of rest in your
53:58
Speaker 1: own case, then increase your efficiency by maintaining this relation.
54:04
Speaker 1: In Denmark, they feed cows scientifically. Day by day they
54:08
Speaker 1: increase the allowance of milk producing food. Day by day,
54:12
Speaker 1: the yield of milk increases. At last, there comes a
54:15
Speaker 1: day when measurement shows that there is no longer any
54:19
Speaker 1: increase in the production of milk. They then decrease the
54:22
Speaker 1: food till the output of milk diminishes. So they determine
54:26
Speaker 1: the normal. So with you and your hours of work
54:29
Speaker 1: and leisure. Give more and more time to your business
54:32
Speaker 1: each day until there comes an impairment in the quality
54:36
Speaker 1: of your work. Stop short of this, you have found
54:40
Speaker 1: your norm of efficiency. End of chapter four recording by
54:46
Speaker 1: Andrea Fury. Chapter five of Initiative Psychic Energy. This LibriVox
54:56
Speaker 1: recording is in the public domain. Recording by an Andrea Fiury.
55:02
Speaker 1: Initiative Psychic Energy by Warren Hilton, Chapter five, The Secret
55:07
Speaker 1: of Mental Efficiency. You are called upon to master and
55:12
Speaker 1: conserve the energies of your mind. This means you must
55:17
Speaker 1: one find out where these energies are stored, and two
55:22
Speaker 1: learn the conditions that determine their activity. All past experiences
55:27
Speaker 1: are conserved within us in the form of complexes. These
55:32
Speaker 1: complexes consist of ideas, emotions, and impulses to muscular activity.
55:38
Speaker 1: By the primary law of association, the recall to consciousness
55:43
Speaker 1: of any one of these component elements of a complex
55:47
Speaker 1: brings with it all the rest. For example, the ideas
55:52
Speaker 1: pertaining to any terrifying experience, when recalled to consciousness, bring
55:57
Speaker 1: with them the trembling, the wildly beating heart, the shaking
56:01
Speaker 1: knees with which they were originally accompanied. The victim of
56:06
Speaker 1: stage fright feels his knees give way, and that he
56:09
Speaker 1: is sinking to the floor. His heart beats tumultuously, cold,
56:13
Speaker 1: perspiration covers his body, he blushes, his mouth is dry,
56:19
Speaker 1: and his voice sticks in his throat. Afterwards, alone in
56:23
Speaker 1: his room, the memory of that dreadful moment, the thought
56:27
Speaker 1: of another appearance before that audience, will be accompanied by
56:31
Speaker 1: the same physiological effects. Every such bodily movement is an
56:36
Speaker 1: expression of energy. The recall to consciousness of the terrifying experience,
56:41
Speaker 1: the recall of the picture of the assembled audience. These
56:45
Speaker 1: things automatically produce bodily activities. So we must conclude that
56:50
Speaker 1: every idea in memory has associated with it the potential
56:55
Speaker 1: energy necessary for the production of muscular movement it It
57:00
Speaker 1: does not necessarily follow that the recall to consciousness of
57:04
Speaker 1: a given idea will be invariably followed by an outwardly
57:07
Speaker 1: visible muscular activity expressive of its energy. Just the mere
57:12
Speaker 1: presence of an idea in consciousness tends to bring about
57:16
Speaker 1: a movement, so the presence of a contrary idea will
57:20
Speaker 1: tend to inhibit it. Try to imagine that you are
57:24
Speaker 1: bending your forefinger at the same time hold it straight.
57:28
Speaker 1: Your finger will actually tremble with the dammed up energy
57:31
Speaker 1: of the repressed impulse, but the finger will not actually move,
57:36
Speaker 1: because the idea of its not moving is just as
57:39
Speaker 1: much a part of your consciousness as the idea of
57:43
Speaker 1: its moving put out of your consciousness. This thought of
57:46
Speaker 1: the fingers not moving and forthwith the finger will bend
57:51
Speaker 1: your conduct during your waking hours. Is thus always the
57:55
Speaker 1: result of opposing forces, some tending in one direction, others
58:00
Speaker 1: tending to counteract the first. Thus there comes about a
58:04
Speaker 1: great waste of mental power and an appalling loss of
58:08
Speaker 1: individual efficiency. In the language of sport, you are suffering
58:12
Speaker 1: from a lack of mental team work. The effect is
58:16
Speaker 1: the same as if the members of a football team,
58:18
Speaker 1: instead of combining their forces against the opposing side, should
58:22
Speaker 1: spend their time in restraining one another. It requires but
58:26
Speaker 1: one step, and not a difficult one at that, to
58:30
Speaker 1: lead you to the conclusion that the solution of this
58:33
Speaker 1: problem lies in having consciousness at any one moment only
58:37
Speaker 1: such ideas as harmonize. Let that condition prevail, and the
58:42
Speaker 1: potential energies of all ideas and consciousness must flow together
58:47
Speaker 1: in a broad stream of useful and exhilarating activity. Your
58:52
Speaker 1: work should be a source of pleasure to you if
58:55
Speaker 1: it is simply a disagreeable task that has to be performed,
58:59
Speaker 1: if it is a day grind, if you have to
59:01
Speaker 1: hold yourself to it by unremitting effort of the will,
59:05
Speaker 1: you are no better than a rusty engine, and all
59:08
Speaker 1: your workings will be accompanied by jars, frictions, and complaining
59:12
Speaker 1: squeaks that bespeak a positively wicked loss of power. Hold
59:17
Speaker 1: the right thoughts persistently in mind, and you cannot help
59:20
Speaker 1: working steadily on toward the goal you are thinking of.
59:24
Speaker 1: Keep steadily at work with the right thoughts persistently in mind,
59:28
Speaker 1: and success is sure to come. Success then lies in
59:33
Speaker 1: the concentration of mental energies, and this concentration is to
59:37
Speaker 1: be brought about by holding in consciousness only those ideas
59:41
Speaker 1: that harmonize. There must be the greatest discrimination and care
59:46
Speaker 1: used in the selection of these ideas that are to
59:49
Speaker 1: constitute such a coordinating consciousness, there must be a re
59:54
Speaker 1: imaging or imagination in a literal and practical sense of
59:59
Speaker 1: those ideas only that carry with them impulses to motion.
1:00:03
Speaker 1: In the same general direction. You must have a set
1:00:06
Speaker 1: purpose in life, and you must yield your powers without
1:00:10
Speaker 1: hindrance and without reservation, to the accomplishment of that set purpose.
1:00:16
Speaker 1: One you must exercise deliberate, patient and persistent watchfulness to
1:00:22
Speaker 1: detect and repress all useless bodily movements. You have all
1:00:26
Speaker 1: sorts of silly habits, twitchings, jerkings, itchings, winkings, shrugs, frowns, coughs, snifflings,
1:00:34
Speaker 1: and odd and meaningless gestures. Watch yourself do these things
1:00:39
Speaker 1: no more, save your eyes and ears, and hands and nerves,
1:00:43
Speaker 1: all your mental energy for useful effort. Two. You must
1:00:49
Speaker 1: give yourself, mind and body to one thing at a time,
1:00:53
Speaker 1: disregarding all that would lure you from your chosen task.
1:00:58
Speaker 1: Three you acquire a self conscious sense of your own
1:01:02
Speaker 1: self mastery. It will help you to acquire this feeling
1:01:06
Speaker 1: if you will continually assert I can and will accomplish
1:01:10
Speaker 1: anything that I am determined upon. I have the power
1:01:13
Speaker 1: of will, I will accomplish this thing. I will make
1:01:18
Speaker 1: these assertions with all the force and intensity of your
1:01:22
Speaker 1: whole being until you are pervaded with a sense of
1:01:25
Speaker 1: your own power. Do this faithfully, and in time this
1:01:29
Speaker 1: courageous and manly attitude will become an inherent part of
1:01:32
Speaker 1: your personality. For you must have confidence. And when we
1:01:38
Speaker 1: say confidence, we do not mean a purely intellectual conviction.
1:01:43
Speaker 1: We mean a profoundly emotional faith. It will help you
1:01:46
Speaker 1: to cultivate this feeling of confidence if you affirm many
1:01:50
Speaker 1: times a day I have implicit confidence in myself. I
1:01:54
Speaker 1: have perfect faith in my own powers. I am absolute
1:01:59
Speaker 1: master of my self and of my career. Practice affirmations
1:02:03
Speaker 1: of this kind persistently, and in time your mind will
1:02:06
Speaker 1: have permanently acquired the habit effacing the facts of life
1:02:11
Speaker 1: in the way essential to success. Five. You must exert
1:02:16
Speaker 1: a favorable influence upon the mental attitude of those about you.
1:02:20
Speaker 1: This is not so difficult as it would appear. You
1:02:24
Speaker 1: cannot yourself acquire will power, confidence, and courage without impressing
1:02:29
Speaker 1: others with your possession of these qualities. Personalities are revealed
1:02:33
Speaker 1: one to another by faint and suggestive activities. All unconsciously perceived.
1:02:40
Speaker 1: Your concentration of energy will inspire others. You will radiate
1:02:44
Speaker 1: an atmosphere of success. You will subtly influence your associates.
1:02:50
Speaker 1: You will be a force to reckon with, and the
1:02:52
Speaker 1: world will know it. Your air of success will draw
1:02:55
Speaker 1: others to you, will bring business and good will, and
1:02:59
Speaker 1: men and money will seek a share in your enterprise.
1:03:03
Speaker 1: Master your mental energies, train them, concentrate them. Thus only
1:03:08
Speaker 1: may you win riches with honor. Thus, broadly put, there is,
1:03:14
Speaker 1: or perhaps it would be more accurate to say, there
1:03:17
Speaker 1: seems to be, nothing startlingly new about this proposition. The
1:03:22
Speaker 1: world has always realized that singleness of purpose concentration of
1:03:27
Speaker 1: effort is essential to success. But in the past the
1:03:31
Speaker 1: world has possessed no formula by which these qualities might
1:03:34
Speaker 1: be acquired. Men have endeavored to create in themselves the
1:03:39
Speaker 1: necessary qualities for success, having no knowledge of the mental
1:03:43
Speaker 1: elements that went into their composition. They have tried to
1:03:47
Speaker 1: run the mental engine, knowing nothing of its mechanism. Some
1:03:51
Speaker 1: few have been lucky, but the path has been strewn
1:03:54
Speaker 1: with a thousand failures to one that passed on to success.
1:03:59
Speaker 1: There are, if some business men who look upon psychology
1:04:03
Speaker 1: as blue sky theorizing or new thought. There are others
1:04:07
Speaker 1: who have a hazy idea that it is a sort
1:04:10
Speaker 1: of unfathomable mystery intended to amuse long haired scientists. The
1:04:15
Speaker 1: truth is that every one of these same business men,
1:04:18
Speaker 1: if he is getting ahead, is unconsciously using psychological principles
1:04:24
Speaker 1: to the profit of his own business every day in
1:04:26
Speaker 1: the year. In the books that are to follow, we
1:04:29
Speaker 1: will show you the immense practical value of a truly
1:04:33
Speaker 1: scientific psychology. You shall come into the psychological laboratory with
1:04:38
Speaker 1: us and work out rational, scientific and exact methods by which,
1:04:43
Speaker 1: without possibility of failure, and with but reasonable effort, you can,
1:04:48
Speaker 1: at any moment completely concentrate your mental powers. You shall
1:04:53
Speaker 1: be instructed in simple devices for mastering scattered energies, repressing
1:04:58
Speaker 1: wasteful habits, vanishing depressive moods, and raising yourself to a
1:05:03
Speaker 1: far higher level of commercial efficiency. End of chapter five
1:05:09
Speaker 1: recording by Andrea Fiori. End of Initiative Psychic Energy by
1:05:15
Speaker 1: Warren Hilton,