Last month I read The Magic of Thinking Big, by David Schwartz. It’s a motivational book first printed in 1959.
It’s like a retro-motivational book month for me in November. I really enjoyed reading these recommended classics, to see how some of the trends about personal success/motivation had evolved, and ho some had stayed the similar. The main difference seems to be these days, much of the books have roots in good research and science. But the intuitive knowledge that these retro-motivational books had back then were quite on target.
What I enjoyed most about this book were the how important it is to upgrade your mindset to the future when you’re already successful, even when you’re not (yet). Lots of useful tips on how to visualize and embody that success mindset as if you are already successful (not being delusional though!).
Also love that concept of “psychological sunshine” - very useful and apt way of describing active rest and time away from work. Will definitely work on that!
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The Magic of Thinking Big
by David Schwartz
See what can be, not just what is
People who don’t have much look at themselves as they are now. That’s all they see. They don’t see a future, they just see a miserable present. Be determined to not let what you haven’t got stop you. Look at yourself as the person you’re going to be in the future. When you look at yourself that way, you feel bigger and think bigger, and it’ll pay off. The price tag the world puts on us is just about identical to the one we put on ourselves.
Petty thinker vs big thinker
- Saves pennies vs increase income
- Gossip, talk negatively vs talk positive
- Prefer status quo vs believes in expansion
- Views future as limited vs future as promising
- Always avoiding work vs looking for more things to do, help others
- Competes with average vs the best
- Set goals low vs high
- Short term vision vs long term
- Preoccupied with security vs seeing security as a natural companion of success
- Surrounded by petty thinkers vs people with large, progressive ideas
- Makes minor errors a bigger deal than they are vs ignores errors of little consequence
Capacity is a state of mind
How much we can do depends in how much we think we can do. We find time for things where there’s no choice.
Upgrade your thinking
Think like important people think. Think like the person you want to be in the future. How am I thinking?
- Would an important person worry about this?
- Would the most successful person I know be worried about this?
- What would an important person do if she had this idea?
- Do I look like someone who has max self respect?
- Am I using the language of successful people?
- Would an important person read this?
- Would an important person get mad at what I’m mad at?
Go first class when you have questions
Successful people are not always inaccessible. They often like to help and give back.
Get plenty of psychological sunshine during leisure hours
Don’t spend weekends unplanned, lazing around on the couch, watching TV and being bored at home, leaving you psychologically starved. Plan refreshing activities, circulate in new groups, enrich yourself in ways that give you energy, ideas.
Surrender to your goal
When you surrender yourself to your desires, when you let yourself become obsessed with a goal, you receive the physical power, energy, enthusiasm needed to accomplish your goal. You also receive the “automatic instruction” needed to keep you going straight to your objective. When you surrender to your goal, the goal works itself into your subconscious mind, you react the right way automatically, making you supersensitive to all the many forces at work that affect him. Without a goal, your actions reflect no personal policy. You waver, second-guess yourself, hesitates, and flounder in mediocrity.