“Powerful and mighty is the human mind! It builds or it destroys.” Hill This is just one of the bullet points that I have been picking out of the chapter this time around. I have noticed that I tend to come back to the same thoughts that I had the last cycle of the book and write lessons close to what I wrote previously. There is much more content in each chapter than just one general idea so it’s my goal to explore more and have more aha moments. These chapters are packed with nuggets if we keep our eyes open and search for them.

 

Important points that hit me about fear that Hill makes

• Fears are nothing more than states of mind. One’s state of mind is subject to control and direction- that tells me that I can create that state of mind by self talk, meditation, and visualization.

• Every human being has the ability to completely control his own mind, and with this control, obviously, every person may open his mind to the tramp thought impulses which are being released by other brains, or close the doors tightly and admit only thought impulses of his own choice- I always have to remember that negative emotions are much stronger than positive so I have to apply a tourniquet to the negative emotions to stop the bleeding and then constantly program my mind with positive thoughts. Hill also says "Mind control is the result of self-discipline and habit. You either control your mind or it controls you."

• No alibi will save you from accepting the responsibility if you now fail or refuse to demand riches of Life, because the acceptance calls for but one thing—incidentally, the only thing you can control—and that is a STATE OF MIND. A state of mind is something that one assumes. It cannot be purchased, it must be created-my take is we have to live in the now. Harv Eker gives an example of this. At one of his events he will tell the audience to raise your hand tomorrow and no one has an answer. The answer is that you can’t because tomorrow isn’t here yet. When we start thinking about tomorrow we start to get anxious and unsure because it is the unknown. But when we are living in the now fear can’t exist!

 

The other big aha I got from this lesson is how your thoughts can damage others. Hill says “The fear of criticism robs man of his initiative, destroys his power of imagination, limits his individuality, takes away his selfreliance, and does him damage in a hundred other ways. Parents often do their children irreparable injury by criticising them. Criticism is the one form of service, of which everyone has too much. Everyone has a stock of it which is handed out, gratis, whether called for or not. One’s nearest relatives often are the worst offenders. It should be recognized as a crime (in reality it is a crime of the worst nature), for any parent to build inferiority complexes in the mind of a child, through unnecessary criticism”. I totally agree that it should be a crime because I have seen my ex do that exact same thing to my daughter which affected her to the point that it has caused a physical sickness.

If positive thinking and living attracts people to you because they want what you have doesn’t it just make sense that negative thinking would have just the opposite effect and repel those same people?

Hill says something towards the end of the chapter that hit me, maybe because of what I have recently experienced. “In parting, I would remind you that “Life is a checkerboard, and the player opposite you is TIME. If you hesitate before moving, or neglect to move promptly, your men will be wiped off the board by TIME. You are playing against a partner who will not tolerate INDECISION!”  We only have a limited amount of time and it runs out, sometimes just like that. We need to get moving so we don’t die with our music still in us. I am preaching this to myself by the way.

 

Thank you Linda and Michael Dlouhy for believing in us and sharing your wisdom and thanks to my friends and mastermind partners for sharing your brilliance!

Rick Burnett

Spanish Fort, Al

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