Sean Rasmussen

Hill goes on here to provide even further proof of the success of dedication and curiosity.

A Course In Success

Let’s consider a second Depression-era example.

During the depression a salesman in a grocery store found himself without a job. Having had some bookkeeping experience, he took a course in accounting, familiarized himself with all the latest bookkeeping and office equipment, and went into business for himself. Starting with the grocer for whom he had formerly worked, he made contracts with more than 100 small merchants to keep their books, at a very nominal monthly fee. His idea was so practical that soon enough he found he needed to set up a portable office in a light delivery truck, which he equipped with modern bookkeeping machinery. His business grew until he had a whole fleet of these bookkeeping offices “on wheels” and employed a large staff of assistants, thus providing small merchants with accounting service equal to the best that money can buy, at a very affordable prices.

Ingredients For Success

Specialized knowledge, plus imagination, were the ingredients that went into this unique and successful business. The accounting business owner’s income grew to ten times what it was when he worked in the grocery store. The man’s temporary adversity proved to be a blessing in disguise.

The beginning of this successful business was an idea!

Of course, the salesman’s road to success was not as direct as this story first makes it sound. When it was first suggested to the salesman that he go into the bookkeeping business, he quickly said, “I like the idea, but I wouldn’t know how to turn it into cash.” In other words, he complained he would not know how to market his bookkeeping knowledge after he acquired it.

Marketing Success

So, that brought up another problem which had to be solved. With the aid of a young woman typist who had a knack for letter-writing, a booklet was prepared, describing the advantages of the new system of bookkeeping. The pages were neatly typed and pasted in an ordinary scrapbook, which was used as a silent salesman; the story of this new business was so effectively told that its owner soon had more accounts than he could handle.

Proof In Action

Again, Hill proves how dedication and action can and do succeed. If you believe there is a way to accomplish your goals, and dedicate to seeing that through by being willing to act, success will be yours!

Sean Rasmussen
Success Communicator
SeanRasmussen.com © 2004 - 2009

What does it mean to be an educated man or woman? By definition, modern society would claim that it means that a person had undertaken extensive study at school and university. To more knowledgeable people, it is known that that is not necessarily a truth.

An Abundance Of Knowledge

An educated man is not, necessarily, one who has an abundance of general or specialized knowledge. An educated man is one who has developed the faculties of his mind in such a way that he can acquire anything he wants, or its equivalent, without violating the rights of others. Both Henry Ford and Bill Gates fall well within the meaning of this definition.

Education Exemplified

During the First World War, a Chicago newspaper published a number of editorials in which, among other statements, Henry Ford was called “an ignorant pacifist.” Mr. Ford objected to the statements, and sued the paper for libeling him. When the suit was tried in the Courts, the attorneys for the paper pleaded justification, and placed Ford himself on the witness stand, for the purpose of proving to the jury that he was ignorant. The attorneys asked Mr. Ford a great variety of questions, all of which were intended to prove, by his own evidence, that, while he might possess considerable specialized knowledge pertaining to the manufacture of automobiles, he was, overall, ignorant.

Mr. Ford was asked questions like:

“Who was Benedict Arnold?” and “How many soldiers did the British send over to America to put down the Rebellion of 1776?” In answer to the last question, Mr. Ford replied, “I do not know the exact number of soldiers the British sent over, but I have heard that it was a considerably larger number than ever went back.”

Finally, Ford grew tired of this line of questioning, and in reply to a particularly offensive question, he leaned over, pointed his finger at the lawyer who had asked the question, and said, “If I should really want to answer the foolish question you have just asked, or any of the other questions you have been asking me, let me remind you that I have a row of electric push-buttons on my desk, and by pushing the right button, I can summon to my aid men who can answer any question I desire to ask concerning the business to which I am devoting most of my efforts. Now, will you kindly tell me, why I should clutter up my mind with general knowledge, for the purpose of being able to answer questions, when I have men around me who can supply any knowledge I require?”

Playing The Logic Card

There certainly was good logic to that reply.

That answer floored the lawyer. Every person in the courtroom realized it was the answer, not of an ignorant man, but of a man of education. Any man is educated who knows where to get knowledge when he needs it, and how to organize that knowledge into definite plans of action. Through the assistance of his “Master Mind” group, Henry Ford had at his command all the specialized knowledge he needed to enable him to become one of the wealthiest men in America. It was not essential that he have this knowledge in his own mind. Surely no person who has sufficient inclination and intelligence to read a book of this nature can possibly miss the significance of this point.

Access To Knowledge

This is an important point. You do not need to know everything, you just need to know how to access the knowledge that you do require at various points in your life travels. It’s fairly obvious that you possess that skill, because somehow you landed here, surrounding yourself with a community of support for success and the access to knowledge for building prosperity. Not one of us here claims to “know it all” already, but we do claim the education to know how to access the resources that we need to succeed.

Sean Rasmussen
Success Communicator
SeanRasmussen.com © 2004 - 2009

The big players already were seeing the promise and success of affiliations, and so they all could see just how promising Schwab’s plan was. But there was an elemental piece to the puzzle that needed to be secured.

Financial Magnetism

“The financial magnetism that began, a generation ago, to attract thousands of small and sometimes inefficiently managed companies into large and competition-crushing combinations, had become operative in the steel world through the devices of that jovial business pirate, John W. Gates. Gates already had formed the American Steel and Wire Company out of a chain of small concerns, and together with Morgan had created the Federal Steel Company. The National Tube and American Bridge companies were two more Morgan concerns, and the Moore Brothers had forsaken the match and cookie business to form the ‘American’ group— Tin Plate, Steel Hoop, Sheet Steel—and the National Steel Company.

“But by the side of Andrew Carnegie’s gigantic vertical trust, a trust owned and operated by fifty-three partners, those other combinations were picayune. They might combine to their heart’s content but the whole lot of them couldn’t make a dent in the Carnegie organization, and Morgan knew it.

It’s All In What You Know

“The eccentric old Scot knew it, too. From the magnificent heights of Skibo Castle he had viewed, first with amusement and then with resentment, the attempts of Morgan’s smaller companies to cut into his business. When the attempts became too bold, Carnegie’s temper was translated into anger and retaliation. He decided to duplicate every mill owned by his rivals. Hitherto, he hadn’t been interested in wire, pipe, hoops, or sheet. Instead, he was content to sell such companies the raw steel and let them work it into whatever shape they wanted. Now, with Schwab as his chief and able lieutenant, he planned to drive his enemies to the wall.

“So it was that in the speech of Charles M. Schwab, Morgan saw the answer to his problem of combination. A trust without Carnegie-giant of them all—would be no trust at all, a plum pudding, as one writer said, without the plums.

Understanding The Elements

Charles Schwab understood the opportunity in a way that the others had failed to see up until this point. That is not so unlike those who fail to see the opportunity that the right wealth creation mindset holds. Think of yourself as a Schwab—as one who understands the essentials of the opportunity, and then act, just as Schwab did—taking steps, making actions, and making your dream a reality!

Sean Rasmussen
Success Communicator
SeanRasmussen.com © 2004 - 2009

As we said at the end of the last post, there will always be cynics—and we all know we’ve seen them around the ‘net aplenty—who will deny that something so simple could have any power over life. Today, let’s see if we can’t support that notion a little more as we make a connection between thought and physical reality.

Thoughts in Translation

In connection with this, consider again the statement, all thoughts which have been emotionalized (given feeling), and mixed with faith, immediately begin to translate themselves into their physical equivalent or counterpart.

The emotions, or the “feeling” portion of thoughts, are the factors which give thoughts vitality, life, and action. The emotions of Faith, Love, and Sex, when mixed with any thought impulse, give it greater action than any of these emotions can do on their own.

Mind Your Recipe

This does not only apply to thought impulses which have been mixed with faith; thoughts mixed with any positive or negative emotions can reach and influence the subconscious mind.

Hence, the subconscious mind will translate a negative or destructive thought into its physical equivalent just as readily as it will act on positive or constructive thoughts. This accounts for the strange phenomenon which so many millions of people experience and refer to as “misfortune,” or “bad luck.”

Believe And You Will Be

There are millions of people who believe that they are “doomed” to struggle financially and fail because of some strange force they believe they have no control over. They are the creators of their own “misfortunes,” because of this negative belief, which is picked up by the subconscious mind, and translated into its physical equivalent.

This seems an appropriate place to remind you that you can benefit and create your own financial destiny by passing any desire which you hope to see translated into wealth creation on to your subconscious mind in a state of expectancy or belief that the transformation will actually take place. Your belief, or faith, is the element which determines the action of your subconscious mind. There is nothing to stop you from “deceiving” your subconscious mind when you instruct it (through auto-suggestion), just as Hill deceived his son’s subconscious mind.

Catch-22 For Cynics

It never ceases to amaze me how many cynics will read a concept like this and tell you it is rubbish—without even connecting the fact that their own negativity and closed-mindedness is the reason this concept cannot work for them! The Law of Attraction works both ways; but you don’t have to even believe in the Law to understand why this concept would hold true. It’s a simple matter of choice and perception. You choose how to perceive the events in your life (even the bad ones) and whether to remain in a state of negativity or move forward and beyond them. In so doing, you choose either a path of positive attraction or negative—but the choice is always up to you!

Sean Rasmussen
Success Communicator
SeanRasmussen.com © 2004 - 2009

This post concludes the Congressman’s letter. What I find interesting here is how he talks about people needing a book like this because so many are faced with starting anew after years in economic turmoil. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?

Historical Repetitions

If there is any possible way that you can afford to render so great a service, may I offer the suggestion that you include with every book, one of your Personal Analysis Charts, in order that the purchaser of the book may have the benefit of a complete self-inventory, indicating, as you indicated to me years ago, exactly what is standing in the way of success.

Such a service as this, providing the readers of your book with a complete, unbiased picture of their faults and their virtues, would mean to them the difference between success and failure. The service would be priceless.

Millions of people are now facing the problem of staging a come-back, because of the depression, and I speak from personal experience when I say, I know these earnest people would welcome the opportunity to tell you their problems, and to receive your suggestions for the solution.

Perpetual Wishes

You know the problems of those who face the necessity of beginning all over again. There are thousands of people in America today who would like to know how they can convert ideas into money, people who must start at scratch, without finances, and recoup their losses. If anyone can help them, you can.

If you publish the book, I would like to own the first copy that comes from the press, personally autographed by you.

With best wishes, believe me,
Cordially yours,
JENNINGS RANDOLPH

Principles Worth Repeating

Thousands of people in America, and thousands more across the world, are still in need of such resources. And this timeless classic is one of them. It’s been said many times and is worth repeating again—the principles of success are timeless, ageless, and work as well today as they did back then. Only thankfully now the resource is at the ready, and we do not need to wait for it!

Sean Rasmussen
Success Communicator
SeanRasmussen.com © 2004 - 2008