Flip This Wholesaler

So, I’ve totally spent this entire week in bed all hopped up on pain pills.  Aleve, actually.  I think they make your stomach bleed or something like that if you take too many of them though, so I just started drinking wine instead to dull the pain.  Because there’s nothing better than drinking a glass of merlot at 1pm on a Wednesday afternoon. In bed. (I’m just kidding, Mom).

Anyway, the good news is that my back is finally feeling better, but the bad news is that I haven’t really gotten anything important accomplished this week, unless you consider surfing the net important. In which case, I got all kinds of important stuff done this week.

Anyhoodle, it’s time for another Flip This Book Club Review, brought to you by my dear friend Shae Bynes from GoodFaithInvesting.com.  This month’s book was Think and Grow Rich, by Napoleon Hill- I hope you guys enjoyed it!

Take it away, Shae….

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Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill is a best-selling business classic.  I’m sure many of you read this book months or even years ago, but this was actually my very first time reading it. For those who didn’t know, Think and Grow Rich was initially published in 1937 during the Great Depression and, according to Hill, is a result of 20 years of research and analysis of hundreds of well-known high achieving men who had accumulated vast fortunes using businessman Andrew Carnegie’s “secret for success.”

If you’ve already read numerous books on success and personal development, many (but likely not all) of the 13 Success Principles presented by Napoleon Hill will be familiar to you because Think and Grow Rich served as the inspiration and foundational text for many of those other books you’ve read and enjoyed!  Here are the 13 Success Principles along with some of the quotes that really stuck out to me from the respective chapter on the topic.

• Desire:  Wishing will not bring riches but desiring riches with a state of mind that becomes an obsession, then planning definite ways and means to acquire riches, and backing those plans with persistence which does not recognize failure, will bring riches.  No one is ready for a thing until he believes it.
• Faith: Faith is the head chemist of the mind. It is the “eternal elixir” which gives life, power, and action to the impulse of thought. Faith is the only antidote for failure!
• Auto-Suggestion: Remember when reading aloud the statement of your desire, that the mere reading of the words is of no consequence – unless you mix emotion, or feeling with your words.
• Specialized Knowledge: Specialized knowledge does not necessarily have to be in possession of the man who accumulates the fortune. Knowledge has no value except that which can be gained from its application toward some worthy end.
• Imagination: First you give life and action and guidance to ideas, then they take on power of their own and sweep aside all opposition.
• Organized Planning: Temporary defeat should mean only one thing, the certain knowledge that there is something wrong with your plan. We see men who have accumulated great fortunes, but we often recognize only their triumph, overlooking the temporary defeats which they had to surmount before “arriving.” (Side note: I loved the list of 31 major causes of failure in this chapter)
• Decision: Analysis of several hundred millionaires disclosed the fact that every one of them had the habit of reaching decisions promptly, and of changing these decisions slowly, if, and when they were changed.
• Persistence: Persistence is a state of mind, therefore it can be cultivated. Persistence is the direct result of habit.  Organized plans, even though they may be weak and entirely impractical, encourage persistence.
• Master Mind: No individual has sufficient experience, education, native ability, and knowledge to insure the accumulation of a great fortune, without the cooperation of other people.
• Sex Transmutation: Take inventory of those whom you know to be men of great achievement, and see if you can find one among them who is not highly sexed.  Man’s greatest motivating force is his desire to please woman! (Hey, these are Napoleon’s words…not mine! LOL! Gentleman, do you even agree with this? Just curious.)
• Subconscious Mind: Thoughts of fear and poverty and all negative thoughts serve as a stimuli to your subconscious mind,  unless you master these impulses and give it more desirable food upon which it may feed. The subconscious mind will not remain idle! If you fail to plant desires in your subconscious mind, it will feed upon the thoughts which reach it as the result of your neglect.
• The Brain: Every human brain is both a broadcasting and receiving station for the vibration of thought. The subconscious mind is the “sending station” of the brain [and] the creative imagination is the “receiving set” through which the energies of thought are picked up.
• The Sixth Sense: The starting point of all achievement is desire. The finishing point is that brand of knowledge which leads to understanding – understanding of self, understanding of others, understanding of the laws of nature, recognition and understanding of happiness…this comes in its fullness only through familiarity with, and use of the principle of the sixth sense.

At the risk of catching flack for this comment, I’ll share that I personally resonated much more with some of the more contemporary professional development experts and books such as Jim Rohn’s The Five Major Pieces of the Life Puzzle, Brian Tracy’s Maximum Achievement, and Mark Victor Hansen, Jack Canfield, and Les Hewitt’s The Power of Focus.  Also, depending on your world view and spiritual beliefs (or even the lack thereof), some of the language and concepts presented in Think and Grow Rich may be a little uncomfortable or simply not jive with you at all. Nevertheless, there is so much wisdom within the pages of this book and, for many people, this is the very book that opened up a world of new possibilities.

So that’s my nickel. What’s yours?

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Thanks for another outstanding review, Shae!

Next month’s book choice is The Power of Focus, by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, and Les Hewitt. Both Shae and I have already read this one, but it’s definitely worthy of a second time through! We’ll meet here on Monday September 20th-ish at 8pm to discuss!

Later Alligators!

P.S.
Shae is having a contest on Facebook to see who can come up with the tastiest coffee drink recipe. If you win, you get some of her delicious magical mushroom coffee (or tea), which also cures diseases and makes you look 20 years younger. You can learn more about the contest here.

P.P.S.
Sorry if the font is really small in the middle of the book review. I tried to fix it, but as I’ve mentioned before, WordPress is a dirty, dirty, hooker and wouldn’t let me.

P.P.P.S.
Shae just brought to my attention (in the comments below) that the word “Napoleon” is highlighted several times in this post.  I have no clue how that happened, and no idea how to fix it.  Apparently WordPress is mocking me.