Napoleon Hill: Think And Grow Rich
EPISODE 151
Think and Grow Rich has been called the "Granddaddy of All Motivational Literature." It was the first book to boldly ask, "What makes a winner?" The man who asked and listened for the answer, Napoleon Hill, is now counted in the top ranks of the world's winners himself.
The most famous of all teachers of success spent "a fortune and the better part of a lifetime of effort" to produce the "Law of Success" philosophy that forms the basis of his books and that is so powerfully summarized in this one. Napoleon said his philosophy can help people succeed in any line of work, to do and be anything they can imagine.
SHOW OUTLINE
INTRO
Bob Proctor gives us the context on Hill
Napoleon Hill Story (2m42)
Mani Vaya of 2000Books introduces us to the power of the subconscious
The big idea
ACTION & PRACTICE
Mani and how deliberate emotional visualizations influence your subconscious thoughts
Power of emotions (1m17)
Mani tells us Napoleon’s story to inspire a burning obsession
Burn the boats (2m29)
MINDSET
Mani and how we should see and feel that your goal has been accomplished
Visualization (47s)
OUTRO
Napoleon encourages us to start writing our goals and reflecting on our visions today
Your only limit is yourself (1m06)
CLIP CREDITS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sm9pNiYpiDY&ab_channel=EvanCarmichael
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTl-X6BkrDU&ab_channel=EvanCarmichael
Napoleon Hill: Think And Grow Rich
TRANSCRIPT
And welcome to dementia. It's podcast. It's episode 151. I'm your co-host Mike Parsons. And as all waves, I am joined by the man who knows how to think and grow. It's Mr. Mark Pearson and Freeland. Good morning, mark. Hey, good morning, Mike money Parsons. Wayne Parsons is in their house. Mark. We are starting a new series and I'm pretty bummed.
Yep. This is brand new for you and I and our listeners, Mike, this is our first moonshots series on money. This is a pretty exciting extension to the self-improvement and entrepreneurs and authors that we always dig into. Isn't it, Mike, this is a bit of a new one. A bit of a departure from the normal, but I propose to you mark, and to all of our listeners, if you are trying to be the best version of yourself, both professionally and personally you're going [00:01:00] to need one thing in modern life and that's money.
And so it's an essential part to shooting for the moon, but it's also something that, you know, crazy, man, we often I would challenge to you and to our listeners, how many money courses and practical advice and explanations did you receive at high school? Very few, if any, which is bizarre.
Yeah. And when I was a kid, most families didn't even really like to talk about money. It was a bit of a taboo isn't it? Which is a strange idea because of how much of our lives we consider. We review, we want to check out our finances, but for some reason, when you're growing up, it's just something that nobody wants to discuss or openly talk about, do that.
It's really [00:02:00] crazy. And obviously things have changed somewhat in modern times, but I still propose to you. It's a massive issue that is underrepresented. If you think about it, what's the biggest killer of a business, lack of cash and capital. That's why you have to close the doors and it amazes me if we transitioned to what happens in our personal lives here is some amazing.
Numbers 10% of Americans, 10% confident that I'll have enough money for retirement and even more concerning still one in four Americans gets to retirement. And they have zero savings. I'm thinking we need to talk about money. We need to manage our money. We need to get in control of this situation, whether you're [00:03:00] trying to be great at work or great at home or anywhere in between.
I feel like, Hey, there's work to be done in this area. What do you think? Yeah, I totally, I agree. And that's why listeners we're kicking off a brand new series in show 151 today. We're deep into Napoleon Hill's think and grow rich (Buy on Amazon), which Mike is pretty much well-known as a, as somebody called it, the ultimate self-help book, the Bible, the first, the greatest we're talking about something that is insanely popular more than 70 million copies have been sold of Napoleon Hill's book, think and grow rich and wait for it.
Mark. It is written. The original transcript was written in 1934 yet it's still is a number one ranking book on Amazon. Tell me, is there any other book perhaps? Maybe, I don't know, the Bible or the [00:04:00] Qur'an. This is off the charts. You want to talk about the bedrock, the foundation of self-improvement being the best version of yourself.
This comes before Dale Carnegie. It comes before Stephen Covey. This book was the original and has been called the grand daddy of all motivational literature, Mick. It's a true landmark event. This book. Yeah, and it really transcends not any kind of getting in charge of your financial future and your wealth, but it transcends that to become almost like realizing your destiny.
I would say in classic terms, it is one powerhouse book. We are gonna have such a rip-roaring adventure through this book. So mark, let's get stuck into the story of Napoleon hill. Where do you want to start? I want to start with a fantastic intro and context setter [00:05:00] on the bone-in hill and his book think and grow rich by an individual called Bob Proctor.
So let's hear from Bob Proctor, tell us the Napoleon hill. That's the deployant hill. When he was a young reporter working for a magazine, the magazine decided that they were going to write articles on wealth, Hilton, duck, the opportunity to spend three hours interviewing Andrew Carnegie. I've often thought of this.
I wonder how nervous he would be, how intimidated he would be. He was broke and here he is sitting down with the wealthiest man in the world. At the time Andrew Carnegie was considered the first billionaire.
He spent three days with him. Now, unbeknownst to Napoleon hill, Andrew Carnegie was looking for people. He was looking for a person. Carnegie said, he thought it was an absolute crime that people like himself, like Henry Ford, Thomas Edison's, [00:06:00] Harvey Firestone, and all these people who had mass Sprig, fortunes he's out of extra crime.
They were going to their grave with all this knowledge locked up in their bones. He was looking for someone that would organize this information so that people like you and I could learn it
about halfway through or towards the end of the interview. He thought maybe he'll was the guy who was looking for. Cause he hadn't found anybody yet. At the end of the interview, he said an employee and this interview is ending. It's just beginning. I want you to come home with me. And he took them home.
They spent three days together at the end of the three days, he said, Napoleon, I'm going to ask you a question and I just want a yes or no answer. He said, are you. To dedicate the rest of your life to an idea for which you will probably receive no material compensation for at least 20 years. [00:07:00] What he didn't tell him yell.
He had to stop writing in his hand and he only gave him 60 seconds to answer the question in 25 seconds, he'll say, yes, I will. Now he said, I want you
gather information. I will give you letters of introduction. Paul Berry, very successful. He became intimate friends with Edison and Ford. Like I'm just explaining, and I want you to put it together in an organized manner so that anyone can do what I've done. Now, I'm going to tell you something so far as I've been able to determine hill Carnegie made maybe 50 million years, the Polian Hills made millions of millionaires.
Wow. Can you imagine going to see Andrew Carnegie as a journalist? And you're pretty hard up financially and you are meeting a guy that in today's terms is worth almost $12 billion. [00:08:00] And he says, look I would love you to go around and meet all these other guys like Henry Ford. He's worth a call $33 billion.
I want you to go around and find out their secret formula. And to imagine that invitation sparked a moment where Napoleon hill, as Bob Proctor was saying, went on to create. Hundreds, maybe thousands of millionaires from his book, even more millionaires than Andrew Carnegie himself created. What a moment in history, mark.
Yeah, this guy, Napoleon hill, just a journalist learning from this individual, the first Andrew county to technically, maybe the first billionaire as Bob protocols out. What an opportunity for Napoleon hill to learn from these Bayer myths in the, in their various industries, learn those secrets, those [00:09:00] tips that help them succeed and package it up, organize the secrets into a package for you and I and our listeners and 70 years worth of readers to dig into and analyze and learn from.
What an accomplishment really fantastic. He went around and he taught to a lot of people. I believe mark was the number. I think when Napoleon hill was researching the book, am I right in understanding it was like 500 interviews that he did to build the book. I believe it took him about 20 years of interviews to gather all of the different secrets, all of the different laws and many individuals who had amassed huge personal fortunes in order to build it into the think and grow rich book.
So just the amount of work that Napoleon hill put [00:10:00] into this tome, this work, which as you can figure out, was published during the great depression in America. It's it was such a, probably one of the first times, all of the thinking, all of the. Insights from such a breadth of individuals was actually gathered together probably one of the first times, Mike I think you're absolutely right.
And what is crazy is if you think about how much research Napoleon did over those 20 years to write the book, if you think about we're always blown away, like Jim Collins spent with his team six years researching. Good to great. Or any of the academics who spent four years or they did a study for seven years were talking about their regional here.
Napoleon hill 20 is 500 interviews. And guess what? Mark, [00:11:00] he came in. With a big idea. He distilled a fundamental truth for financial success and so much more. Are you ready to hear this bid from Napoleon hill? Yes, please. Mike don't tease it any further. Okay. We're going to have a listen to a money value of 2000 books.
Breaking down the big idea of the heavyweight champion of the world, Napoleon hill. And he's. Think and grow rich. We all have two minds inside of us, the conscious and the subconscious, how we were in terms of sheer power. The subconscious mind is orders of magnitude more powerful than the conscious mind.
There is literally no comparison. If the size of the conscious mind is the size of a microwave oven, the subconscious mind is the size of the Milky way. It's extremely powerful. And the computational resources it has are humongous, [00:12:00] millions of times, more powerful than the conscious mind. So in order to accomplish your big goals, you need to harness the power of your subconscious mind by programming it with the goal that you want.
And how do we harness the power of the subconscious mind and program it for what we want? Given the nature of our subconscious mind and the conscious mind, it is not easy to program the subconscious mind, but it is entirely possible. And this book is all about understanding precisely how to do that.
Okay, this is breaking it down for us. Now, Mike, with money, vayar telling us that the secret the Napoleon hill really found was understanding the true power of your own subconscious. And once you appreciate that, there's a difference between my subconscious in the background. It's powering away. My conscious is obviously what I'm interacting with right now.
If you can harness the vastly larger computational power of your [00:13:00] subconscious and train it and harness it in order to be more efficient, more focused, you can go out and achieve the same level of perhaps success or the same level of achievements that some of these individuals that Napoleon hill went out and interviewed.
That's a pretty significant insight that I think Napoleon hill was able to find wasn't it? Yeah. It's almost like he's saying, Hey we spend a lot of. Most of our time in conscious thought. And what this book really uncovered is the difference maker is subconscious thought. And what is pretty crazy is before we get to the solution.
So I do want to relate to that because I think let's ask ourselves, where do we see ourselves just being stuck in conscious thought. And for me, the way I relate to that is times where I'm just answering emails, going to meetings, getting to the end of [00:14:00] the day, crashing out and doing it all again and lacking.
Time for goal setting for reflection for being present, like I'm just responding to the stimulus around me. I'm just, computating at a very tactical level. I'm not doing any reflection. Do you think that's what it looks like when we're just very much in that conscious approach. That's exactly how I relate to it.
So conscious being the immediate reactions to the things around you and not giving yourself and your subconscious or your brain and the true power that you have enough reflection time in order to go out and be a little bit more insightful, a little bit more. Intentional, I think conscious for me is like a, an immediate reaction.
Whereas a subconscious element is something that you can train in order to be, to power your consciousness a [00:15:00] little bit more efficiently. So you're not just reacting, you're not just shooting from the hip as they might say. It's almost when you have your intuition signaling, something's not right, but you never deal with it by that's for me, an example of where you just not letting you're not giving enough time to this subconscious that Napoleon hill discovered that over 500 incredibly successful people, this was the overriding pattern, mark.
We're not, this is not some hippy trippy retreat that people do. In west coast, California, I'm saying back in the day, this is the fundamental thing that hundreds of successful people had. This is what Napoleon hill found that they did to engineer their success. That's [00:16:00] big.
Yeah. The individuals that he actually interviewed, Mike included as we heard Henry Ford, but he also spoke to Theodore Roosevelt Jr. He spoke to John D Rockefeller, Thomas Edison, Woodrow Wilson Dr. Alexander Graham bell, just to name like four or five. These are not the hippies. As he is saying, these are unbelievably well-known globally renowned thinkers and successful individuals who had mentally a mass vast fortunes.
The fact that we have the ability to dig into Napoleon Hill's work and think about what he uncovered and the fact that it really stems from this big idea of consciousness versus self-consciousness is a huge uncovering isn't it? There's a lot for us to process here because he's not, he's saying that is more [00:17:00] than just being tactically smart and managing your time well and hustling through the day.
I think he's going deeper and saying the real unlock is around positive, confident, subconscious, emotional Tobo boosting of yourself. Do you think that's the thing, is that the question we're going to answer on this show? Yeah, I think today the show 151 on the purlin Hills think and grow rich is exactly that it's helping you and I, and our listeners understand how we might be able to harness that deeper power or that deeper focus within us in order to go out and achieve those goals and those visions that we probably have either with regards to money or in fact, anything that you've got in your professional or home life.
So what we've got coming ahead [00:18:00] on this show, mark is we're going to get into the power of emotions, visualization, a concept of ultimate commitment called burning the boats. And we're going to discover if Napoleon hill found it's the power of the subconscious mind is the ultimate game changer.
Have the benefit of learning? What is the ultimate blocker? What's the thing that's going to stop that from happening. So what a great show we've got my what a treat for us to discuss the work of the granddaddy of self-improvement books. But before we do that, there are a lot of positive vibes coming from you, our members and mark, we continue to grow our member list.
Let's do, why don't you give a shout out to all of our members who've signed up@moonshots.io. Let's do a bit of a shout out to all of our members, mark, because we've really enjoyed all of their messages, all of the [00:19:00] things that they've shared. So hit us up with the list. Drum roll mark. Do-do here is the roll call for our loving and very attentive members on Patrion, welcoming in Yaniv Halena, mark, Byron, Tom DMR, and Ken modularly and Sandy Neil Brighton.
Terry John kneels and Bob a big, special shout out from myself, Mike and the moonshots team for all of our members who are joining us every week. And please continue to send us your thoughts, your feedback and recommendations because every single one of them provides us with great inspiration as well as guidance on this.
Big shout out to Justin. Who's a new listener who reached out to us. He's in a bunch of really important meetings at work over the coming period. And he said he really found the nuggets from [00:20:00] the podcast, he really loved them and they were really helpful. And so a big shout out to Justin, we really appreciate it when new listeners reach out to us, mark, it's always good to hear what they enjoy about the show and to make sure that we're doing the right thing, where like we're putting together a show that you are listening.
Truly enjoy that truly appreciate it because that's what it's all about. Isn't it? Yeah, that's right. We on the moonshot show a dog digging into these entrepreneurs and authors uncovering the secrets of the greatest thinkers that are out there. Some of whom are modern. Some of them are classic, like today's show Napoleon hill.
And when we hear from brand new listeners also enjoying what we're learning and calling hours and experiencing live with you guys, it really means a lot to us. So please listeners, whether you're a lifetime listeners or brand new, give us a little bit of a message because we love to hear it. And a big welcome to [00:21:00] all of the Brazilian listeners.
We went rocketing up the podcast charts in Brazil. I think we hit 36 in business and entrepreneurship this week. So big, welcome to our Brazilian listeners. Tell us what you like about the show we invite you to give us feedback. Maybe there are some great Brazilian superstars that we can study and learn from mark.
You can I'm sure like let's just think about this sports athletes for one holy smoke. I think we could learn a lot from Brazil. I think you're totally right. So please, all of our listeners in Brazil, feel free to get in touch via any of the social media channels. You can even email us at hello, moonshots.io, or you become a member and you'll have access to contact us directly on the member platform.
All right. Now that we've done the most important work, which is to welcome you, our listeners, and an, a big shadow, [00:22:00] special shout out to our members. I think we're now going to go and do some serious work to understand how we can think and grow rich. According to this kind of epic piece of work from Napoleon hill himself mark, this is a book that has over 50,000 reviews on Amazon, just to set the scene here.
This is how big this book is in some 70, 80 years later after its publication. There are literally hundreds of people every week, writing things like this is the best self-help book I've ever read. This is a classic, all these kinds of stuff. So I don't know why it took us 151 shows to get to Napoleon hill mark.
We should. We should sort those hosts out. They don't know what they're doing, but let's get into this now. Mark, are you ready to do some serious [00:23:00] business? I am. I'm really excited to really dig into the actions and the practices of Napoleon Hill's think and grow rich. And Mike, this next clip we're going to hear from is from Manny again.
And Manny's going to introduce us to Napoleon Hill's lessons on the power of emotion. Use the power of emotions to direct your subconscious mind. Now it is not enough to think about your goals and just repeat them. You must mix those parts of your goals with emotions, the emotions you want to feel when the goal will be accomplished.
The subconscious mind only understands the language of emotions, emotional. I do not affect the subconscious mind. That is a fact. It does not understand the subconscious does not understand the language of logic or reason. So any language you use in order to program your subconscious mind has to involve emotions.
You have to feel the feelings in order to be able to program your subconscious mind. You must mix your thoughts at positive emotions or thoughts mixed with negative [00:24:00] emotions will unfortunately reach your subconscious mind by default. And tarts makes with emotions, have a magnetic force to them in the sense that they attract similar thoughts and emotions, positive emotions will keep on attracting more of those positive thoughts, more of those positive emotions.
So your job is to minimize the inflow of negative and disempowering thoughts and emotions, and to instead program your subconscious with deliberately designed positive and empowering cards, emotions, and feelings. And when we can consistently do that's when we have the key to unlocking our subconscious mind.
Man like this one deserves a little bit of a consideration from us here. So one thing I could pick up on that mark was, he's basically saying that if you're not programming yourself with positive emotions, He's basically saying watch out, cause the negative ones are going to start slipping in and [00:25:00] it's funny.
I think that sometimes you feel like it's a bit cheesy when you try and pump yourself up a bit. Don't you? I think that's the real blocker about thinking positive. Like you oh, this is a little bit Tony Robbins thing. Yeah. I think that is a bit of a blocker for me when I'm trying to get out of a funk when you're a little bit stressed or you're feeling a little bit of an, a negative emotion, I think what is being caught out in that clip is the fact that they can be magnetic.
So if you're in a bit of a funk and you're only focusing on the negatives, what you'll end up doing is attracting more negative thoughts. And if you can train yourself to be perhaps that a little bit more positive and you're right, step away from that kind of cheesy standing in front of the mirror, trying to pump yourself up, if you can actually harness and accept that process is actually [00:26:00] really valuable.
And it does in doing so attract more positive thoughts and more positive energy into your mindset and your behavior. It can actually be the way to unlock a very heightened efficiency in the work that you're going to go out and go and do. Yeah. So what do you, when you want to bring positive thinking Into your day.
How do you do it mark? Like where do you start by bringing your, I need to pump myself up. I need to remind myself I need to get positive. How do you do that? I think you've actually just touched on the word it's reminding. Again, going back to the big idea of Napoleon Hill's book, think and grow rich, the difference and harnessing the power of the subconscious versus the conscious, when you're in quite a conscious mode, you're only focusing on the here and now aren't you [00:27:00] and my reminding myself of positives.
Hey, remember that project that went really well, or remember you're in control of this situation. If you choose to remember that you can achieve this success because you've done it before, and it's essentially using mantras actually that's. Little hack, Mick, I'll go into my to do list app or maybe I'll open up my journal.
I've got a little whiteboard in my home office that I'll write up the mantras on. Occasionally when I refer back to those or even little post-it notes, those are great. You can just scribble something down and leave it on the desk. When you are in a bit of a funk or you're in a really conscious mode and way of thinking, you can glance at that in suddenly for me, it's like grounding myself a little bit and remembering the bigger picture it's it's like a workout, an essential workout for the mind is [00:28:00] positive thinking because this positive thinking over time, this continual practice primes the subconscious into positive emotion and positive emotion creates positive outcomes. Is that there's that the formula? Yeah. I really think I perform better when I'm working in a team.
And for those around me, when they're interacting with me, if I'm in a positive mind frame if I'm in a positive kind of mood and I don't mean positive jumping around the office what I mean is I'm willing to hear new ideas. I'm positive that other people have a point of view that is really valuable.
You're more willing to hear the other side's point of view because you're in a positive and therefore welcoming, inviting. Yeah so I think it's [00:29:00] you need to, I think the message in this book and what we have to do as a practice is to proactively embrace positive thinking. Just like we might say, I have to walk every day.
I have to run every day. I have to exercise every day because if we don't do this, Napoleon hill is saying you actually give opportunity for negative space in the subconscious. And unless you work on being positive and it comes right back to our resilience series that we just finished, which is makes this the perfect kind of bridge between the two series.
Unless you do this, you're going to be in for all sorts of subconscious bad vibes. You will just not have a glow about you. You will not have a as kind of a skip in your [00:30:00] step. I think what's really interesting here is that we need to find ways to continually prime ourselves to be positive because positive emotion is what gets through to the subconscious.
You can't be cerebral and reasoned with your subconscious, because that's what you're doing in your conscious. So you need to actually like bathe your subconscious in positivity. And one of the things that I like to do is to remind myself, like I have my different mantras written down.
I love to go back to those and to remind yourself of what you are good at. And one of the, one of the really empowering things that I found is ideas strengths finder, which by the way, mark, we should [00:31:00] do that on the show. And StrengthsFinder is a book and it has an online analysis tool that goes with it.
And it basically tells you who you are in terms of the way you work, a personality analysis, it's similar to 16 personalities.com. And I found that very powerful to get a picture of myself and to be able to remind myself of my most positive, the best version of myself.
And I still have those and I did this some 10, 15 years ago. I still have these as little manifestations of little positive mantras that that I can actually use. The profile that strengths finder gave me is it says I'm an arranger and individualized and achieve a maximizer and a learner.
And so I, I still returned to these [00:32:00] 10, 15 years later after reading the book as a way of confirming to myself and giving my subconscious positive emotions. This becomes like my bedrock, particularly if I'm tired, if I'm facing a lot of challenge, I go back to these, this is my sanctuary. This is how I get positive vibes, positive emotions, going back into my subconscious Allah Napoleon hill style.
What do you think? Yeah, that sounds very, really positive. I've done the 16 personalities online tests and I find them a very revealing and. The reason why I liked them is that it helps me notice some of the things that maybe I it makes me unique that perhaps I take for granted.
So for example, the one that you were just calling out there, a bit of an organizer, that's something that's perhaps more unique to yourself than it is to, [00:33:00] to me, for example, and we might share some traits, some DNA, but there might be differences between the way that we work. And I think it's a really valuable technique and format and almost templates to go out and check those hours because you're then able to notice those strengths.
So for example, Napoleon hill calling out the strength of the subconscious, if you can find those little strengths and you can remind yourself, Hey, you're really good at doing this. Suddenly the positive energy that we were hearing in that last clip is going to be elevated because we know that could be a unique thing that we're able to bring to the.
Bring to a meeting room bring to a particular project. Absolutely. And they, this kind of really sets the scene for the other work in Napoleon Hill's book, think and grow rich. Yeah. I love there's this anecdote mark in many kinds [00:34:00] of histories and mythologies of different cultures about this idea of burning the boats and Napoleon hill uses this to convey another really important topic in his book.
So let's now turn our ears towards this story of Napoleon hill and many is going to break this down for us. And it's all about burning the boat. No. Let me tell you the story of Spanish conqueror, Hernan Cortez, back in the 15 hundreds to really explain what it means to burn the boats. When Hernan Cortez warships arrived on what was then the Aztec empire.
He had clear intentions of fighting the Aztecs and conquering that area of board is now modern day Mexico. However, he quickly realized that his army was badly outnumbered almost to the ratio of one to one. And he saw that his soldiers were starting to hesitate and thinking of retreating in case the war did not go according to plan.
So [00:35:00] in order to get the very best out of his soldiers in order to get them to win, he ordered his men to burn their boats. And once the ports were born, there was no way of retreating. The soldiers knew very clearly that they only had two options, either win or die. There was no other way out do or die.
And that created a burning obsession inside of them to win and to live. And that is why his army went on to win the war. Even though they were outnumbered one, 200. Now that is the power of burning the boats. It quickly gets us to harness the power of our subconscious mind because when our survival is at stake, the subconscious mind brings all its power to bear on a given situation.
In those situations, we become unstuck. If you want to create a burning obsessive pulsating desire for something, if you really want to program your subconscious mind with your goal, you need to cut off all other paths of [00:36:00] retreat. You need to cut off all other possibilities. You have to go all in just one option.
And sometimes these situations are externally manufactured for us. For example, you are running out of money in your venture, and you have a clear deadline by which you must make the business work or the business. Many great entrepreneurs have actually created those moments as the ones that really torn their businesses around.
At other times, we have to burn the boats ourselves when there are no external manufactured situations available to us. And one of the ways you can do that is to publicly commit to a goal or another way to do that is to create real deadlines with real consequences. If the goal is not accomplished or whatever you do to burn the boats, make sure that it leads to a state of burning obsession, where you are almost obsessively thinking about the goal.
You need that fire, you need that obsession. You need that in order to program your subconscious mind. And that is what will trigger you to greatness. There's two key thoughts, Mike, that [00:37:00] stand out to me in that clip. One of them is quite a practical bit of advice for anybody running a project or starting to do, create a business and that's to have deadlines and timelines and roadmaps really commit to.
Like an end goal so that you can hold yourself accountable and get the project or the product out there because without a timeline, as we all know, you end up putting it on the back burner. So without having an intentional effort to get it out there, it live into the world. It might drag a little bit, and that's quite a practical bit of advice.
But the other lesson that I think where we're hearing in that story is a reminder that challenges are opportunities. So the challenge is not having a path out of that. Whether it's in a business context or whether it's you're landing in the land of the Aztecs. And you're trying [00:38:00] to figure out which way to go, whether to go home or not you can see the, that story and that story, the challenge that they had was where we don't have any other choice.
So therefore they were able to turn this real challenge, this obstacle into an opportunity to motivate themselves and to go out and achieve that goal. And I think that's probably for me, the key call-out there, which is when you have something forced upon yourself, maybe it's a challenge. Maybe it's a, and an issue, whatever it might be, that actually is going to be an opportunity for you to go out and achieve perhaps a better solution based on the fact that you've only got one way of doing it.
It's a story of commitment isn't and you should be absolutely committed to it. If you actually really want to take the island burn the boats, isn't that great. It's a great, it's a great little metaphor, isn't it? [00:39:00] And it goes back in a lot of different cultures the Vikings were famous for burning boats.
It's all about that commitment. And really if you want to see prosperity wealth and success coming your way, get behind it. Like one of the great bits of advice I was given when I was living in San Francisco and I was doing a lot of work in the startup community and a venture capitalist told me one of the great signs of startup failure is imminent is when one of the founders is consulting on the side.
And I'm like, okay, tell me more about it. And he was basically a lot. So if someone has the argument, like I can't afford to do the startups. So what I'll do is I'll consult on the side and then I'll be a part-time co-founder [00:40:00] because we're starting without any funding. And he's if the founders can't get together for three months and be all in and burn the boats, this thing's never working.
And so he, whenever he heard that a founder was doing that, he was like, Nope, not touching that because they weren't fully committed. They were still like, oh, I'm not really risking anything. Cause I'm doing the consulting on the side. And he was like classic, classic negative signal about the the future outcomes for this study.
Isn't that interesting. Yeah. And you know what? It makes sense, doesn't it? Because I, I'm going to, I'm going to go so far as to say a distraction when you're working on something else and you're not able to give it your full attention and let's say love you might find that it is a distraction in the sense that it, you can't give it your [00:41:00] full effort.
And again, yeah. Your going back to this big idea of thinking grow rich, unless you're giving it the power of your subconscious, as well as your conscious. If you're giving it only your conscious thinking, then you're not going to go out and succeed the level that you probably could do. Then there's always going to be a little bit limited.
I don't think that's what that story. Okay. It's like invaluable, isn't it? It's it's amazing. These life lessons that Napoleon wrote about growing rich and they really truly are like a self-improvement mantras, aren't they? Yeah. And I think that's the power of this book. Yes.
It's focused around financial achievements and the individuals that he, or the hundreds of individuals that he interviewed for the book had a master in a huge wealth. I think the truth is. Any of these lessons, even if we're not in similar industries, [00:42:00] as the people that he had interviewed for think and grow rich, the lessons are still absolutely true.
No matter what you're trying to achieve, whether it's in medicine, whether it's in business or innovation or anything else. I think the truth is that all of this, these powers of the emotion, putting yourself in a position where you can't back out, giving it your full attention and working and therefore working hard true across any of those.
I'm really. Yeah. I tell you who else is fully committed and that's our members and our members. We're super lucky because just a few days ago our members got the next installment of our moonshots master series. So we only shared the moonshot master series. There's a whole separate podcast with our members, mark.
We spent a lot of time talking about habits and we finally [00:43:00] produced quite the mass class. Didn't we, it was a very comprehensive, deep dive into the power of habits. So not only Mike, where we trying to get inspired by the likes of Tom Brady and Tim Ferriss, we actually dug into how to cultivate habits that you and I and our members can put into action every single day.
In the latest episode, over in our moonshots members section on Patrion episode four, the habits and how to create good daily habits is officially live for all of our members to go and check. And boy we covered some classics. We got du HIG, Brady, Ferris, Conaman Covey, James clear. We even found a new kind of guru from which we can learn.
That's Robin Sharma. So we have some thoughts from here. We've got some downloads on how to create a good daily habit. [00:44:00] Full transcript. And it's also great to see that our members are starting to share thoughts on each of these moonshots master series. So if you, our listeners, if you would love to support us for example, your contribution, your membership helps us pay for all of our hosting, which we still, we don't have enough members to pay for all of our different hosting, like our website and all over our podcast hosting.
So we need your support. We would love your support. We'll produce a great show for you every single week to help you be the best version of yourself. And we'd really appreciate it. If like our latest member Yaniv, if you could become a member and support us, it's like a dollar a week. It's really very little that helps us on our mission.
And it's also a signal that we're doing the right thing for you, our listeners. So we really would appreciate it. Go over to moonshots.io, click on the big members button [00:45:00] and the rest will be your destiny and talking about destiny. It's something that you need to bring to life. It's something you need to visualize.
And once again, Napoleon hill has thinking here, but let's have a listen to many breaking down the. Visualization in order to program our subconscious mind, we must see and feel the goal as if the goal is already accomplished, that you already have fortunate desire. Ask yourself, how would you act if you had already accomplished your goal, how would you feel?
What would you do? What feelings would dominate your mind? The key to visualization is to actually be able to see and feel yourself as having already accomplished the goal, rather than thinking of it as a distant possibility. So if you have a goal of making a million dollars by December 31st of next year, but you lose yourself on December 31st as having already accomplished that goal, don't think of it as something you would like to accomplish in the future that is creating the feeling of not having the goal right now.
[00:46:00] Instead feel that it is December 31st of next year right now. And you have already accomplished a goal. So this is a big. Build, I think Mike, on the power of visualization, which you and I, and our listeners are probably aware of the concept of putting something in your mind, seeing it in front of you and going out and chasing that goal.
But I think the difference than Napoleon Hill's calling out here is actually feeling, again, going back to that earlier clear power of emotions, feeling how you would be once you've achieved it. So rather than trying to see the roadmap, obviously that's going to be very important the journey in order to get you from point a to point B, but actually placing yourself in this mindset of, oh I've already achieved in that example, a million dollars by new year's Eve.
How are you going to feel? Maybe you'll feel positive. Maybe you'll feel confident. You can then utilize those [00:47:00] emotions and that feeling in your subconscious to power your decisions right now. He says in the book that visualization and belief in the attainment of desire, these are the powerful steps to your rich shoes.
And he goes on to talk about whatever the mind can conceive and believe it can achieve. Again, this is just reinforcing that big idea of think and grow rich. Isn't it reinforcing the power of your subconscious and by cultivating a visualized and positive mindset and foundation only then can you go out and achieve perhaps those dreams that you will starting to visualize?
And I think this is coming back to some of the earliest thoughts, if you want to get committed and you want to unlock the power of emotions and the subconscious it's the visualization [00:48:00] practice that gets you, isn't it? Yeah. And I think what I think is another build on the visualization lesson that we're learning here.
It's not to create a feeling of disappointment, is it? It's not saying, oh, I don't have my million dollars yet instead you're growing accustomed to the idea that, okay I'm working towards new year's Eve 31st of December. And if I can imagine how I feel at that point. Maybe I'll look back and say, wow, I put in so much hard work.
I feel very achieved. I feel very positive. I think it's not about putting yourself in a position now where you dreaming of having it. And therefore you're a little bit disappointed that you don't have it yet. You're setting more of a, an expectation that, yeah, it'll take that a little bit of time, but by having that powerful driver and that positive emotion present you're then going to be able to go out and utilize that [00:49:00] strength that drive that you've got inside you in order to try and go out and achieve it.
Yeah. It's it's like a crucial step in the way. And I think visualization. Unlocking your subconscious thoughts and getting committed. They're also deeply interrelated. I think one of the takeaways that I'm having is oh my gosh, how much you need to work on these? I think I've perhaps over recent time being a little bit lazy on the positive thinking.
I think I've been more about like the habits and less about the motivation, less about the the visualization, like an unlocking that, that, that subconscious it's funny. You would imagine in the clarity of a sports contest, people would be positive and trained and well-prepared, but sometimes the life we just slip out [00:50:00] of our positive habits, don't we, it's very easy to fall into a pattern of quite negative thinking I guess you could, as a blanket statement, you can fall into why don't I have a, yet, why isn't the project happening?
Why isn't the weather really sunny? These things that are perhaps out of your control you'll start to focus on. And I think that's why particularly our habits series for members, as well as our recent series on resilience where we're so powerful, Mike, because we're able to really dig into what drives us and how.
Utilize our own strengths in order to keep going forward. But I think you're right, this idea of visualization is perhaps something that I haven't really done too much of recently either. And I think this is something that is a reminder to me, that to really [00:51:00] unlock the power of the subconscious as we're learning, as well as the power of having good goals in mind, working towards where you want to be.
It's something that you don't necessarily want to put to one side and forget about it. There's a lot of value in having a good visualized processing place. It's, it was when we did the motivation series show for the master series, which. Available for all our members. You will remember that we talked about like motivations, like makes total sense.
And you're like, oh, I don't really work on maintaining my motivation. And it, what we're learning here, Napoleon hill is basically if you're not continually stimulating a subconscious with positive thought in the absence of that, it's not neutral. It becomes negative. Yes. It's actually, if you're not constantly working [00:52:00] on seeing that positive and I'd go so far as to say gratitude keeping a journal of what you are learning when you're enjoying our ways of cultivating that positive.
Oh, that positivity in your kind of reflections. And one of the themes that we've learned when we were doing power of now and how to stop wearing by Dale Carnegie, we learned that if you want to be happy, stop being happy. Yeah. Like it is so fundamental and intrinsic, do not underestimate when in doubt, smile, it seems so simple, but it's something that we all forget about.
Isn't it? Oh gosh. Oh gosh. It's like we're in a battle against ourselves and our laziness and our bad habits. And we have to keep reminding ourselves of how to be the best version of ourselves. Thank goodness. We have a podcast that helps us do that. Math it's [00:53:00] exactly. Thank grace. Listen, there is one more thought that we have from Napoleon hill and it's probably apps, the granddaddy of them all, because we've talked so much about how to get on track, how to get committed, positive thoughts, visualizing success, but it would only be appropriate that on this last clip that we listened to.
Actually the greatest obstacle to overcome. If we want to think and grow rich, pocket-sized a notebook or something on the order of this one here, a loose leaf affair. And on the page one, write down a clear description of your major desire in life, the one circumstance or a position or thing, which you will be willing to accept that as your IVs.
And remember before you begin lighting that you're all in limitations are those which you set up in your own mind or permit others to set up for you to on page two [00:54:00] of your notebook, write down a clear statement of precisely what you intend to give in return for that, which you desire from life, and then start in, right?
Why you stand now to begin giving. And so we memorize both of your statements, what you are and what you intend to give in return for it and repeat them at least a dozen times daily and all his and your statements with this expression of gratitude for the blessings, with which you were gifted at birth.
I mean hearing from the Polian hill himself, Mike giving us this secret sauce to achieving this a way of harnessing the subconscious in order to go out and be the best version of ourselves, seems like a perfect bookend to the think and grow a Sera episode that we've done today. Mike, and it, to me, it's all about ownership.
Reminding yourself and holding yourself [00:55:00] accountable along with mantras. Very much and I love that he brings, if you want things from the world, you must give to it. I love like how he puts you on this, but what are you giving? And the other thing that stood out to me was apart from the fact that if anybody didn't believe us, that he wrote this book in 1934, I think the quality of that audio should suggest that it doesn't veteran, Bali and hill was around a long time ago.
The other thing here is he said that you should repeat your, like your self defining vision and mantra is your purpose 12 times a day. Mark. I must have met Mike. I probably. Don't currently do that. But I think having known the context of Napoleon Hill's work the 20 years he spent studying and interviewing these individuals, if this is [00:56:00] the secret source that he's calling out boy, who am I to turn down repeating?
My mantra is 12 times a day, right? Yeah. Wow. Wow. Wow. Mark, we've gone to the granddaddy and we've taken a lot from his body of work and I thought it was great to end on Napoleon himself. So I want to throw you the big question. What's the one thing that changes having heard this, having done this show together?
What changes after exploring Napoleon hill think and grow rich? I think it's the connection that we've seen to. Eckhart tall and the idea of ownership around your subconscious actually. And I think the power of emotions for me really [00:57:00] understanding the magnetism that positive and negative thoughts have on my behavior and my reaction to things is a huge deal.
And I think that connects quite nicely into the final clip we heard from Napoleon himself, talking about yourself, being the only limit that you can encounter if I'm able to harness a slightly more positive approach, a positive way of thinking to my day to day, as well as my work life. I feel as though that's the secret source that can help me think and possibly even grow rich based on the podiums research.
It's let's just so much in this, isn't it like that insight, I've just priming your emotional self. That's huge. And having read the book quite a long time ago, it just comes back to me so much, even stronger now. And then when I held myself accountable, I'm like, yeah, I'm not [00:58:00] saying my affirmations mantras.
Yeah. My purpose 12 times a day. So I've got work to do, man. I think we all do well, mark. I want to say, thank you. Thank you to you for helping us enjoy this masterpiece. Thinking grow rich by Napoleon hill and thank you to you, our listeners, and a special thanks to our members today. We got a real treat together.
We learnt out loud and we went to Napoleon hill who did 500 interviews over 20 years with Titans of industry. And he came back with this big idea, the power of subconscious, and then he gave us some very important advice on how we can make ourselves not only. Positive, but successful how to become the best version of ourselves.
He said, deliberate, emotional visualizations to prime, our [00:59:00] subconscious number one. And it's not only seeing it. It is feeling the emotion. This is what will help us realize our dreams. And he said, you have to get committed. You need to burn the boats. If you want to take the island. And it is critical to visualize and feel your dreams, not just once, not just twice but 12 times a day, and the greatest barrier to achieving the very best for yourself for thinking and growing rich, the biggest barrier will be your own self.
Take this as a daily practice, a daily habit, a daily lifestyle, where you continue to prime yourself with positivity to get a hundred percent committed, to do the best things that you can possibly do in this world. And if there was ever a book that celebrates what we're all about here, it is thinking grow rich by Napoleon hill.
[01:00:00] So I hope you really enjoyed going deep on an absolute epic masterclass today on the moonshots podcast. That's a wrap.