Discovering Yourself: Living the Work You Were Meant to Do

By Orison Swett Marden

It is important to thoughtfully choose our careers but for many reasons many of us take a job because it is the first decent offer that comes along. Over time we are content to move up in salary, rather than personal satisfaction. We have no choice, as we have bills to pay and a family to support.

But Orison Swett Marden says that we must not settle. We have a personal obligation to find our own happiness and success. In fact, the world demands that we experience fulfillment for ourselves as our happiness also affects those around us.

In this book, Discovering Yourself, Marden goes through the preparation and pursuit of fulfillment and includes the life stories of successful men and women as told by themselves.

Chapters include:
• The Victorious Attitude
• According to Thy Faith
• Doubt the Traitor
• Making Dreams Come True
• Making Yourself a Prosperity Magnet
• Where Your Supply Is
• You Are Headed Toward Your Ideal
• Education Under Difficulties
• Misfit Occupations
• This One Thing I Do
• Enthusiasm
• Doing Everything To A Finish
• The Help Yourself Society
• How to Find Oneself
• Life Stories of Successful Men and WomenTold By Themselves

“To be a conqueror in appearance, in one’s bearing, is the first step toward success. It inspires confidence in others as well as in one self. Walk, talk and act as though you were a somebody, and you are more likely to become such. Move about among others as though you believe you are a person of importance. Let victory speak from your face and express itself in your manner. Carry yourself like one who is conscious of having a splendid mission, a grand aim in life. Radiate a hopeful, expectant, cheerful atmosphere. In other words, be a good advertisement of the winner you are trying to be.”

• Language: English
• Publisher: G&D Media
• Release date: Apr 3, 2020
• ISBN: 9781722524388

Orison Swett Marden

El Dr. Orison Swett Marden (1848-1924) fue un autor inspirador estadounidense que escribió sobre cómo lograr el éxito en la vida. A menudo se le considera como el padre de los discursos y escritos inspiradores de la actualidad, y sus palabras tienen sentido incluso hasta el día de hoy. En sus libros, habló de los principios y virtudes del sentido común que contribuyen a una vida completa y exitosa. A la edad de siete años ya era huérfano. Durante su adolescencia, Marden descubrió un libro titulado Ayúdate del autor escocés Samuel Smiles. El libro marcó un punto de inflexión en su vida, inspirándolo a superarse a sí mismo y a sus circunstancias. A los treinta años, había obtenido sus títulos académicos en ciencias, artes, medicina y derecho. Durante sus años universitarios se mantuvo trabajando en un hotel y luego convirtiéndose en propietario de varios hoteles. Luego, a los 44 años, Marden cambió su carrera a la autoría profesional. Su primer libro, Siempre Adelante (1894), se convirtió instantáneamente en un éxito de ventas en muchos idiomas. Más tarde publicó cincuenta o más libros y folletos, con un promedio de dos títulos por año. Marden creía que nuestros pensamientos influyen en nuestras vidas y nuestras circunstancias de vida. Dijo: "La oportunidad de oro que estás buscando está en ti mismo. No está en tu entorno; no es la suerte o el azar, o la ayuda de otros; está solo en ti mismo".

Book preview

DISCOVERING YOURSELF

DISCOVERING YOURSELF

Living the Work You Were Meant to Do

ORISON SWETT MARDEN

Published 2020 by Gildan Media LLC

aka G&D Media

www.GandDmedia.com

DISCOVERING YOURSELF. Copyright © JMW Group Inc. All rights exclusively licensed by JMW Group Inc., [e-mail].

No part of this book may be used, reproduced or transmitted in any manner whatsoever, by any means (electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. No liability is assumed with respect to the use of the information contained within. Although every precaution has been taken, the author and publisher assume no liability for errors or omissions. Neither is any liability assumed for damages resulting from the use of the information contained herein.

Front cover design by David Rheinhardt of Pyrographx

Interior design by Meghan Day Healey of Story Horse, LLC

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request

ISBN: 978-1-7225-0333-8

eISBN: 978-1-7225-2438-8

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

CONTENTS

HOW TO USE THIS BOOK

PREFACE

PART I

PREPARATION

CHAPTER I The Victorious Attitude

CHAPTER II According to Thy Faith

CHAPTER III Doubt the Traitor

CHAPTER IV Making Dreams Come True

CHAPTER V A New Rosary

CHAPTER VI Making Yourself a Prosperity Magnet

CHAPTER VII The Suggestion of Inferiority

CHAPTER VIII Where Your Supply Is

CHAPTER IX You Are Headed Toward Your Ideal

CHAPTER X Education Under Difficulties

CHAPTER XI Misfit Occupations

CHAPTER XII This One Thing I Do

PART II

PURSUIT

CHAPTER XIII Enthusiasm

CHAPTER XIV Doing Everything to a Finish

CHAPTER XV The Help Yourself Society

CHAPTER XVI I Will!

CHAPTER XVII Something Touched Him

CHAPTER XVIII How to Find Oneself

PART III

LIFE STORIES OF SUCCESSFUL MEN AND WOMEN TOLD BY THEMSELVES

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

CHAPTER XIX Marshall Field

CHAPTER XX Bell Telephone Talk

CHAPTER XXI What Miss Mary E. Proctor Did to Popularize Astronomy

CHAPTER XXII The Story of John Wannamaker

CHAPTER XXIII Giving Up Five Thousand Dollars a Year to Become a Sculptor

CHAPTER XXIV John D. Rockefeller

CHAPTER XXV A Talk With Edison

CHAPTER XXVI Carnegie as a Metal Worker

CHAPTER XXVII Herreshoff, The Yacht Builder

CHAPTER XXVIII A Successful Novelist: Fame After Fifty

CHAPTER XXIX John Burroughs at Home: The Hut on the Hill Top

CHAPTER XXX How James Whitcomb Riley Came to be Master of the Hoosier Dialect

SELF-ASSESSMENT

HOW TO USE THIS BOOK

The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation." Henry David Thoreau, Walden.

It is of such great importance to thoughtfully choose our careers—to respond to that which is literally our vocation, our calling. But for a variety of reasons, many of us have not chosen the work that we are in, it is not our true calling. Many of us took jobs based on the first decent offer that came along (based on whatever standards we had at the time for decent). In time, we then moved up. But more often than not, moving up means moving up in salary, not moving up in personal satisfaction. And so from time to time we feel a tug, a pulling, and looking around we see the horizon behind us receding—our once cherished dreams of the person we wished to be is slipping further away. Behind us, and becoming dimmer in the waning light of that distant horizon, is the ballet dancer we wanted to be … the writer … the forest ranger … the butcher, the baker, or the candlestick maker.

But what can we do? We have a family to support. Children to put through college. A mortgage to pay. Bills to pay. And if we can stay at the work we’re doing, we’ll be eligible for the company’s profit-sharing plan in another year. Moreover, isn’t it too late in our lives to be a ballet dancer? To take the writing classes or attend the writing conferences necessary for us to learn the craft of the novel and become novelists?

Perhaps.

Perhaps it’s true that we can no longer be the ballet dancer we once wanted to be. But the novelist? That’s not so self-evidently gone forever.

And nor is something else, something that may not be that ballet dancer but which is nonetheless still tugging at us, still pulling at us something that is still telling us that there’s another direction for our lives, and if we will only take it, we will be more than just successful in the worldly sense, we will be whole.

Orison Swett Marden says that we must not only heed that call, but that we have a certain obligation to do so—that not only our personal happiness and success, but the very welfare of the whole fabric of society depends on our doing so. Because if each of us is whole, then the world will be whole. Or, to put that differently: Until each of us is whole—experiencing our fulfillment—the very world we live in cannot be whole—an experience of fulfillment, for us as well as for others.

And for that, it is never too late.

We have, then, a responsibility to ourselves and others to live our lives as works of art. For if I live my life as a work of art, then I not only bring art into my world, but into yours as well. And if my neighbor lives his or her life as a work of art, then he or she will not only bring art into his or her life, but mine as well. And so on and so forth, until one day the whole world became a work of art.

Nothing short of that, Marden makes clear, will ever provide us with a world in which there is peace. For if we don’t feel a sense of peace, a sense of fulfillment within ourselves, then we will not be able to achieve it anywhere else.

In Part I of this book—Preparation—Marden discusses the things we must do to prepare ourselves for the lives we wish to live—the mental, emotional, psychological habits we must acquire or break in order to make ourselves available for our lives.

It’s of interest to notice that the matters that Marden writes about in Part I are not aptitudes we must learn, but personality traits. Here we see why Orison Swett Marden held such a commanding role as the leading motivational/self-help writer. In writing about personality traits rather than aptitudes as the concerns we needed to look at for life and career satisfaction, Marden was foreshadowing what today has become a well-researched fact: that contentment in work has less to do with aptitudes than with self-expression. Put differently, that we should not think of work as being the opposite of self-expression—or if we do, we do so at our own discontent.

In Part II—Pursuit—Marden discusses the activities, the ways of thinking, that will help guide us into that choice of life we’ve decided upon.

Part III—Life Stories of Successful Men and Women Told By Themselves—is arguably the crux of the book. Indeed, Parts I and II could be seen as a distillation of the traits, habits, etc., of the true-life success stories recounted in Part III. If a picture is truly worth a thousand words, here are the pictures—the stories of men and women, told in their own words, many of whom you will recognize by name, who lived the lives they chose for themselves. These are not, though, stories of lives made easy, although history has tended to make the lives of these people seem more effortless, more well-fitted, than perhaps most of ours are. But you’ll see that the people in Part III overcame hardships, rejection, handicaps—sometimes handicaps of circumstance and sometimes physical—and had to make sacrifices and take risks. Some entered the bumpy roads toward their goals early; some didn’t locate the road until late.

It was Marden’s intent in acquiring these interviews that they should instruct and inspire … instruct and inspire by example, and by example demonstrate to us the worthwhileness of each of us finding our own road, as well as the understanding that the road is not straight for anyone … except in the important sense that once we enter upon it, it keeps moving us straight into the innermost yearnings and inclinations of our lives.

Read the interviews first just for the pleasure and unique opportunity to hear the voices of some of America’s leading figures from a variety of careers. (The interviews were originally printed in Success magazine; Marden later edited and collected them in book form, and they are presented here in that latter format and style.) Then read them again, and this time pay close attention to the implicit and explicit insights that the various people give as to the process they had to pursue, the decisions they had to make, the habits they had to develop in order to attain the lives they desired. Then find the way that you can integrate these habits, traits, beliefs into your own life, in order that you may attain the life you desire.

And don’t be lulled into the mistaken notion that these people had it easier back then, that it was easier to shape one’s destiny in those days. Yes, there might have been less competition in certain pursuits, and yes the United States was younger then, and so there were particularly unique opportunities then that there may not be now. But go back to that quote of Henry David Thoreau’s that begins this section, and remember that it was written before any of the people in Part III began and succeeded in their careers. Regardless of what opportunities there were or weren’t back then, in other words, the majority of people were not pursuing them, and the people you’ll read about in Part III still had to take pains to stand out from their friends, family, and neighbors who were not finding lives of fulfillment.

And then remember, too, that there are more millionaires in America today than ever in its history—not that money is or should be a standard of fulfillment, but that indicates that there are still plenty of opportunities … for entrepreneurs, the self-employed, whomever.

There are no action steps or tests to determine your calling in Parts I–III of this book. There aren’t, because as Marden points out, ultimately the way to identify the path of one’s life is to look within—to know thyself—and that’s an individual process.

Moreover, virtually all of us know the answer to the question What’s my right place in life? We know it because virtually all of us know, in expressing our feeling of a lack of wholeness, what it would be in our lives that would make us feel whole. The answer to that is not to be found in easy answers like More money, or To be younger, because all of us know that just having more money would not truly fulfill our soul’s yearnings. Remember: When we wanted to be that ballet dancer, that musician, that artist, that history teacher—even that lawyer or doctor—it wasn’t because that lifestyle was going to make the most money for us.

Nor is the answer to that question about what would make us feel whole the easy answer, If only I were younger. After all, if and when we do say we’d like to be younger, we invariably add, knowing the things I now know. So it’s not truly the years we want back, but the opportunity to fill them rightly.

That’s the goal, the purpose, of this book—to give you the opportunity to not only believe that you can, but to encourage you take steps to fill the years of your life rightly.

As Marden says, "Everything in nature is naturally beautiful, and each thing is necessary in its place. Find your place, and fill it."

Wishing you the best….

—The Editor

PREFACE

The demand during its first two years for nearly an edition a month of Peace, Power, and Plenty, the author’s last book and its republication in England, Germany, and France, together with the hundreds of letters received from readers, many of whom say that it has opened up a new world of possibilities to them by enabling them to discover and make use of forces within themselves which they never before knew they possessed, all seem to be indications of a great hunger of humanity for knowledge of what we may call the new gospel of optimism and love, the philosophy of sweetness and light, which aims to show how one can put oneself beyond the possibility of self-wreckage from ignorance, deficiencies, weaknesses, and even vicious tendencies, and which promises long-looked for relief from the slavery of poverty, limitation, ill-health, and all kinds of success and happiness enemies.

The author’s hope in this volume is of arousing the readers to discover the wonderful forces in the Great Within of themselves, which, if they could unlock and utilize, would lift them out of the region of anxiety and worry, eliminate most, if not all, of the discords and fric tions of life, and enable them to make of themselves everything they ever imagined they could and longed to become.

The book teaches the divinity of right desire; it tries to show that the Creator never mocked us with yearnings for that which we have no ability or possibility of attaining; that our heart longings and aspirations are prophecies, forerunners, indications of the existence of the obtainable reality, that there is an actual powerful creative force in our legitimate desires, in believing with all our hearts that no matter what the seeming obstacles, we shall be what we were intended to be and do what we were made to do; in visualizing, affirming things as we would like to have them, as they ought to be; in holding the ideal of that which we wish to come true, and only that, the ideal of the man or woman we would like to become, in thinking of ourselves as absolutely perfect beings possessing superb health, a magnificent body, a vigorous constitution, and a sublime mind. It teaches that we should strangle every idea of deficiency, imperfection, or inferiority, and however much our apparent conditions of discord, weaknesses, poverty, and ill-health may seem to contradict, cling tenaciously to our vision of perfection, to the divine image of ourselves, the ideal which the Creator intended for His children; should affirm vigorously that there can be no inferiority or depravity about the man God made, for in the truth of our being we are perfect and immortal; because our mental attitude, what we habitually think, furnishes a pattern which the life processes are constantly weaving, outpicturing in the life.

The book teaches that fear is the great human curse, that it blights more lives, makes more people unhappy and unsuccessful than any other one thing; that worry-thoughts, fear-thoughts, are so many malignant forces within us poisoning the very sources of life, destroying harmony, ruining efficiency, while the opposite thoughts heal, soothe instead of irritate, and increase efficiency and multiply mental power; that every cell in the body suffers or is a gainer, gets a life impulse or a death impulse, from every thought that enters the mind, for we tend to grow into the image, of that which we think about most, love the best; that the body is really our thoughts, moods, convictions objectified, outpictured, made visible to the eye. The Gods we worship write their names on our faces. The face is carved from within by invisible tools; our thoughts, our moods, our emotions are the chisels. It is the table of contents of our life history; a bulletin board upon which is advertised what has been going on inside of us.

The author believes that there is no habit which will bring so much of value to the life as that of always carrying an optimistic, hopeful attitude of really expecting that things are going to turn out well with us and not ill, that we are going to succeed and not fail, are going to be happy and not miserable.

He points out that most people neutralize a large part of their efforts because their mental attitude does not correspond with their endeavor, so that although working for one thing, they are really expecting something else, and what we expect, we tend to get; that, there is no philosophy or science by which we can arrive at the success goal when we are facing the other way, when every step we take is on the road to failure, when we talk like a failure, act like a failure, for prosperity begins in the mind and is impossible while the mental attitude is hostile to it.

No one can become prosperous while he or she really expects or half expects to be always poor, for holding the poverty-thought keeps us in touch with poverty-producing conditions.

This book teaches that everybody ought to be happier than the happiest of us are now; that our lives were intended to be infinitely richer and more abundant than at present; that we should have plenty of everything which is good for us; that the lack of anything which is really necessary and, desirable does not fit the constitution of any right-living human being, and that we shorten our lives very materially through our own false thinking, our, bad living, and our old-age convictions, and that to be happy and attain the highest efficiency, each of us must harmonize with the best, the highest thing in ourselves.

—December, 1910

O. S. M.

PART I

PREPARATION

CHAPTER I

The Victorious Attitude

To be a conqueror in appearance, in one’s bearing, is the first step toward success. It inspires confidence in others as well as in oneself. Walk, talk and act as though you were a somebody, and you are more likely to become such. Move about among others as though you believe you are a person of importance. Let victory speak from your face and express itself in your manner. Carry yourself like one who is conscious of having a splendid mission, a grand aim in life. Radiate a hopeful, expectant, cheerful atmosphere. In other words, be a good advertisement of the winner you are trying to be.

Doubts, fears, despondency, lack of confidence, will not only give you away in the estimation of others and brand you as a weakling, a probable failure, but they will react upon your mentality and destroy your self-confidence, your initiative, your efficiency. They are telltales, proclaiming to every one you meet that you are losing out in the game of life. A triumphant expression inspires trust, makes a favorable impression. A despondent, discouraged expression creates distrust, makes an unfavorable impression.

If you don’t look cheerful and appear and act like a winner nobody will want you. Every one will turn a deaf ear to your plea for work. No matter if you are jobless and have been out of work for a long time you must keep up a winning appearance, a victorious attitude, or you will lose the very thing you are after. The world has little use for whiners or long-faced failures.

It is difficult to get very far away from people’s estimate of us. A bad first impression often creates a prejudice that it is impossible afterwards wholly to remove. Hence the importance of always radiating a cheerful, uplifting atmosphere, an atmosphere that will be a commendation instead of a condemnation. Not that we should deceive by trying to appear what we are not, but we should always keep our best side out, not our second best or our worst. Our personal appearance is our show window where we insert what we have for sale, and we are judged by what we put there.

The victorious idea of life, not its failure side—its disappointed side—the triumphant, not the thwarted-ambition side, is the thing to keep ever uppermost in the mind, for it is this that will lead you to the light. You must give the impression that you are a success, or that you have qualities that will make you successful, that you are making good, or no recommendation or testimonial however strong will counteract the unfavorable impression you make.

So much of our progress in life depends upon our reputation, upon making a favorable impression upon others, that it is of the utmost importance to cultivate mental forcefulness. It is the mind that colors the personality, gives it its tone and character. If we cultivate willpower, decision, positive instead of negative thinking, we cannot help making an impression of masterfulness, and everybody know that this is the qualification that does things. It is masterfulness, force, that achieves results, and if we do not express it in our appearance people will not have confidence in our achieving ability. They may think that we can sell goods behind a counter, work under orders, carry out some mechanical routine with faithfulness and precision, but they will not think we are fitted for leadership, that we can command resources to meet possible crises or big emergencies.

Never say or do anything which will show the earmarks of a weakling, of a nobody, of a failure. Never permit yourself to assume a poverty-stricken attitude. Never show the world a gloomy, pessimistic face, which is an admission that life has been a disappointment to you instead of a glorious triumph. Never admit by your speech, your appearance, your gait, your manner, that there is anything wrong with you. Hold up your head. Walk erect. Look everybody in the face. No matter how poor you may be, or how shabby your clothes, whether you are jobless, homeless, friendless even, show the world that you respect yourself, that you believe in yourself, and that, no matter how hard the way, you are marching on to victory. Show by your expression that you can think and plan for yourself, that you have a forceful mentality.

The victorious, triumphant attitude will put you in command of resources which a timid, self-depreciating, failure attitude will drive from you.

This was well illustrated by a visitor to the Athenæum Library in Boston. Ignorant of the fact that members only were entitled to its special privileges, this visitor entered the place with a confident bearing, seated herself in a comfortable window seat, and spent a delightful morning reading and writing letters. In the evening she called on a friend and in the course of conversation, referred to her morning at the Athenæum.

Why, I didn’t know you were a member! exclaimed the friend.

A member! No, said the lady. I am not a member. But what difference does that, make?

The friend, who held an Athenæum card of membership, smiled and replied:

Only this, that none but members are supposed to enjoy the privileges of which you availed yourself this morning!

Had the lady in Boston had any doubt of her right to enter the Athenæum and to freely use all its conveniences, her manner would have betrayed it. The library attendants would have noticed it at once, and have asked her to show her card of membership. But her assured air gave the impression that she was a member. Her victorious attitude dominated the situation, and put her in command of resources which otherwise she could not have controlled.

The spirit in which you face your work, in which you grapple with a difficulty, the spirit in which you meet your problem, whether you approach it like a conqueror, with courage, a vigorous resolution, with firmness, or with timidity, doubt, fear, will determine whether your career will be one grand victory or a complete failure.

It is a great thing so to carry yourself wherever you go that when people see you coming they will say to themselves, Here comes a winner! Here is someone who dominates everything he or she touches.

Thinking of yourself as habitually lucky will tend to make you so, just as thinking of yourself as habitually unlucky, and always talking about your failures and your cruel fate will tend to make you unlucky. The attitude of mind which your thoughts and convictions produce is a real force which builds or tears down. The habit of always seeing yourself as a fortunate individual, the feeling grateful just for being alive, for being allowed to live on this beautiful earth and to have a chance to make good will put your mind in a creative, producing attitude.

We should all go through life as though we were sent here with a sublime mission to lift, to help, to boost, and not to depress and discourage, and so discredit the plan of the Creator. Our conduct should show that we are on this earth to play a magnificent part in life’s drama, to make a splendid contribution to humanity.

The majority of people seem to take it for granted that life is a great gambling game in which the odds are heavily against them. They look on the probability of their winning out in the life game in any distinctive way as highly improbable. When they look around and see how comparatively few of the multitudes of men and women in the world are winning they say to themselves, Why should I think that I have a greater percentage of chance in my favor than others about me? These people have as much ability as I have, perhaps more, and if they can do no more than grub along from hand to mouth, of what use is it for me to struggle against fate? This conviction colors their whole attitude, and is responsible for innumerable failures.

What would you think of an actor who was trying to play the part of a great hero, but who insisted on assuming the attitude of a coward and thinking like one; who wore the expression of a man who did not believe he could do the thing he had undertaken, who felt that he was out of place, that he never was made to play the part he was attempting? Naturally you would say the man never could succeed on the stage, and that if he ever hoped to win success, the first thing he should do would be to try to think himself the character, as well as to look the part, he was trying to portray. That is just what the great actor does. He flings himself with all his might into the role he is playing. He sees himself as, and feels that he is actually, the character he is impersonating. He lives the part he is playing on the stage, whether it be that of a beggar or a hero. If he is playing the part of a hero he acts like a hero, thinks and talks like a hero. His very manner radiates heroism. And vice versa, if the part he takes is that of a beggar, he dresses like one, thinks like one, bows, cringes and whines like a beggar.

Similarly, you will be judged by the role you are performing in life and how you are performing it. If you are trying to be successful you must act like a successful person, carry yourself like one, talk, act and think like a winner: You must radiate victory wherever you go.

You must maintain your attitude by believing in the thing you are trying to do. If you persist in looking and acting like a failure or a very mediocre or doubtful success, if you keep telling everybody how unlucky you are, and that you do not believe you will: win out because success is only for a few, that the great majority of people must be hewers of wood and drawers of water, you will be about as much of a success as the actor who attempts to personate a certain type of character while looking, thinking and acting exactly like its opposite.

It always pains me to hear everyone who ought to be full of hope and high promise express a doubt as to the future career. To hear such a person about possible failure sounds like treason to his or her creator. Talking about failure is like beauty talking about ugliness; like superb health dwelling upon weakness and disease; like perfection dwelling upon imperfection. It is in our nature act as it is in all of Nature: to climb, to look up. The very atmosphere of our souls should breathe hope, superb promise of the future.

Just think what would happen if all of the down-and-outs-today, all of the people who look upon themselves as failures or as dwarfs of what they ought to be, could only get this victorious, this triumphant, idea of life, if they could only once glimpse their own possibilities and assume the triumphant attitude! They would never again be satisfied to grovel. If they once got a glimpse of their divinity, once saw themselves in the sublime robes of their power, they never again would be satisfied with the rags of their poverty.

But instead of such a true and noble purpose, of trying to improve their condition, to get away from their failure, poverty-stricken atmosphere, so many cling the more closely to their false sense of hopelessness and sink deeper and deeper in the quagmire of their own making.

Everywhere we find people grumbling at everything, complaining that life is not worth living, that the game is not worth the candle, that life is a cheat, a losing game.

Life is not a losing game. It is always victorious when properly played. It is the players who are at fault. The great trouble with all failures is that they were not started right It was not drilled into the very texture of their being in youth that what they would get out of life must be created mentally first, and that inside the man, inside the woman, is where the great creative processes of life are carried on.

By a psychological law we attract that which corresponds with our mental attitude, with our faith, our hopes, our expectations, or with our doubts and fears. It is what we do with our brains that counts. Our manner and our appearance are determined by our mental outlook. If we see only failure ahead we will act and look like failures. We have already failed. If we expect success, see it waiting for us a little bit up the road, we will act and look like successes. We have already succeeded. The failure attitude loses; the victorious attitude wins.

There are times when we cannot see the way ahead, when we seem to be completely enveloped in the fogs of discouragement, disappointment