STEP 8: PERSISTENCE: THE SUSTAINED EFFORT NECESSARY TO INDUCE FAITH
Persistence is will power. Desire and will power are irresistible. Men who accumulate great fortunes are sometimes misunderstood as ruthless because they have persistent will power mixed with burning desires behind their goals. Henry Ford was considered ruthless because he had the habit of following through with all of his plans with persistence. Most people abandon their goals at the first sign of defeat. But, a few determined individuals continue despite all opposition until they achieve their goals. These few are the Fords, Carnegies, Rockefellers, and Edisons.
Persistence is heroic. It makes humans stronger like carbon in steel. Building a fortune usually involves applying all 13 Steps to Riches applied persistently. If you don’t have enough persistence, you will need to increase your desire. Go back to the Six Steps for Creating a Burning Desire. Review the lessons on auto-suggestion. Study the lessons about power later in this book. Ask the people you chose to help you achieve your ultimate goal—your Master Mind group—to help you develop persistence. Follow all of these new habits until your subconscious mind paints a clear picture of whatever you desire most. If you do all these things, you will have plenty of persistence to succeed.
You must work at developing money-consciousness by applying all 13 Steps to Riches. This formula is all or nothing. Work all the steps until they become habit for you. This is the only way to develop money-consciousness to attract money to you as if by magic. Poverty consciousness is the default mental state. Without money consciousness to fill your mind, poverty consciousness will automatically fill it up and attract poverty into your life like a curse. If you have the habit of persistence, you cannot fail because, no matter how many times you are defeated, you will still eventually succeed.
Persistence is a state of mind that can be cultivated by the following:
1. Definite Purpose – Knowing what you want is the first and most important step to developing persistence. A strong motive forces you to overcome many obstacles.
2. Burning Desire – The more intense your desire, the easier it is to develop and keep persistence.
3. Self-Confidence – If you believe you will carry out your plan, you will continue working toward that goal with persistence. Read again the advice on auto-suggestion to strengthen your self-confidence.
4. Definite Plans – Organized plans, even weak or impractical ones, develop persistence.
5. Accurate Knowledge – Knowing your plans are soundly based upon observation or experience encourages persistence, while “guessing” creates self-doubt.
6. Cooperation – Harmonious cooperation with others develops persistence.
7. Will Power – The habit of constantly focusing your thoughts to build plans to attain your ultimate goal leads to persistence.
8. Habit – Habit creates persistence. Whatever you think and do daily feeds your mind and becomes a part of it. Fear, your biggest enemy, can be destroyed by good habits.
Key Points No. 28: Fear can be cured by forced repetition of acts of courage.
If you really want to know who you are and what you are capable of doing, measure yourself against the following symptoms of lack of persistence:
1. No clearly defined ultimate goal.
2. Procrastination and indecisiveness.
3. No interest in learning all you need to know to achieve your ultimate goal.
4. Making excuses instead of making definite plans to solve problems.
5. Self-satisfied or lack of ambition. There is no cure for this problem.
6. Lack of passion resulting in too much compromise.
7. Blaming others for your mistakes and accepting losses as unavoidable.
8. Not moving on an idea or grabbing the opportunity when it presents itself.
9. Trying to “get rich quick”—always involves gambling or sharp dealing.
10. Fear of criticism of others, of what they will think, do, or say.
Most people let their relatives, friends, and the public at large to influence them so much that they cannot live their own lives for fear of criticism. Too many people marry the wrong person but fear the criticism that would follow if they corrected their mistake. So instead they choose to lead miserable lives that kill their ambitions and self-confidence.
Millions of adults choose not to go back to school or change their careers because they fear criticism. Men and women, young and old, allow relatives to wreck their lives in the name of duty because they fear criticism. But duty does not require anyone to destroy their personal ambitions or the right to live your own life in your own way. Too many people are afraid to set high goals or even choose a career because they imagine their family or friends will either laugh at them or warn them that others might laugh at them.
When Andrew Carnegie suggested to Hill that he devote 20 years of his life to organize a philosophy of individual achievement, Hill immediately feared what people might say. That goal was the biggest Hill had ever imagined for himself. Almost instantly, his mind began making excuses for why he shouldn’t even try it. All of his excuses were based in fear of criticism. The following objections and questions flashed into his mind:
“You can’t do it. The job is too big and will take too much time.”
“What will your family think?”
“How will you earn a living?”
“No one has ever organized a philosophy of success. How can you do it?”
“Who are you anyway to aim so high?”
“Remember your humble birth.”
“What do you know about philosophy?”
“People will think you’re crazy.” (And they did.)
“There must be a good reason no one has done this before.”
FOUR STEPS TO PERSISTENCE
1. An ultimate goal backed by burning desire for its fulfillment.
2. A definite plan for action that leads to the fulfillment of the ultimate goal.
3. A mind that shuts out criticisms from family, friends, or acquaintances.
4. Constant contact with people who encourage you to reach your ultimate goal.
The 13 Steps to Riches are designed to turn the above 4 steps into lifelong habits. If you make these steps your habits, you will also overcome fear, discouragement, and lack of passion. The reward for these 4 steps is you can ask whatever you want from life, and you will get it.
Plans are useless without the power to turn them into action. This next section describes how you can get and keep power. Power can be defined as “organized and intelligently directed knowledge.” Here, power means organized effort to change desire into money. Organized effort is two or more people working toward an ultimate goal in harmony.
Power is needed to get money, and power is needed to keep it after you get it. Power is organized knowledge, so understand the sources of knowledge:
1. Infinite Intelligence. The use of creative imagination to access this type of intelligence is discussed later in this book.
2. Accumulated Experience. Public libraries, schools, and colleges are excellent sources of all organized and recorded experiences. (To this, I add the internet.)
3. Experiment and Research. People gather, classify, and organize new facts. There is no other way when the knowledge people need does not yet exist.
Knowledge is acquired from the above 3 sources and converted into power by organization into definite plans followed by action based on those plans. Often, the bigger the ultimate goal, the more cooperation you will need from other persons to give you the necessary power to carry out your plans.
