You Are What You Read
What you read will determine what you think. What you think will determine what you do. What you do will determine what you become. What you become / are dictates what you will achieve in your life. So the question that I have for you, given that you actually read books (if you don’t, this article is not for you), is, “What do you read?” If I know what you read, I can predict your thoughts, choices, actions, and thus creations.
See, a bum in the street has created his own circumstances in the same, certain way that a millionaire created his own circumstances, (unless he inherited his wealth, of course, in which case, they usually specialize in spending money and buying friends, while they rarely create anything of value.) But I digress.
When I see a fellow with dreadlocks, a cigarette, and sandals shuffling aimlessly down the street, I can be pretty sure he’s not reading Ayn Rand or Mark Steyn. One of those dirty protestors with a joint in one hand and a placard in the other probably has a Noam Chomsky novel stuck in his backpack - certainly not Milton Friedman’s work. Ask yourself this: will a trailer park cult member be reading Sam Harris or Tim LaHaye? Will a successful entrepreneur be aligned with the thinking of John Stossel and Ludwig von Mises or Al Franken and fat man Michael Moore? Elementary, methinks.
When we find ourselves feeling sad, doing bad or getting mad, we need to check our bookshelves. I was given a copy of Dan Kennedy’s wonderful book, “No B.S. Time Management for Entrepreneurs” and I can assure you that suddenly, a few human time leeches have discovered that it is almost impossible to get me on the phone. Thanks to Mr. Kennedy, I can honestly say that I have made the phone my b…. servant. I read and then I implement almost instantaneously, if I agree. I consumed the Art of War for the fifth time, this time a version by Stephen Kaufman, and my income jumped within a week. Books can cheer one up remarkably fast.
Why do books have such a powerful influence over us? This is the magic of books: When you read a book by a genius like Leonard Peikoff, you actually think his thoughts! Isn’t that amazing? As Mr. Peikoff thought, so he wrote. His thoughts appear on paper before you. You see them, read them, and think them. If you think like Napoleon Hill, you will probably make the same kind of choices and get the same kind of results, nes pas? So when you see someone’s life, ambition and hope swirling slowly down the drain, you probably won’t find a dog-eared copy of a novel by Winston Churchill or General George Patton in his crusty hand.
So here’s the bottom line for a real quick fix that actually works. When you are attacked by stinky thinking gremlins that threaten to steal your joy, your profits, your sleep an your self respect, pick up the right book and instantly start to transform your thoughts from fear to faith, from pessimism to optimism, from passive to active and from loser to winner. Create a beautiful battery of brilliant books that are ready to magically convert failure to freedom. And be ready and willing to take a good swig of this powerful literary libation to the first sign of droopiness in your otherwise star-studded life.
Robin J. Elliott www.DollarMakers.com
posted by Robin J. Elliott at
7:59 PM
