Think and Grow Rich Book Review PART 2 ”Thinking Differently and Choosing Faith over Fear.”

Neuroscience Meets Social and Emotional Learning

Welcome back to PART 2 of Making 2022 You Best Year Ever with EPISODE #191 on “The Importance of Thinking Differently and Choosing Faith over Fear” as we continue our deep dive into Napoleon Hill’s Classic book, Think and Grow Rich, that has sold over 15 million copies worldwide.

Be sure to click here to access the images in the show notes.

For those new, or returning guests, welcome back to Season 7 of our Podcast I'm Andrea Samadi, author, and educator from Toronto, Canada, now in Arizona, and like many of you who tune in, have been fascinated with learning, understanding, and applying the most current brain research to improve productivity in our schools, our sports, and workplace environments. This month, I decided to share my notes with you on a book that I have been studying every year, with Paul Martinelli, who has studied this book for most of his career.

On our first episode[i] and PART 1 of this book study, where we cover the Author’s Introduction and Desire chapter, we opened with a quote from Undercover Billionaire Grant Cardone, who said, “In order to get to the next level of whatever you’re doing, you must think and act in a wildly different way than you previously have been” and this is where I wanted to begin this episode, with reviewing Chapter 1 “Thoughts Are Things” with the idea that we must “think” in a wildly different way than we previously have to obtain NEW results in 2022.

On this episode, you will learn

✔︎ How to go from fear to hope, using faith, in pursuit of your goals.

✔︎ How to “think” wildly different than you did last year.

✔︎ Examples of people who “thought” their way to their goals, making their ability to “think” the best investment of their lifetime.

✔︎ The 6 STEPS you must take every day, that will put your goal on autosuggestion.

✔︎ Common mistakes made when goal-setting/achieving.

✔︎ 4 steps to overcome your fears, helping you to break through to new levels in 2022.

✔︎ How to becoming unwavering with our faith, helping us when obstacles appear.

How Do We “Think in a Wildly Different Way” to Get New Results?

The answer is--by expanding our awareness. I’m sure you see now why studying Think and Grow Rich by reading and thinking about every word we are reading is so very important. We could spend a whole year studying this book, which is why I think we should all keep reading it, gaining more awareness long after January and this book study ends.

Look at it this way. Remember the last lesson where we looked at how ideas are formed, and how it’s up to us to act on our ideas and bring them to fruition.

IMAGE: Levels of Frequencies of Thought

Look at the image in the show notes of the levels of frequency and think of this as an example of where you are now, or the thoughts, feelings, and actions you are currently living with, giving you a certain result. Then imagine all the lines above where you are now, leading to where you want to go. Think of these frequencies like radio stations. To tune into the radio station you want, you need to turn the dial to that frequency. This is exactly the same idea to think about when we want to tune into the frequency that our goals exist on.

And it won’t be with the level of thinking you have at your current level. That’s the whole point of Marshall Goldsmith’s book What Got You Here, Won’t Get You There: How Successful People Become Even More Successful.[ii]

To ATTAIN your goal, or a new result, you will need to “think and act in a wildly different way that you previously have been” like Grant Cardone, reminded us. That’s because the goal is on a different frequency than where you are now. To hit this NEW target, you will need to think NEW thoughts, take NEW actions, that will create NEW results, and none of them will be what you are currently doing.

When I first saw this image, I remember wondering “well how on the earth do I magically get on the same level of vibration as the thing that I really want?” and the first time I did this exercise, I wrote down that I wanted to live in the United States (when I lived in Toronto at the time) and had no idea how I would ever make that happen. In the beginning, we don’t need to know all the details on “how” we will do what we want to do.

How Do You Move to a New Frequency?

Over the years, and once I had achieved a few goals this way, it became obvious how this works. Think back 5 years ago to the person you were then. You have probably grown and changed since then and may be nothing like the person you once were. You had new experiences that took you to a new frequency. It can happen with a new job, where you must think in an entirely different way than you had to with a previous job, or maybe you moved to a new location, like I did, and had new experiences that have changed you. Now you can see the importance of why Napoleon Hill called this book “Think and Grow Rich” because it is crucial that we change our thinking to obtain the new results we are looking for. When we change our thinking, we will have new experiences, that will change our conditions, circumstances and environment, changing our vibration or frequency level and put us exactly where we need to be for the attainment of our goal. Only then, will we be able to look back and explain how we did it to others.

Yesterday, I ran into my good friend Jeff Gould on the hiking trails, otherwise known as South Mountain Cowboy, who has been horseback riding on these mountains for the past 40 years and he looks younger than most of us who run up and down the hills daily. While chatting with Jeff this morning, who is a huge supporter of this podcast, he shared what he’s learning from the episodes, and that he’s always challenging himself to “think differently” by tuning into these episodes, which is probably what keeps him looking and feeling so young! I agreed with him that happiness comes naturally when we do what we love, continually challenge ourselves to grow, and live life doing whatever it is that makes us happy. It’s a simple formula really--we radiate energy when we are doing what we love and enjoy the most, aligning ourselves with more and more experiences, as we continually expand and grow in pursuit of our vision. Can you see how 2022 can be your best year ever? It just takes your vision, and your will to achieve it, and I love seeing people like Jeff, living their dream on a daily basis.

Jeff Gould, Southmountain Cowboy, on Telegraph Pass Mountain, AZ.

Edwin C. Barnes

In Chapter 1 “The Power of Thought” Hill talks about Edwin C. Barnes who also had a vision that he wanted to achieve when he “thought” his way into a partnership with Thomas Edison. Hill shares how Barnes had this burning desire to work with Thomas Edison. This was his goal, and was way out there for him, because he didn’t even know Edison, and was short on money to pay for his rail fare to get him to New Jersey to meet him. Barnes overcame all the obstacles he faced, and Edison described meeting the man he would eventually partner with by recalling the day he arrived. He said, “he stood there before me looking like an ordinary tramp, but there was something in the expression of his face which conveyed the impression that he was determined to get what he had come after.” (Page 2, TAGR). Edison recognized the look in his eyes and it’s what allowed him to eventually go into partnership with Barnes, who had no money, or influence to bring to the table, but he did have “initiative, faith and the will to win” (CH 1, page 4, TAGR) which was all Edison needed to see.

Barnes thought wildly differently to obtain what he wanted, and Edison picked up the energy or vibration that came from him, and it was easy for him to trust this was going to be a lucrative partnership.

There are more important examples in this chapter, that I hope you will read, to see why we should never quit when we experience defeat, and why persistence is a power that often gets a person what they want, but only when one persists long after most people would usually give up. Have you even seen this principle in action? I saw an example of this recently while researching Dr. David Sinclair, who we covered on EPISODE #189[iii] when I uncovered that he had to self-fund his trip from Australia to MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) to interview to work in their lab, which he did. He didn’t let his lack of funds stop him from finding his way to MIT and had many obstacles to overcome when he would eventually begin his work, when he experienced criticism for the direction he wanted to take, when other researchers questioned whether “aging was even a thing”[iv] to study. He had a clear vision of what he wanted and didn’t let any obstacles get in his way, even though he faced many that began in his early days and was just something he had to push through.

Chapter 2: DESIRE

Which brings us to Chapter 2: DESIRE and why we must know what we want, with a crystal-clear vision, and hold an unwavering belief that we can have it, and expect that we will have it, remembering this is where it all begins. That “all achievement, begins with an idea.” (Napoleon Hill). Barnes had a “burning desire” (CH2, page 19 TAGR) that “was not a hope. It was not a wish. It was a pulsating desire, which transcended everything else. It was definite.” (CH2, page 19, TAGR).

Barnes wanted to work with Edison, even though there was no evidence of these two meeting. It wasn’t like Edison and Barnes had been talking about this idea for a while, it was Barnes’s idea, and when he started to move this idea into form, I’m sure he thought it was crazy and something he wouldn’t be shouting out from the rooftops. Going from where we are now, to where we want to go, is a process.

You are never ready when you start something, but you will never be 100% ready. You just need to start and do the thing that you want to do.

When I moved from Canada to the US in early 2001, I remember following this process, and not sure of “how” exactly I was going to do it. Proctor would always remind us that we don’t need to know “how” we will do what we want, but just get it started and the way will be shown. That was true. The way will always be shown, along with a billion obstacles that will show up as well, to try to deter you from moving forward.

You just need to know WHAT you want and WHY, and this will drive your behavior. You can only explain HOW you did it after the fact, looking back, once you arrive there.

Do you know what you want? Do you have that burning desire that Edison saw in Barnes’s eyes? Remember, it’s difficult to see our own potential, but others can surely see it in us. That burning desire of what you want radiates from you, and others can pick up this energy, and like Edison did with Barnes, help move you to where you need to go. That’s why you can’t be shy about what you are working on. You will need all the help you can get, from as many different sources as possible. And there’s something else to consider.

“Every person who wins in any undertaking must be willing to burn his ships and cut all sources of retreat.” (CH 2, page 21, TAGR). Barnes did this when he found his way to New Jersey to meet with Edison, and Dr. David Sinclair did it when he left Australia for MIT. I remember doing this when I left Toronto. There was no going back saying “oh it didn’t work out” because I had burned all ships and had no other options.

You must be committed with your decision (which is another chapter) but you will see how all of these chapters tie into each other. The Latin root word for the word decision literally means “to cut” so when you make a decision, you must never go back. You’ve burned your ships and cut all sources of retreat.

Which brings us to the important 6 Steps to Achieve Your Goal in chapter 2. You will notice that these steps are written with the idea of drawing finances to you, but these 6 steps can be used to bring ANY goal your way. These are the 6 steps I have written on my wall, that I read every day, and Grant Cardone, Uncover Billionaire says he does this as well, all 6 steps, every day, twice a day. I’ve watched him do it using a legal pad of paper in less than 3 minutes.

Either way, the 6 steps to put any goal into our non-conscious mind, so that it eventually happens on autopilot, without much effort, is as follows:

Write out a clear description of what you want. You must be prepared to give something of value up in return for what you want. There no such thing as “something for nothing.” When you begin working on your action steps, it will become clear what you are giving up. Set a date when you intend to have this goal that you desire. Create your action plan, to carry out what you want, whether you are ready for it or not. Write this out in detail! Read what you wrote twice a day! “As you read, see and feel and believe yourself already in the possession” (CH 2, page 23, TAGR) of what you want.

It’s this simple, but not really, because most people won’t follow these steps. I was surprised when I watched Grant Cardone demonstrating how he WRITES and READS his goals twice a day, mostly because I know where this idea originated from, and most people miss that reading out loud part. Cardone didn’t. He knows these six steps and didn’t miss one of them. It’s easy to read this book, and grab some ideas to implement, and make some mistakes, and not do exactly what the book suggests. That’s why it’s called “Think and Grow Rich.”

Common Mistakes That Are Made When Setting Goals-That Will Guarantee That None of this Will Work?

People set goals on what they know they can do, or what they’ve done in the past. You will be sure to fail this way, because there is no inspiration in going after what we already know we can do. You need to really stretch yourself, and think of what you want, that takes you beyond where you have ever been before in this process. You’ll be sure to fail if you don’t change your plans when they aren’t working. If your Plan A fails, do you have a Plan B? Remember—you don’t need to know exactly how you will attain your goal. Just begin, do the work, and eventually you will achieve it, and only then will you be able to explain this process to others.

Chapter 2 has some examples of well-known, highly successful people who have put these ideas into action and ends with Hill summarizing the process for us when he says “I want to convey the thought that all achievement, no matter what it’s nature or purpose, must begin with an intense, burning desire for something definite. Through some strange and powerful principle of mental chemistry, nature wraps up in the impulse of strong desire that something which recognizes no such word as impossible and accepts no such reality as failure.

We must remember that there’s a difference between “wishing for” something and being ready to receive it. Remember that look that Edison saw in Barnes’s eyes? Do you have that look with whatever it is you want? If I was standing in front of you, and asked you “what do you really want” would you answer this question clearly and confidently, with that look in your eye, and be able to show me how you would use the 6 steps, with your action plan, or would this question catch you off guard, like when Proctor first asked me, and I wasn’t prepared to answer it?

This brings new meaning to the quote— “Luck is when preparation and opportunity meet.” How? Over time, we become better at what we do. Every day that we write and repeat our vision out loud, it etches deeper into our being. Our vision becomes who we are, and we never let it rest, until we perfect our craft and achieve our goals. Keep going and remember “if a person is not prepared when the opportunity arises, it will only make them look foolish.” (Earl Nightingale).

How Do I Overcome my Fears?

What happens when you begin moving towards your big, outrageous idea, and FEAR, or DOUBT starts to set in, ruining your vision, and making you want to give up? This will happen. It will happen more times than you’d like. Dr. Sinclair mentioned it happened to him when he finally got to MIT to work on his vision of creating anti-aging strategies and people he worked with challenged his ideas, urging him to reconsider his vision, and that “anti-aging” wasn’t a thing to do study. He talked about this on Joe Rogan’s podcast that he called home and was worried that he had made a mistake with his vision. It’s easy to see HOW this happens, when it’s not you who is experiencing the fear. Look at the image in the show notes where you see your INSPIRED IDEA that you are working on with focused thought.

I write about this in my first book, The Secret for Teens Revealed[v], and it’s something I learned from my early days of working with Proctor.

The Terror Barrier or The Change Mechanism

To break through to a new level, you will need to break through what Proctor called the Terror Barrier, and I re-named it The Change Mechanism in my first book. It’s what happens when you have a major shift in your life, and you begin to feel scared deep inside that maybe you have made a mistake. Your entire Central Nervous System starts to go off as you begin to think of this new thought.

I remember feeling this when I quit my teaching job, broke my contact with TDSB and went to work for Proctor for $10 an hour. It didn’t help that my Dad screamed at me that I would regret this decision for the rest of my life, but I really did believe that there was more I needed to learn. You will go through these 4 stages with your new idea.

Stage 1: Help I’m Stuck (Bondage).

When you are here, you are living in your comfort zone. Life is easy, because you are not stretching outside your comfort zone. There is no discomfort or fear. But, if you were to be honest, this type of life is playing it safe. You might know you are capable of so much more, but are afraid to take the necessary steps needed for this change. You are stuck here, in your old paradigm. If you look at the image in the show notes, I show a person who is thinking x thoughts in their conscious mind, with x thoughts in their non-conscious mind, getting x results. They are not doing anything new, and their results will stay the same. We have all been here, stuck, not sure of how to make a change.

Stage 2: I’m Frustrated

If we live life stuck for too long, you will become frustrated, because it’s natural that we want to BE, DO, and HAVE more with our life. We are either creating (expanding) and growing, or we are going the other way, disintegrating, not growing, and frustrated. The feeling of frustration can be motivating, and push you to make a change, and try something different.

Stage 3: I’m Making Changes, But Feeling So Uncomfortable

At this stage, you have taken a new idea (I label it a Y idea in my diagram) in your conscious mind, but your non-conscious mind still has the old X idea (or whatever you are currently doing) so there is cognitive dissonance at the brain level. The new idea might be a new job, moving somewhere else, or maybe an entire career change, and suddenly, in the middle of the decision-making process, your entire central nervous system goes out of control, and you are overcome with fear. It’s because your non-conscious mind is still operating with your old idea, or whatever you are currently doing, and you will think that you have made a mistake and question your decision.

At this point, we must understand that the opposite of FEAR is FAITH, leading us to Chapter 3 of the book. We feel fear because we lack understanding, FAITH is based on understanding, and when we have it, we can move forward, and never look back at our old life. We will only advance forward to new opportunity with understanding, and the use of FAITH.

It’s here that we BREAK FREE from our past, and experience the final stage,

Stage 4: Freedom

Freedom is achieved when we step outside of our comfort zone, feeling uncomfortable, but doing it anyway, and keep moving towards growth. You’ll see in my diagram the Y (or new idea) in the conscious mind, over time will create a Y idea in your non-conscious mind, and with time, you will notice that you made the switch, broke free from your past where you were stuck, into a more fulfilling life, creating new results.

You did this using faith that Hill says “is the head chemist of the mind.” (CH 3, page 45, TAGR).

How Do We Develop Faith?

“Faith is a state of mind that may be induced, or created by affirmations or repeated instructions..through the principle of auto-suggestion” (CH 3, page 46, TAGR).

We develop Faith by following the 6 Steps, writing and reading our goal out loud every day, twice a day, until it moves into our non-conscious mind on autosuggestion.

It’s a process. If you have never read your goal out loud before, I will tell you that it feels weird in the beginning. When I first started doing this activity, I would close my window, thinking my neighbors will think I’m crazy, especially when I did this process trying to win grant funding for some of the projects I worked on. The first time you do this, you will feel weird, until with time, your words flow quickly, confidently, and easily.

You will read your goals out loud “as if you were already in possession of them” (CH 3, page 48, TAGR). I found it helps to say something like “I’m so happy and grateful now that….” and whatever it is that you want “now that I’m awarded a $50,000 grant to work with students in our schools” or whatever it is that you might be working on.

This is the part where we may all have different beliefs with this process, but if you are like me, and believe that there is something bigger than you, you can call it whatever you want (God, Spirit, Infinite Intelligence) whatever you call it, you will feel it in this process. Hill wrote that “FAITH is the element, the chemical which when mixed with prayer, gives one direct communication with Infinite Intelligence.” (CH 3, page 49, TAGR).

We must have FAITH in our DREAMS, not in our DOUBTS.

This is a process, that comes from following the 6 steps of reading/writing our goals every day and doesn’t need to take a lot of time, Grant Cardone did it in less than 3 minutes. Faith is a state of mind that will develop as you become more self-aware, self-confident and with experience.

Remember—to Become Unwavering with our Faith

You must go through the Terror Barrier and match up your conscious mind, with your non-conscious mind. You will continue to build faith through autosuggestion when you write and repeat your goals. Pick one idea that you are working on, and as you move towards it, with new actions, you will develop more self-confidence, self-awareness and self-esteem.

This will lead to BELIEF….one day you will be working and think back to the early days when you didn’t have the level of confidence, faith and belief that you have today, and you will be grateful that you stepped outside of your comfort zone, through the fear, with faith at your side, into a new life that had more opportunity than you ever realized. Whatever it is that you are working on, remember with that understanding you can move past the fears, doubts, and uncertainties to hope, and this changes your entire mindset, giving you faith, fueling you to keep moving forward.

I hope you are enjoying studying this book with me as I’m diving deeper into my notes more thoroughly than I’ve ever done in the past. Some of the wisest people in the world have studied these principles, and it doesn’t matter what your background or level of education is. The playing field is equal for all of us. This book is the essence of success that can be used in anyone’s life.

I’ll see you in the next few days as we move onto Specialized Knowledge, Imagination and Organized planning next episode, with an interview coming with Nick Jonsson, from Singapore, the author of the important and timely book, Executive Loneliness: The 5 Pathways to Overcome Isolation, Stress, Anxiety and Depression in the Modern Business World.

FOLLOW ANDREA SAMADI:

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REFERENCES:

[i]Neuroscience Meets Social and Emotional Learning Podcast EPISODE #190 PART 1 “Making 2022 Your Best Year Ever” https://andreasamadi.podbean.com/e/think-and-grow-rich-book-review-part-1-how-to-make-2022-your-best-year-ever/

[ii]What Got You Here, Won’t Get You There: How Successful People Become Even More Successful by Marshall Goldsmith, June 12, 2008 https://www.amazon.com/What-Got-Here-Wont-There/dp/1846681375

[iii]Neuroscience Meets Social and Emotional Learning Podcast EPISODE #189 on “Understanding Hormesis: Why Stress and Adversity Make Us Physically and Mentally Stronger” https://andreasamadi.podbean.com/e/understanding-hormesis-why-stress-and-adversity-make-us-physically-and-mentally-stronger/

[iv] The Backlash Dr. Sinclair Faced from the Scientific Community Published Jan.29, 2019 with Joe Rogan https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDdAI-X3y1o&t=618s

[v] The Secret for Teens Revealed by Andrea Samadi, Published September 15, 2008 https://www.amazon.com/Secret-Teens-Revealed-Teenagers-Leadership/dp/1976820030