Think And Grow Rich In Six Steps
“What the mind can conceive and believe, it can achieve.” – Napoleon Hill
Napoleon Hill is considered one of the most successful writers on success and wealth in history. As a journalist in 1908, Hill interviewed Andrew Carnegie, one of the most powerful men in the world at the time.
Impressed with Hill, Carnegie gave him an assignment to interview 500 of the most successful people in America in order to discover a formula for their success and one that anyone could understand and achieve.
In addition to Carnegie, Hill interviewed Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, John D. Rockefeller and many other successful people. Hill wrote several books on his findings, with the most famous Think and Grow Rich published in 1937. Since being published, the book has sold more than 20 million copies in the U.S. and 70 million worldwide. Despite the fact it was written 76 years ago, many consider Hill’s principles just as powerful today. Hill also was an adviser to Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson.
Hill’s premise was that people needed to learn to think like the rich in order to become rich. They needed to overcome psychological barriers that kept them from becoming wealthy. He developed 13 principles of becoming successful and rich.
For all 13 principles, please visit artofthinkingsmart.com under SMART books. In one section of the book, Hill sums up “six definite, practical steps” to achieve the wealth you desire.
1) Fix in your mind the exact amount of money you desire. It is not sufficient merely to say “I want plenty of money.” Be definite as to the amount. (There is a psychological reason for being definite, which will be described in a subsequent chapter).
2) Determine exactly what you intend to give in return for the money you desire. (There is no such reality as “something for nothing.”)
3) Establish a definite date when you intend to possess the money you desire.
4) Create a definite plan for carrying out your desire and begin at once, whether you are ready or not, to put this plan into action.
5) Write out a clear, concise statement of the amount of money you intend to acquire, name the time limit for its acquisition, state what you intend to give in return for the money and describe clearly the plan through which you intend to accumulate it.
6) Read your written statement aloud, twice daily, once just before retiring at night and once after rising in the morning. As you read, see and feel and believe yourself already in the possession of the money.
“Wishing will not bring riches,” Hill writes. “But desiring riches with a state of mind that becomes an obsession, then planning definite ways and means to acquire riches, and backing those plans with persistence which does not recognize failure, will bring riches.”
In other words, “well-conceived and carefully executed plans” that overcome emotions and mind-sets that hold us back are among the only ways to achieve true wealth.
