Success Through A Positive Mental Attitude Principle One - A Positive Mental Attitude

[This is a continuing series on the book Success Through A Positive Mental Attitude by Napoleon Hill and W. Clement Stone. If you'd like to start from the beginning, see this post]

According to the authors, a Positive Mental Attitude (PMA), is the starting point of all achievement.

It makes sense that the authors would include this in the title of the book.

Here’s what I learned:

You Choose

The authors use the analogy of a talisman (a magical amulet, one with special powers) to describe the power that our mind has. They say that this talisman can be used in two ways, for either good or evil. You own this talisman; you are the one who has the power to flip it over and use it’s powers of PMA (Positive Mental Attitude) or NMA (Negative Mental Attitude).

One power. It’s just the way that it’s used that makes the difference.

You are the one who chooses how it is used.

This reminded me of something that Bob Proctor said in The Secret: that the Law of Attraction is like electricity. It can cook a man’s dinner, or it can cook the man!

It’s Not Wishful Thinking

Often people confuse PMA with Pollyanna thinking… “Everything’s Wonderful, There Are No Problems, La La La La La….”

That’s not the kind of positive mental attitude we are talking about here.

One of the biggest things that is stressed is the following question: How can I turn my disadvantages into advantages?

We don’t deny our challenges, or turn a blind eye to them. We use them to our own advantage.

PMA is the basis for all of the other principles

Without a Positive Mental Attitude, attempting to use the others principles is useless. This almost seems self evident: can you imagine the misery of working at a goal with perfect persistence, while all the while never believing you will attain it?

Make your immediate world right

It’s extremely important that we make our immediate world right. If we do this (”make the man right”, as the authors put it), then our world will come into line.

This is a common theme among many self-help/personal development authors… work from the inside, and the outside will follow. One of my favorite Jim Rohn quotes is “Learn to work harder on yourself than you do on your job. Working hard on your job will make you a living; working hard on yourself will make you a fortune.”

Memorize the Principles

A suggestion that they make is to memorize the 17 success principles. I’ve been testing myself of this lately, and I can almost rattle them off without thinking. When we have things memorized, they become a part of us, and we can use them to our advantage anytime, anywhere.

Gratitude

Another common theme in personal development. The authors state that counting our blessings is one of the best ways to improve our PMA.

At the end of each chapter of the book, the authors summarize the chapter in what they call Pilots, and then give the basic principles in what they call “Self Motivators.” We would probably call them affirmations today. Readers are encouraged to memorize and repeat these self motivators to themselves until they become a part of their belief system.

One of the things that I found interesting in the style of writing is that, although it’s dated, it employs the use of questions throughout the text and in the Pilots, which is a very modern, NLP-ish way of changing one’s perspective.

What are your thoughts on these topics, or your ideas on developing and maintaining a positive mental attitude?

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