Category Archives: Change and Personal Empowerment

Part 6: May Day- Napoleon Hill’s 17 Success Principles

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What Do You Want from the Universe?

Napoleon Hill became so inspired by Andrew Carnegie that it changed his whole outlook on life and he then dedicated the next 20 years to studying and writing about how to become extraordinarily successful. So what did he find out?  He summed it up in his 17 success principles.  The first of his principles was ‘definiteness of purpose.”

Mr. Hill directs his readers to answer two questions.  The first, “What do you want from the universe?” He says to write it down and recite our desire a dozen or more times each day.  And, the second question, “What are you willing to do or give for it?”

Carnegie had taught him that, “It is the mind that makes the body rich,” and that, “No man can become rich without enriching others.”

I call this ‘definiteness of purpose,” certitude.  Certitude for me is, knowing for sure why I am here on the planet and understanding the wisdom of using my talents and gifts to serve humanity and not only myself.  Are you clear on your goals?  Have you decided and chosen what you want from this life?  Have you written your goals down?  Have you been specific?

The Mastermind Principle

The second principle and the one I’d like to focus on in this message was the Mastermind principle.  He asserts that no one that has achieved any significant success has done it alone.  They all took advantage of the mastermind principle that entailed bringing together a small group of trusted people and using their synergistic power of prayer, creativity, and knowledge to spark ideas, solve problems, or provide resources.

So, if you could use a little push or need a serious shove in the right direction, find a few people that you trust and seek their prayerful consultation, mentorship, or collaboration.  I write about using a mastermind group in my book, ‘Talleyup: The Excitement of Value-based Living’ under the topic of spiritual consultation.

http://www.barbaratalley.com/index_files/TalleyUP_Reawaken_the_Dreamer_in_You.htm

List of Napoleon Hill’s 17 Success Principles

Some of Napoleon Hill’s other principles are a Positive Mental Attitude, Pleasing Personality, Applied Faith, Go the Extra Mile, Personal Initiative, Enthusiasm, Self Discipline, Accurate Thinking, Controlled Attention, Teamwork, Learning from Adversity and Defeat, Creative Vision, Maintenance of Sound Health, Budgeting Time and Money, and Cosmic Habitforce. http://www.naphill.org/

Continued from Part 5: Napoleon Hill’s 17  Success Principles- http://wp.me/ppImQ-rG

To continue to Part 7: Success and Money Are Spiritual Matters, click here:  http://wp.me/ppImQ-rV

c) 2010, Barbara S. Talley- All Rights Reserved

Barbara Talley is a keynote speaker, author of six books, and trainer on value-based living themes.  She also offers Effective Communication, Diversity, Leadership, Time Management, and Goal Setting workshops.  Visit her at www.thepoetspeaks.com or contact her at 301-428-4831.  You may email her at Barbara@ThePoetSpeaks.com.

Part 5: May Day- Earl Nightingale Defines Success

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Continued from Wisdom of Dale Carnegie, http://wp.me/ppImQ-qS

“Man Becomes What He Thinks About Most”

Success as defined by Earl Nightingale is, the “Progressive realization of a worthy ideal…  If a man is working toward a predetermined goal and knows where he is going, that man is a success.  If he doesn’t, he is a failure.” His “secret” to success was, “Man becomes what he thinks about most.”

So, I ask you to think about what you spend your time thinking the most about, your end goal or your obstacles, your fears or your success, your dreams or your doubts?    Mr. Nightingale was asked, “If it is that simple to achieve success just by thinking about it,  why don’t men use their minds more?” He responded that we receive our minds as standard equipment at birth, and it’s free. “Things that are given to us for nothing, we place little value upon.  Things we have to pay money for, we value.”

If You Want More Out of Life, Give More!

That’s the paradox he says, for the complete opposite is true. Everything that is of value, our minds, souls, dreams, intelligence, etc. are free.  The bible also affirms the simplicity of reaching success, “For everyone that askest, receiveth.”  Most people want more out of life than they are receiving.  His response to this was, “If you want more, provide more service.”  If you give less service, you will receive less compensation.  I guess in other words he’s saying, “We reap what we sow.”

Only 5% of People Are Successes

Earl Nightingale once made an astounding observation, and that is 95% of the people in life are unsuccessful.  That means that only 5% are living the life of their dreams.   He defines success as doing what you really want to do in life. It doesn’t matter so much what you do, as long as you choose to do it and it makes you happy.  If you choose to be a dancer, mother, janitor, or CEO, and you are doing it or making progress towards it, you are successful.  All of the truly successful people agree that success is not about money, but more about meaning, joy, purpose, and fulfillment.  It means taking advantage of the free will we have been given, choosing what we really want from the universe of possibilities, and then faithfully, confidently and steadily doing what we must to move closer to our ultimate outcome.

To continue to Part 6: Earl Nightengale Defines Success, http://wp.me/ppImQ-rt

c) 2010, Barbara S. Talley- All Rights Reserved

Barbara Talley is a keynote speaker, author of six books, and trainer on value-based living themes.  She also offers Effective Communication, Diversity, Leadership, Time Management, and Goal Setting workshops.  Visit her at www.thepoetspeaks.com or contact her at 301-428-4831.  You may email her at Barbara@ThePoetSpeaks.com.

Part 7A: May Day-Success and Money Are Spiritual Matters

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Continued from Part 6: Earl Nightengale Defines Success, http://wp.me/ppImQ-rt

While money should not be the object of one’s life,  it is still a necessary requirement for responsible living.

No one wants or should be dependent on other people for their basic needs.  We have been given gifts and talents in order to contribute to the world and thereby earn a livelihood from our labor.  Certainly it is not a spiritual or noble thing to have to beg for one’s existence.  The key is to choose a path of service that we can commit to.  The key is ‘to choose’ what would bring us happiness.  Our work must become a labor of love, otherwise how can we stick with it, excel at it, and be joyful in the process.  No one wants to be served by someone whose heart is not in it and made to feel like that service is a burden.  It is however praiseworthy to be able to earn enough money to take care of ones family and be able to help the poor or other worthy causes.

Baha’u’llah, in ‘The Persian Hidden Words’ teaches, “The best of men are they that earn a livelihood by their calling and spend upon themselves and upon their kindred for the love of God, the Lord of all worlds.

Abdul-Baha, son of the Bahaullah, Prophet-Founder of the Bahai Faith corresponded with Andrew Carnegie on his ‘Gospel of Wealth‘ in 1912 when he toured America spreading his father’s teaching on unity.  http://tinyurl.com/nytimescarnegie

The following text is from that correspondence:

O respected personage!
I have read your work “The Gospel of Wealth” and noted therein truly apposite and sound recommendations for easing the lot of humankind. To state the matter briefly, the Teachings of Baha’ullah  advocate voluntary sharing, and this is a greater thing than the equalization of wealth.

For equalization must be imposed from without, while sharing is a matter of free choice. Man reacheth perfection through good deeds, voluntarily performed, not through good deeds, the doing of which was forced upon him. And sharing is a personally chosen righteous act: that is, the rich should expend their substance for the poor, but of their own free will, and not because the poor have attained this end through force. For the harvest of force is turmoil and the ruin of social order.

…I have seen the good effects of your own philanthropy in America, in various universities, peace gatherings and associations for the promotion of learning, as I travelled from city to city… For more information on the Bahai Faith, a religion dedicated to service to humanity, check out. http://www.bahai.org/

To read Part 7B- Success and Money Are Spiritual Matters
(A Biblical Perspective) http://wp.me/ppImQ-v6

To continue reading Part 8: Mid-Year Checkup, click here- http://wp.me/ppImQ-sv

c) 2010, Barbara S. Talley- All Rights Reserved

Barbara Talley is a keynote speaker, author of six books, and trainer on value-based living themes.  She also offers Effective Communication, Diversity, Leadership, Time Management, and Goal Setting workshops.  Visit her at www.thepoetspeaks.com or contact her at 301-428-4831.  You may email her at Barbara@ThePoetSpeaks.com.

Part 8: May Day- Time for a Mid-Year Check-Up

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Continued from Part 7:  Success and Money Are Spiritual Matters           http://wp.me/ppImQ-rV

What are Your Gifts and How Can You Best Serve?

Life has a way (if you let it) to allow you to drift aimlessly.  But at the same time if we take charge, we can immediately get back on course.  If this were your last day, week, month, or year, what would you be doing differently?  Figure out what that is and DO IT!  May Day, May Day!  Don’t you know that your earthly journey has finality?  It will end without prior notice.

You are here for a reason and need to make figuring out what that reason is your priority.  To begin that journey of certitude, service, and fulfillment, you must first figure what gifts you have and how you can serve the world best by using those gifts.  Are you a potential artist, scientist, craftsperson, single, author, parent, or business owner with a talent or dream that fulfills you or inspires others?

What You Do Matters- To Somebody You Are the World

How many of your goals that you set this year have you accomplished?  What about last year, the year before, or even ten years ago?  You are an important cog in the wheel of life.  What you do or don’t do matters and matters a lot. Just like the rippling effect of a pebble is felt across a pond, so does your contribution affect an untold number of people you may not even know.  Reflect on the poet Heather Cortez’s words, “To the world you might be just one person, but to one person you may be the world.”

Click to continue to Part 9: Life Tests Us to Protect Us http://wp.me/ppImQ-sG

c) 2010, Barbara S. Talley- All Rights Reserved

Barbara Talley is a keynote speaker, author of six books, and trainer on value-based living themes.  She also offers Effective Communication, Diversity, Leadership, Time Management, and Goal Setting workshops.  Visit her at www.thepoetspeaks.com or contact her at 301-428-4831.  You may email her at Barbara@ThePoetSpeaks.com.

Part 9: May Day- Life’s Tests Perfect Us

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Continued from Part 8: Mid-Year Checkup,  http://wp.me/ppImQ-sv

Are you dissipating so much of your energy fighting fires and just plain surviving that there is no fire or energy left to pursue those goals that bring passion and meaning to your life?

Are you overwhelmed by seemingly competing priorities?  Or maybe you’re looking at a career transition and just don’t know what to do next.  Maybe the transition was a choice or maybe it was forced on you.  Perhaps, your life or values have changed dramatically because your children have left home, you have health problems, have recently divorced or widowed, or have lost your job or someone special in your life.  Some have an even different challenge, they’ve spent so much of their lives working that they haven’t had the time to pursue a relationship or family.  We’ve all got our own burdens to bare.  No one escapes the  tests.  But, the tests perfect some and destroy others.

Life Tests Us to Protect Us

Many of you, like me, have been thrust into the sandwich generation and find yourselves taking care of parents and kids simultaneously while trying to work full-time.  Or, maybe you just don’t feel valued or appreciated and are not passionate about anything anymore.  It’s understandable to get depressed or feel down when so much seems to be out of your control.  Just remember that life constantly tests us in order to perfect us and we can’t have growth or a testimony without these tests.  We were not created to go it alone.  Be open and expectant because someone out there has exactly what you need and you have what someone else needs to progress to the next step in their journey.

Support Comes Naturally When You Get Serious!

How can you realistically and honestly expect others to believe in you and support your endeavors when you have not demonstrated by your persistent and faithful action, enthusiasm, commitment, and focus that you truly believe in your own dreams.

Faith attracts others while desperation and doubt detract.  The Creator, His Messengers, the universe, teachers, friends, mentors, angels, and even strangers are ready to help you if you would only ask and believe. Inspiration and enthusiasm come naturally when you get serious about your goals and are doing something about them.  Realizing that your amazing destiny is within your reach is of the utmost urgency; so stake your claim now.  The world is in desperate need of the contribution that you alone were created and destined to offer.

To continue to Part 10: The Wisdom of  Wil Smith, click here- http://wp.me/ppImQ-sQ

c) 2010, Barbara S. Talley- All Rights Reserved

Barbara Talley is a keynote speaker, author of six books, and trainer on value-based living themes.  She also offers Effective Communication, Diversity, Leadership, Time Management, and Goal Setting workshops.  Visit her at www.thepoetspeaks.com or contact her at 301-428-4831.  You may email her at Barbara@ThePoetSpeaks.com.