5 LESSONS FROM “THE POWER OF POSITIVE THINKING BY NORMAN VINCENT PEALE” 

1. BELIEVE IN YOURSELF

Have faith in your abilities! Without a humble but reasonable confidence in your own powers you cannot be successful or happy. But with sound self-confidence you can succeed. A sense of inferiority and inadequacy interferes with the attainment of your hopes, but self-confidence leads to self-realization and successful achievement. 

2. PRACTICE CALMNESS

Definitely practice emptying your mind of fears, hates, insecurities, regrets, and guilt feelings. The mere fact that you consciously make this effort to empty your mind tends to give relief. Haven’t you experienced a sense of release when you have been able to pour out to somebody whom you can trust worrisome matters that lay heavy upon the heart?

3. HAVE PEACEFUL CONVERSATIONS 

Depending upon the words we use and the tone in which we use them, we can talk ourselves into being nervous, high-strung, and upset. We can talk ourselves into either negative or positive results. By our speech we can also achieve quiet reactions. Talk peaceful to be peaceful. 

In a group when the conversation takes a trend that is upsetting, try injecting peaceful ideas into the talk. Conversation filled with expressions of unhappy expectation, at breakfast, for example, often sets the tone of the day. Little wonder things turn out according to the unhappy specifications. Negative conversation adversely affects circumstances. 

On the contrary, start each day by affirming peaceful, contented, and happy attitudes and your days will tend to be pleasant and successful. Such attitudes are active and definite factors in creating satisfactory conditions. Watch your manner of speech then if you wish to develop a peaceful state of mind. 

It is important to eliminate from conversations all negative ideas, for they tend to produce tension and annoyance inwardly.

4. BE HAPPY 

Who decides whether you shall be happy or unhappy? The answer—you do! Every morning before arising, lie relaxed in bed and deliberately drop happy thoughts into your conscious mind. Let a series of pictures pass across your mind of each happy experience you expect to have during the day. Savor their joy. Such thoughts will help cause events to turn out that way. Do not affirm that things will not go well that day. By merely saying that, you can actually help to make it so.

5. STOP FUMING AND FRETTING

Many people make life unnecessarily difficult for themselves by dissipating power and energy through fuming and fretting. 

Do you ever “fume” and “fret”? Here is a picture of yourself if you do. The word “fume” means to boil up, to blow off, to emit vapor, to be agitated, to be distraught, to seethe. The word “fret” is equally descriptive. It is reminiscent of a sick child in the night, a petulant half-cry, half-whine. It ceases, only to begin again. It has an irritating, annoying, penetrating quality. To fret is a childish term, but it describes the emotional reaction of many adults.

Thank you for reading.