Who should (not) read this book?
This books contains a few valuable insights for people who are ambitious and want to aim for a very specific goal.
It is written from an alpha male point of view. You might be annoyed reading several passages in the book if you are a female, feminist or supporting equality between genders.
Why you should read this book (or not)?
Given the book is written in 1937, it is amazing how contemporary some passages are. The author was a visionary.
Despite that, I do not recommend this book:
- The examples are not very relevant anymore as the world has changed significantly, not in the least because of our digital age.
- The wisdom that can be found in this book has been refined and there are much much better books on the topic.
- Some stuff like the chapter on ‘sixth sense’ is really not my cup of tea.
Interesting extracts
“The emotions of faith, love and sex are the most powerful of all the major positive emotions. When the three are blended, they have the effect of ‘coloring’ the vibration of thought in such a way that it instantly reaches the subconscious mind, where it is changed into its spiritual equivalent, the only form that induces a response from Infinite Intelligence.”
“Business is due for a reform, make no mistake about this! The methods of the past, based upon economic combinations of force and fear, will be supplanted by the better principles of faith and cooperation. Men who labor will receive more than daily wages; they will receive dividends from the business, the same as those who supply the capital for business; but, first they must give more to their employers, and stop this bickering and bargaining by force, at the expense of the public. Thye must earn the right to dividends! Moreover, and this is the most import thing of all – They will be led by leaders who will understand and apply the principles employed by Mahatma Gandi. Only in this way may leaders get from their followers the spirit of full cooperation which constitutes power in its highest and most enduring form. (…) The watchword of the future will be human happiness and contentment.”
“No satisfactory substitute for Nature’s stimulants has ever been found. It is a fact well known to psychologists that there is a very close relationship between sex desires and spiritual urges-a fact which accounts for the peculiar be- havior of people who participate in the orgies known as religious “revivals,” com- mon among the primitive types. The world is ruled, and the destiny of civilization is established, by the human emotions. People are influenced in their actions, not by reason so much as by “feelings.” The creative faculty of the mind is set into action entirely by emotions, and not by cold reason. The most powerful of all human emotions is that of sex. There are other mind stimulants, some of which have been listed, but no one of them, nor all of them combined, can equal the driving power of sex. A mind stimulant is any influence which will either temporarily, or permanently, increase the vibrations of thought. The ten major stimulants, described, are those most commonly resorted to. Through these sources one may commune with Infinite Intelligence, or enter, at will, the storehouse of the subconscious mind, either one’s own, or that of another person, a procedure which is all there is of genius.”
“Man’s most useful years, mentally and spiritually, are those between forty and sixty.”