influence, and your only hope is to neutralize and counteract them by sending out strong, new thought waves of the proper sort, or by asserting the I AM, and thereby creating a mental aura, or by both means.
The old saying "Like attracts like" and "Birds of a feather flock together," are both literally exemplified by the tendencies of thought waves. There is what is known as the "Adductive Quality of Thought," the word "adductive" being derived from the Latin word adductum, to bring to. The manifestation of this quality of thought is one of the most wonderful features in the realm of psychic phenomena.
Fear or worry thought will attract others of their own kind, and will combine with them, the result being that you will be afflicted not only by the product of your own mind, but also by those emanating from the minds of others, the whole forming a heavy burden. And the longer that you persist in that line of thought, the heavier will be your burden. On the other hand, if you think bright, cheerful and happy thoughts they will draw to themselves others of the same degree, and you will feel brighter, more cheerful and happier from their combined influence. This is absolutely true, but you are not asked to accept it on faith alone. Try it and be convinced. But, in the experiment, be sure to couple the thoughts with a feeling of confidence in the outcome, and you will obtain much better and quicker results. Half-hearted, doubting thoughts have only a small percentage of the force of confident, expectant ones.
If you think along the lines of discouragement, lack of confidence, "afraid to try," "know I can't" lines, you will attract to yourself the force of other murky thoughts of the same kind, and you will find that you really "can't," and moreover, everyone else will seem to entertain just the same opinion regarding your ability. But just brace up and send out earnest, confident, fearless, "I can and I WILL" thought waves, and you will attract to yourself the similar thought waves of others, which will still further stimulate and strengthen you, and help you to accomplish your aims.
If you send out jealous, envious thoughts, they will come home bringing their mates with them, and you will be wretched until the effect passes off. So will waves of hate return to harm you, having gained force and power on their journey. The old proverb "Curses like chickens come home to roost," is much nearer the real truth than is generally supposed. Anger thought arouses anger in the other man (unless he has rendered himself positive to them), and he sends back his return thought waves; besides which other anger waves mingle and help on the vicious work. You have heard people say, "A man always finds what he looks for." Of course he does, he cannot help it, for his thought attracts others of the same sort, and he sees a world of the same color as his mental spectacles.
Good thought attracts good - evil thoughts, evil. If you hate a man and send him your hate thoughts, you will get hate in return, and will face a hating and hateful world. In the thought world, you get back what you send out - with good interest. Send out kind thoughts and kind thoughts will return to you, with compound interest, and you will find yourself greeted by a kind, helping world, and will be much the gainer. If only from a selfish point of view, it pays to think the best thoughts. If you will practice thinking along these lines for, say, one month, you will find the greatest difference in things, the greatest change in yourself, and you will find that you look with aversions and disgust upon your old, mean, low, miserable way of thinking, and would not return to it under any consideration - no, not for a fortune. Before the month will have passed you will be conscious of the helpful force of the responsive thought waves, and your life will seem entirely different to you. Try it. Try it now. You will never regret it.
There are two particularly bad thoughts, which you should root out, first of all, and you will find that, when you have rid yourself of the balance will die out of their own accord. I allude to Fear and Hate. These two following weeds are the parents of most of the others. Worry is the oldest child of Fear, and bears a close resemblance to its father. Envy, Malice, and Anger are some of the numerous broods claiming Hate as their parent. Destroy the "old ones" and you will not be troubled with their offspring. I will speak further on this point in the lesson on Character Building.
I will now process to another phase of the Adductive Quality of Thought. I refer to its exhibition along the lines of Success by right Thinking.
It may seem almost incredible to you, but it is a fact, that all successful men owe their greatness to their earnest, forceful, concentrated thought vibrations. They fixed their mind upon a certain line of thought; brought the aid of Will - the recognition of the I AM - to bear on that line of thought; allowed that line of thought to mold their characters; went straight to the mark at which they and aimed in the beginning. Others had aimed for the same mark, but failed because they failed to hold the thought, and had allowed themselves to become discouraged, intimidated, tempted or coaxed away form their ideal.
The requisites for the successful follow-up of a thought ideal to the end, are, first, an overpowering Desire (not a mere wish); second, a strong belief in your ability to accomplish your desire (not a mere half-hearted faith); and, third, an invincible Determination to win (not a mere back boneless - "I'll try to").
It is a strange thing and difficult to explain (without leading you into metaphysical depths), but the measure of success by this plan seems to depend materially upon your belief in the force. A half-hearted belief will bring only half-way results, whilst an earnest, firm, confident belief that "your win will come to you" will accomplish results little short of marvelous. Cultivate that sort of belief, and accompany it with a firm mental demand for what you want, and you will succeed. "Ask and you shall receive, knock and it shall be opened unto you," but accompany the asking and knocking with the firm belief and expectation of Success.
Helen Wilman says: "He who dares assert the I May calmly wait While hurry fate Meets his demand with sure supply."
But the words "calmly wait" refer only to the state of mind - and indicates that calm, confident expectation of a "sure thing." It does not mean that a man shall sit down and fold his hands and do nothing more than "calmly wait" for "hurrying fat" to drop his reward in his lap. Oh, no. Helen Wilmans never meant that - she is not built that way. The man, who is possessed of the dominating desire, and concentrated thought impulses, does not sit down and merely wait - he couldn't do that without sacrificing his keen desire and earnest pursuit. "Thought manifests itself in Action" - the firmer the thought, the stronger the action. You may want a thing in the worst way, and be fully confident of your ability to secure it, but you are going after that thing the best way you know how, and are "going to get it." You will agree with Garfield, who said, "Do not wait for a thing to turn up - go out and turn something up," with all your might and main, but carrying with you the calm demand that that thing will be "turned up as the result of your going out and turning." And you will feel all the time the confident expectation of the "thing" obeying your command.
I wish that my space would allow me to tell you of the wonderful results of this plan of thinking and acting, but I can merely touch upon it and call your attention to the workings of the Law. But, after all, one must learn a thing by experience before they will appreciate its truth. The I AM is not satisfied in any other way. I want everyone who reads this lesson to start in and practice the New Thought plan. You will have to accept what I say on faith, at first, but you will soon begin to demonstrate its correctness by personal experience, and then you will know it to be true, and will push forward toward Success.
Anything is yours, if you only want it hard enough. Just think of it. ANYTHING. Try it. Try it in earnest and you will succeed. It is the operation of a mighty Law.
Our next lesson will take up the subject of Character Building, and will show you that "as a man thinketh in his heart, so is he."
Character Building By Mental Control
Man can
