Careful observation of the business philosophy of more than one hundred men and women who have attained outstanding success in their respective callings, disclosed the fact that each was a person of prompt and definite decision.
The habit of working with a definite chief aim will breed in you the habit of prompt decision, and this habit will come to your aid in all that you do.
Moreover, the habit of working with a definite chief aim will help you to concentrate all your attention on any given task until you have mastered it.
Concentration of effort and the habit of working with a definite chief aim are two of the essential factors in success which are always found together. One leads to the other.
The best known successful business men were all men of prompt decision who worked always with one main, outstanding purpose as their chief aim.
Some notable examples are as follows:
Woolworth chose, as his definite chief aim, the belting of America with a chain of Five and Ten Cent Stores, and concentrated his mind upon this one task until he “made it and it made him.”
Wrigley concentrated his mind on the production and sale of a five-cent package of chewing gum and turned this one idea into millions of dollars.
Edison concentrated upon the work of harmonizing natural laws and made his efforts uncover more useful inventions than any other man who ever lived.
Henry L. Doherty concentrated upon the building and operation of public utility plants and made himself a multimillionaire.
Ingersoll concentrated on a dollar watch and girdled the earth with “tickers” and made this one idea yield him a fortune.
Statler concentrated on “homelike hotel-service” and made himself wealthy as well as useful to millions of people who use his service.
Edwin C. Barnes concentrated on the sale of Edison Dictating Machines, and retired, while still a young man, with more money than he needs.
Woodrow Wilson concentrated his mind on the White House for twenty-five years, and became its chief tenant, thanks to his knowledge of the value of sticking to a definite chief aim.
Lincoln concentrated his mind on freeing the slaves and became our greatest American President while doing it.
Martin W. Littleton heard a speech which filled him with the desire to become a great lawyer, concentrated his mind on that one aim, and is now said to be the most successful lawyer in America, whose fees for a single case seldom fall below $50,000.00.
Rockefeller concentrated on oil and became the richest man of his generation.
Ford concentrated on “flivvers” and made himself the richest and most powerful man who ever lived.
Carnegie concentrated on steel and made his efforts build a great fortune and plastered his name on public libraries throughout America.
Gillette concentrated on a safety razor, gave the entire world a “close shave” and made himself a multimillionaire.
George Eastman concentrated on the kodak and made the idea yield him a fortune while bringing much pleasure to millions of people.
Russell Conwell concentrated on one simple lecture, “Acres of Diamonds,” and made the idea yield more than $6,000,000.
Hearst concentrated on sensational newspapers and made the idea worth millions of dollars.
Helen Keller concentrated on learning to speak, and, despite the fact that she was deaf, dumb and blind, realized her definite chief aim.
John H. Patterson concentrated on cash registers and made himself rich and others “careful.”
The late Kaiser of Germany concentrated on war and got a big dose of it, let us not forget the fact!
Fleischmann concentrated on the humble little cake of yeast and made things hump themselves all over the world.
Marshall Field concentrated on the world’s greatest retail store and lo! it rose before him, a reality.
Side note: Anyone can “start,” but only the thoroughbred will “finish!”
Philip Armour concentrated on the butchering business and established a great industry, as well as a big fortune.
Millions of people are concentrating, daily, on POVERTY and FAILURE and getting both in overabundance.
Wright Brothers concentrated on the airplane and mastered the air.
Pullman concentrated on the sleeping car and the idea made him rich and millions of people comfortable in travel.
The Anti-Saloon League concentrated on the Prohibition Amendment and (whether for better or worse) made it a reality.
Thus it will be seen that all who succeed work with some definite, outstanding aim as the object of their labors.
There is some one thing that you can do better than anyone else in the world could do it. Search until you find out what this particular line of endeavor is, make it the object of your definite chief aim and then organize all of your forces and attack it with the belief that you are going to win. In your search for the work for which you are best fitted, it will be well if you bear in mind the fact that you will most likely attain the greatest success by finding out what work you like best, for it is a well known fact that a man generally best succeeds in the particular line of endeavor into which he can throw his whole heart and soul.
Let us go back, for the sake of clarity and emphasis, to the psychological principles upon which this lesson is founded, because it will mean a loss that you can ill afford if you fail to grasp the real reason for establishing a definite chief aim in your mind. These principles are as follows:
First: Every voluntary movement of the human body is caused, controlled and directed by thought, through the operation of the mind.
Second: The presence of any thought or idea in your consciousness tends to produce an associated feeling and to urge you to transform that feeling into appropriate muscular action that is in perfect harmony with the nature of the thought.
For example, if you think of winking your eyelid and there are no counter influences or thoughts in your mind at the time to arrest action, the motor nerve will carry your thought from the seat of government, in your brain, and appropriate or corresponding muscular action takes place immediately.
Stating this principle from another angle: You choose, for example, a definite purpose as your life-work and make up your mind that you will carry out that purpose. From the very moment that you make this choice, this purpose becomes the dominating thought in your consciousness, and you are constantly on the alert for facts, information and knowledge with which to achieve that purpose. From the time that you plant a definite purpose in your mind, your mind begins, both consciously and unconsciously, to gather and store away the material with which you are to accomplish that purpose.
Desire is the factor which determines what your definite purpose in life shall be. No one can select your dominating desire for you, but once you select it yourself it becomes your definite chief aim and occupies the spotlight of your mind until it is satisfied by transformation into reality, unless you permit it to be pushed aside by conflicting desires.
To emphasize the principle that I am here trying to make clear, I believe it not unreasonable to suggest that to be sure of successful achievement, one’s definite chief aim in life should be backed up with a burning desire for its achievement. I have noticed that boys and girls who enter college and pay their way through by working seem to get more out of their schooling than do those whose expenses are paid for them. The secret of this may be found in the fact that those who are willing to work their way through are blessed with a burning desire for education, and such a desire, if the object of the desire is within reason, is practically sure of realization.
Science has established, beyond the slightest room for doubt, that through the principle of