The Power of Personal Development

Article by Jeffrey Gitomer

When I say Think and Grow Rich, what comes to your mind?

Almost everyone in sales and those interested in personal development have read this classic by Napoleon Hill at least once. And almost everyone who's read it has a positive comment. Many (like me) will say, "Turning point in my life."

Everyone has a turning point in their quest for lifelong learning. Everyone has their Aha! In your personal development, it's what you choose to listen to, watch or read that enhances your understanding of your life and teaches you what you need to do to succeed.

Napoleon Hill's 1937 quote sets the standard. "Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve." And once you have the information, it's all about what you are willing to do to take advantage of it.

Most people know Napoleon Hill was the author of Think and Grow Rich. The person Hill emulated and studied was Orison Swett Marden. Not many know that.

Marden was the leading positive-attitude genius of the 20th century. Well-known before 1930-almost unknown today. He was a founding father of personal development and positive thought. Aha!

Author of more than 40 books, Marden also was the founder of SUCCESS magazine. Here are a few of his words of wisdom from the book he wrote in 1908, He Who Thinks He Can.

•"Every child should be taught to expect success."
•"The man who has learned the art of seeing things looks with his brain."
•"The best educated people are those who are always learning, always absorbing knowledge from every possible source and at every opportunity."
•"People do not realize the immense value of utilizing spare minutes."
•"No substitute has ever yet been discovered for honesty."
•"Poverty is of no value except as a vantage ground for a starting point."These are quotes worth learning and passing on to others. One hundred years old!

"Learn More about Orison Swett Marden."
Based on my personal experience and personal Ahas!, I'd like to challenge you with the rules of personal development and give you some examples of what I have learned so you might make your own plan to succeed or enhance the one you have.

1.Expose yourself to knowledge.
At the end of a seminar I gave on positive attitude, I received an evaluation from a woman named Mary with a comment that read, "I wish I would have heard this 30 years ago." I got goose bumps of sadness and thought of a Jim Rohn quote: "All the information you need to succeed already exists; the only problem is you're not exposing yourself to it." This information existed 30 years ago. Mary just hadn't exposed herself to it.

Jim Rohn is known as America's leading business philosopher. His CD, The Art of Exceptional Living, is among the modern classics of personal development. Jim Rohn is the current master of inspiration and Aha! He imparts wisdom in every sentence.

Between Marden and Rohn, there is a long list of valuable books. I owe my career success to these books and to personal development information to which I have exposed myself.

Most of the books are more than 50 years old. Many with religious connotations-but still preaching the right words and thoughts. One of the most notable is The Power of Positive Thinking by Norman Vincent Peale. Biblical and brilliant.

2. Simple is powerful.
If you read it and it seems too easy or too hokey, reread it. It's probably part of your personal development foundation.

One of my early Aha! moments of personal development was the simplicity of the message. Sometimes it's so simple, you go right past it without understanding the impact it can make.

A classic example is the eternal "How to Win Friends and Influence People" by Dale Carnegie. In 1936 he wrote, "You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you." How many salespeople could benefi t from that single Aha!? I think all of them.

Interesting to note that Dale Carnegie's lessons still are being taught in the classroom 70 years later!

3. Think and apply to improve.
In "As a Man Thinketh", published in 1902, James Allen says, "A man is literally what he thinks, his character being the complete sum of all his thoughts." Thinking what can be done is at the core of your personal development. About 54 years later, in the million-seller, The Strangest Secret, Earl Nightingale writes, "We become what we think about all day long." Get it?

In 1969, I listened to Glenn W. Turner on a cassette tape: "Act as though you have already begun to achieve. Not fake it-live it."

4. Take a daily dose.
Think about the time-worn expression, "An apple a day keeps the doctor away." Apply that to personal development, and it means learn and apply one new thing every day. At the end of a year you will have 365 new pieces of information.

5. The older the better.
If you want a new idea, read a book that's 100 years old. "The best educated people are those who are always learning, always absorbing knowledge from every possible source and at every opportunity." -Marden, 1908. Or, "History has demonstrated that the most notable winners usually encountered heartbreaking obstacles before they triumphed. They won because they refused to become discouraged by their defeats." -B.C. Forbes, 1919.

6. Personal development and positive attitude are joined at the hip-and at the brain. And there is another component-being of service.
"There is little difference in people, but that little difference makes a big difference. The little difference is attitude. The big difference is whether it is positive or negative." -Clement Stone, 1946. Add that to the 5000-year-old Chinese proverb, "To Serve is to Rule."

7. Do it even as your butt falls off.
In 1898, Elbert Hubbard wrote an essay titled, Message to Garcia. Deliver the message, get the job done, complete the task-no matter what. Many have read that essay. Few have emulated it.

Personal development challenges you to think forward. "Greater than the tread of mighty armies is an idea whose time has come." -Victor Hugo, 1874.

Personal development challenges you to be your best. "You cannot mandate productivity; you must provide the tools to let people become their best." -Steve Jobs, 1988.

"I am the greatest of all time." -Muhammad Ali, 1963.

Personal development challenges you to make decisions based on the person you seek to become. "The highest reward for a person's toil is not what they get for it, but what they become by it." -John Ruskin, 1869.

Wondering where you can "find more time" to devote to your own success? "It has been my observation that most people get ahead during the time that others waste." -Henry Ford, 1901. Just a thought.

The key word is not development; the key word is personal. Do it for yourself, in your own way, and make your own time for it-or not.

The biggest Aha! of personal development is from Russell Conwell's Acres of Diamonds. Considered to be one of the finest speeches ever written, Acres of Diamonds offers a multitude of lessons about the rewards of work, education and finding the riches of life in your own back yard-or your own library. Aha!

Jeffrey Gitomer is the author of The Little Red Book of Selling and The Little Gold Book of YES! Attitude. President of Charlotte-based Buy Gitomer, he gives seminars, runs annual sales meetings, and conducts Internet training programs on selling and customer loyalty at www.trainone.com. He can be reached at 704/333-1112 or at salesman@gitomer.com.

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Overcome Negative Thinking with Free Ebook

You know what you want to achieve in life and you are very positive about those goals. But they remain just out of reach. Why?

The main culprit can be negative thought patterns even though you are not aware of them. You think you are thinking positively but in fact, most of your thoughts are more about what you want to avoid eg financial problems, lack of loving relationships and the fears which bring the “What if?” questions. You know, “What if I can’t get out of debt? What if I don’t win that contract? What if I never find Mr/Miss Right? What if he/she leaves me? What if I get sick?"

You might not even be aware that you are focusing on these negative questions but they will ultimately cause you to self-sabotage any good that may happen in your life and eat away at your self-confidence.

"The way to overcome negative thoughts and destructive emotions is to develop opposing, positive emotions that are stronger and more powerful." says the Dalai Lama. Wise words indeed.

But how do we go about achieving this? Happily, help is at hand in the form of a new video-ebook entitled "Mind Weapons: Overcoming Negative Thinking & Bad Habits". You can download this f-r-e-e of charge at: http://freeselfhelpvideos.com/videobooks.html

It will teach you powerful techniques to help you overcome negative thinking and destructive thought patterns forever.

On the same site you can download another complimentary ebook entitled "The Edge of Success" in which you will learn easy to follow strategies that will give you the edge over your competition when it comes to marketing your business. This ebook outlines 9 Proven Techniques to Double Your Sales, no matter what type of business you are in.

Here is a direct link to download "The Edge of Success: http://freeselfhelpvideos.com/TheEdge

You can also download free inspirational wallpapers for your PC screen on the same site: http://freeselfhelpvideos.com/wallpapers.html

Antonia Harrison from Personal Development in the 21st Century and The Secret and Law of Attraction .

Tony Robbins - Free Tickets for Breakthrough TV Show

A gift for you from Tony Robbins:

By now you may have heard some of the buzz surrounding our new NBC Reality TV show, "Breakthrough with Tony Robbins". Some of you may have even attended our first taping opportunity in August. We are pleased to inform you that after months of development with some of the sharpest minds in television, the finishing touches are now being completed.

The show will capture the journeys of everyday people struggling to overcome incredible personal obstacles as they strive to achieve their ultimate goals, contribute in meaningful ways and make their lives truly extraordinary.

As a member of the Robbins family, you know my work and my mission better than most. My life is dedicated to transforming the quality of peoples' lives. It's a privilege to be working with NBC to not only touch the lives of each participant that's going to appear on the show but also NBC's entire television audience. Breakthrough will be a journey of extraordinary human emotion and achievement. It will introduce every viewer to new ways of experiencing their own lives as well as special strategies for overcoming their own barriers to find a more fulfilling quality of life.

I wanted to extend a special invitation to you, as my friends and family, to attend the last live filming of our series for season 1 in Los Angeles, California, on October 15th. Seating is limited so if you plan to attend, you must RSVP. It will be a day you'll never forget!

Click here for free tickets

I'm so grateful for your commitment and support on this journey and we would be so honored and excited to have you there to help celebrate this momentous step forward in our mission to improve the quality of peoples' lives.

Live with Passion!

Tony

ABOUT THE SHOW

One-hour alternative series

Tony Robbins is an international star, bestselling author, philanthropist, advisor and inspirational speaker to Fortune 500 executives, sports professionals and world leaders. In Breakthrough he'll use his extraordinary skills to help deserving individuals who have suffered terrible setbacks in their lives. Their hopes and dreams have been shattered, but now they're ready to step up and, with Tony's help, make the changes they so desperately need. Through tough emotional challenges, Breakthrough will inspire people to search out the tools to forever their change their lives, and to reach out and help others as well. When you need to make a positive change. When you're ready to step up ... it's time to make a Breakthrough.

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Paulo Coehlo quote

"To say "no" is painful, but much better than a "yes" that brings regrets."

- Paulo Coehlo

The Best Motivational Video

Break The Cycle of Failure

Break the cycle of failure by doing something extraordinary. Thomas A Edison kept going when he was working on inventing the light bulb. He could have given up and where would that leave us today? Fortunately, he kept finding ways that did not work, did not produce the result he wanted. With every failure, he knew he was one step closer to finding the solution.

"All my successes have been built on my failures."- Benjamin Disraeli

So maybe you tried something which did not work. Maybe you called some people and they said no. Some people or lots of people? Maybe you wrote a book and a couple of publishers said no. Do you know how many publishers turned down JK Rowling's first Harry Potter book? Twelve, before the chairman's daughter at Bloomsbury demanded to see the next chapter. "Jonathan Livingston Seagull" was first turned down by 18 publishers.

Are you going to allow other people to steal your dream, to prevent you from achieving whatever it is that burns inside you? Are you going to live a future which is far short of the life that you know is waiting for you? Have you seen that life, felt it, heard it, tasted it, smelt it?

You have probably heard about the power of visualization. Well it is true. "Whatever the mind can conceive, the mind can achieve." Why? Simply because the unconscious mind knows no difference between reality and fiction. It creates whatever you think about. As a hypnotherapist, I know how feeding positive suggestions with visualization direct to the unconscious mind can bring desired results. So if you think about people rejecting your idea, your project, your service then you will project that thought on to others and it will be your reality. But imagine yourself achieving, succeeding. Make that visualization strong and that thought will gather strength and go out into the universe. Don't be concerned with how it will be achieved. Just be ready for the positive result, the YES.

"There is no failure except in no longer trying." - Elbert Hubbard

I encourage you to be a grown-up, not a given-up.

"Between you and every goal that you wish to achieve, there is a series of obstacles, and the bigger the goal, the bigger the obstacles. Your decision to be, have and do something out of the ordinary entails facing difficulties and challenges that are out of the ordinary as well. Sometimes your greatest asset is simply your ability to stay with it longer than anyone else."

- Brian Tracy

Here is the bad news. When you set out to achieve anything out of the ordinary, you will encounter obstacles, set-backs, negativity and the most damaging is negative self-talk. The challenge lies within you to overcome them and keep your mind focussed on the result with the absolute certainty that it is out there, waiting for you. It is not a question of if but when.

Be absolutely sure why you want to achieve this future? Ensure that the reasons are worthy of you, your family and the global community. Write down your reasons, why you not only want to achieve but why you must achieve.

Start by being grateful for where you are, for having a skill that you can share. You might need to develop the skill, take courses to fine-tune it, deepen your knowledge or maybe you just need practice. Learn from others whom you admire or who are already achieving success in your chosen field.

The question then is, are you ready for success? Are you ready to receive? Are you ready to turn your desire into day-to-day reality? Let me know when you start your book signing tour.

©Antonia Harrison 2009 from Personal Development in the 21st Century

How to Turn Obstacles Into Opportunities

Article by Christopher Howard:
In modeling extraordinary men and women throughout time, one thing I have discovered is that they aren’t really extraordinary at all—they are simply ordinary people who made extraordinary decisions about the events in their lives.

Click here for Two FREE TICKETS to Christopher Howard's "Breakthrough to Success" Seminar

When Nelson Mandela was in his teens, he attended a tribal ceremony. A tribal elder stood up and said, “These are our young men. They are our future. But the truth is…They are second-class citizens…They will always be boys.” When Mandela heard this, he made a decision to change South Africa. That one decision changed the world forever. When Richard Branson was labeled dyslexic, he decided the impairment would make him more intuitive in business.

What sets world leaders apart is their decision to turn obstacles into opportunities. One person could grow up in poverty and decide that means they could never be President of the United States. While another in that same circumstance or worse decides that it is the very reason they should become President. The first sees their circumstance as a stumbling block that creates an impossibility. The second uses their “obstacle” as a way to relate to people that gains them popularity, and eventually the Presidency. Same circumstance…completely different outcome. The only differing factor was what they decided that something meant.

Say that you are walking down a path and come upon a huge boulder blocking your path. What would you do? Too many people choose to turn back then use that as their excuse for not being able to live the life they want. It’s those rare few who make the decision to learn how to rock climb. Those are the mega-successful who not only surmount the obstacle in front of them, but in so doing gain the skill and confidence to then climb any mountain they want to.

What are you seeing as an obstacle in your life right now?Make a list of all those things you feel are stopping you from fulfilling your financial, health and/or relationship goals.
Now imagine for 5-10 minutes there is no such thing as an “obstacle”…how could each one of these obstacles actually be a great opportunity?

If memories are the cement that perpetuates beliefs, then decisions are the cornerstones of belief. They act as the line in the sand from which you will make future choices. I had a woman in one of my seminars who had made a decision at an early age that “it’s a man’s world.” Because she was a woman and obviously couldn’t do anything about this “obstacle,” she had a lot of difficulty achieving what she set out to do. It wasn’t until she became aware of the unconscious decision and realized she had made it only as real as she believed it to be, that she chose a different way of seeing things and her business expanded.

So it is essential to figure out:
What decisions did you make in your past?
Do those decisions serve your goals or work against them?
What are you deciding about the events going on in your life now?

The bottom line is, it is not the events in your life that shape your destiny, but the decisions you make about those events. So often we put world leaders on a pedestal as if they possess some rare and elusive power that we were not born with. Power is simply the ability to create real results. Becoming conscious of the decisions you make on a day-to-day basis, and consciously and carefully choosing your responses or reactions to those circumstances gives you that power.

Even if you only pay attention to what decisions you choose on a daily basis, this aspect of personality alone can make all the difference in causing you to be unstoppable. This alone places you firmly on that pedestal with the elite achievers. Circumstance no longer has the opportunity to be an excuse. You have successfully allowed “obstacles” to disappear from your life.

Originally Posted: Feb 9, 2006 at 2:56 PM

Click here for Two FREE TICKETS to Christopher Howard's "Breakthrough to Success" Seminar

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Free ebook Free From Fear

Imagine if you had absolutely no fear of failure (or success...) and you knew you could accomplish anything you wanted - no limitations whatsoever. What would you do with your life?
*Would you change careers or start a business?
*Would you go travelling?
* Would you write that novel?

Download Free ebook: Free From Fear

When you overcome the influences of fear, you unlock an amazing life for yourself... ...but fear surrounds and suppresses people in so many ways - Fear of losing your job, the world wide crises, public speaking, rejection, spiders, teletubbies!

...so grab this new free ebook, 22 Powerful To Transform Your Fear Into Happiness, Peace and Inspiration.

It can help you -
* Make positive changes in your thinking and living ...with much less resistance * Feel more motivated and inspired...
* Break destructive habits and behaviour more effectively overcome phobias
* Find inner peace and happiness
* Co create a less fearful collective consciousness which benefits all of humanity
* and even boost your immune system and dramatically reduce the risk of stress related diseases (which is 95% of all diseases according to a recent Stanford University study...)

Visit the link below to download this important new ebook and it's free :)
Free ebook: Free From Fear

Crammed full with valuable tips, exercises, articles and audio/video links, you'll discover -
* How to create effective affirmations to feel calm, centered and confident
* How to use journaling to explore inner blockages
* 3 Top Tips on how to connect with pure positive energy
* How to transcend overwhelming fear using The 3 Step Sedona method
* How to produce more Feel Good chemicals into your brain ...naturally...
* 4 Powerful prayers and a wonderful meditation to soothe fearful thoughts
* How to release charged emotions through grounding
* 3 Simple ways to turn fear into gratitude
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Visit here now to grab your free ebook: Free From Fear

Overcoming the influence of fear so you can live an amazing life is a simple matter of knowing how to diffuse the fearful feelings in the heat of the moment.

Would your life be better if you were not afraid?


Antonia Harrison from Personal Development in the 21st Century

Developing Self-Discipline for Starting Your Own Business

To start and build your own successful business you need special disciplines; disciplines that are practiced by all successful entrepreneurs and self-made business millionaires. You can either learn and practice these disciplines early in your entrepreneurial career or you can learn and practice them later. Sooner or later you must become knowledgeable and skilled in each of these seven areas if you are going to build a successful enterprise. And the longer it takes you to master these seven areas, the longer it will take and the more it will cost, before you eventually achieve your financial and business goals.

The first discipline is the discipline of market analysis. This is where most entrepreneurs fail. They start off with a great idea, and often don't want to tell anybody about it; for fear that someone will steal their idea. So they go off half-cocked into the marketplace with a product or service that has not been thought through properly and they are amazed when it fails.

The fact is that people are far too busy to steal your idea. 99 out of 100 new business ideas fail anyway. People who are operating their own businesses are far, far too busy to have even a minute of time to "steal" your idea, whatever it is.

Ask People's Opinion
In fact, if you have an idea for a product or service in a particular industry, you should go to someone who is already in that industry and ask for their opinion. If you are really smart, you will get in touch with as many people in that industry as possible and lay out your idea to them in full and ask for their candid comments.

What you are looking for is "negative thinking." A negative thinker is someone who will point out the holes and flaws in your plan. If you cannot patch the holes or fix the flaws in your plan for a new business, that is probably a pretty good indicator that your business is not going to succeed.

Article by Brian Tracy, the Chairman and CEO of Brian Tracy International, a company specializing in the training and development of individuals and organizations.

He has consulted for more than 1,000 companies and addressed more than 4,000,000 people in 4,000 talks and seminars worldwide. As a Keynote speaker and seminar leader, he addresses more than 250,000 people each year.

Brian's goal is to help you achieve your personal and business goals faster and easier than you ever imagined. He is offering this "How You can Start, Build, Manage or Turn Around A Business" package in digital or CD form.




Grab yours now before they're gone.

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Using Positive Self-Talk to Conquer Any Goal

Do you feel like you are always talking yourself out of success? As soon as you start to set goals for yourself, do you suddenly have nagging thoughts about how you aren't up to the task or how you simply aren't qualified to carry it through?

If you have ever experienced either situation, you need to change the way you respond to your inner dialogue. Instead of obeying your negative commands, you can use positive self-talk to counter the negativity and overcome nearly all anxious thoughts.

Setting Goals and Sticking to Them with Positive Self-Talk

Are you initially filled with excitement when you first set goals for yourself? Are these thoughts then followed by self-doubt and self-defeating thoughts that stop you in your tracks before you even get started?

It can be difficult to make the most of your life when you are constantly talking yourself out of being a success. It can be frustrating and discouraging to have these thoughts constantly plaguing you. Many of us, in fact, don't even realize we have them! All we know is that we don't have the confidence to stick to our plans and reach our goals.

But there's another way

Positive self-talk is an effective way to set goals and ensure that you stick to them, even if you have never been able to do this before. The way this works is that you decide what goal is important to you, and then you plan the logistics of how you are going to attain this goal. When self-doubt starts kicking in, you will respond with affirmations that prove your success without surrendering to the negative pressure. Since you're reading this article, it's clear that you're no quitter and you're certainly not a failure, so start believing in yourself!

Re-Programming Your Mind

Affirmations are essentially positive statements that re-program your mind for the positive. The moment you have a self-defeating thought you'd be able to counter the negative with a motivating statement. An example of a positive affirmation is: "I am worthy of great success," or "I see myself in the winner's circle." What this does is replace negativity with thoughts that will help you move toward your goals instead of further away from them.

Positive self-talk is easier to implement than you might think. You may not be aware of the severity of the negative dialogue currently within your mind. However, once you begin with positive self-talk, you will suddenly realize that you are self-sabotaging the goals you set for yourself from the minute that you make them. This process can open your eyes to exactly how much this inner conversation has been interfering with your life. You'll feel hopeful that you can now set goals and surpass them.

Through positive self-talk you will be able easily set long and short-term goals for yourself. And when you use affirmations, you'll have accessible tools to help you push yourself further than ever before. Learning to quiet negativity with positive thoughts is a great move toward setting and attaining future goals with ease.


Antonia Harrison from Personal Development in the 21st Century