Think and Grow Rich: Difference between revisions

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🧠 '''12 – THE SUB-CONSCIOUS MIND (The Eleventh Step to Riches).''' Every thought reaching the objective mind through the senses is classified and recorded in the subconscious, which then acts first on dominating desires that are mixed with emotion such as faith. Described as a connecting link, it works continuously and draws on Infinite Intelligence to translate desires into their physical equivalents by the most practical routes available. Because it responds more readily to feeling than to “cold reason,” the chapter instructs approaching this “inner audience” with emotionalized instructions delivered through autosuggestion. It names seven major positive emotions—desire, faith, love, sex, enthusiasm, romance, hope—and seven negative emotions—fear, jealousy, hatred, revenge, greed, superstition, anger—and notes that positives must be injected deliberately while negatives enter uninvited. As a cautionary example, prayers made in fear and doubt fail because the subconscious transmits the feeling, not the request. The earlier tools—written chief aim, morning‑and‑night repetition, and harmony with a Master Mind—are presented as the daily inputs that saturate attention and keep behavior aligned with a definite purpose. Within the book’s system, the subconscious mind is the conduit that receives plans and enlists larger forces; the mechanism is repeated, emotional suggestion that displaces negatives and turns desire into sustained action. ''You may VOLUNTARILY plant in your subconscious mind any plan, thought, or purpose which you desire to translate into its physical or monetary equivalent.''
 
📡 '''13 – THE BRAIN (The Twelfth Step to Riches).''' Working with Alexander Graham Bell and Elmer R. Gates more than twenty years earlier, observation gives rise to a claim: every human brain functions as both a broadcasting and a receiving station for thought vibrations moving through the ether. Emotion “steps up” these vibrations; the subconscious mind acts as the sending station and the Creative Imagination as the receiving set, so that feelings fuse with thoughts before the subconscious will act on them. The narrative then turns to science: University of Chicago neuroanatomist C. Judson Herrick estimates 10–14 billion cortical nerve cells arranged in definite patterns and describes micro‑electrodes that register potentials to a millionth of a volt, underscoring the brain’s vast circuitry. A New York Times editorial summarizing J. B. Rhine’s Duke University experiments reports more than a hundred thousand tests of telepathy and clairvoyance, with results said to be beyond “one chance in many a million million,” unaffected by distance of several hundred miles and boosted by stimulants while depressed by narcotics. As a practical method, a three‑person round‑table blends minds in harmony to stimulate ideas “from unknown sources,” a simple use of the Master Mind to solve client problems. The chapter’s thrust is operational rather than mystical: three principles—subconscious mind, creative imagination, and auto‑suggestion—constitute a mental radio that can be tuned to send and receive plans. The core idea is that the brain converts desire into power when emotion raises the intensity of thought high enough to be broadcast to, and to receive from, other minds. Mechanistically, auto‑suggestion and harmonious discussion create a feedback loop that amplifies attention until practical solutions present themselves. ''The Creative Imagination is the 'receiving set,' through which the vibrations of thought are picked up from the ether.''
📡 '''13 – THE BRAIN (The Twelfth Step to Riches).'''
 
🕯️ '''14 – THE SIXTH SENSE (The Thirteenth Step to Riches).''' Night after night, for years, an imaginary “Invisible Counselors” cabinet convenes around a mental Council Table: Emerson, Paine, Edison, Darwin, Lincoln, Burbank, Napoleon, Ford, and Carnegie are addressed aloud, each asked to impress specific qualities on the subconscious. The practice grows from hero‑worship into deliberate character‑building through self‑suggestion, with the admission that the meetings are fictional yet productive of “inspiration” during emergencies and complex decisions. The sixth sense is framed as the apex of the philosophy, the door to the “Temple of Wisdom,” and a probable medium of contact between the finite mind and Infinite Intelligence. It is not acquired casually; mastery of the other twelve principles and years of meditation and self‑examination are said to precede reliable use. The text claims the function is practical—warnings of danger and timely notice of opportunity—while emphasizing that leaders from Edison to Ford exemplify its application in invention and enterprise. The guiding image is a mental antenna that works best when the mind is emotionally keyed up and harmonized by prior discipline. The core idea is that a cultivated intuition completes the system by converting disciplined desire into timely guidance. Mechanistically, sustained auto‑suggestion, emotional readiness, and a clear chief aim prime the “receiving set” so that hunches arrive as workable plans. ''Through the aid of the sixth sense, you will be warned of impending dangers in time to avoid them, and notified of opportunities in time to embrace them.''
🕯️ '''14 – THE SIXTH SENSE (The Thirteenth Step to Riches).'''
 
👻 '''15 – HOW TO OUTWIT THE SIX GHOSTS OF FEAR (Clearing the Brain for Riches).''' A closing self‑audit begins with three enemies that must be cleared out—Indecision, Doubt, and Fear—because the sixth sense will not function while they remain. Six basic fears are named and examined in order of prevalence: poverty, criticism, ill health, loss of love, old age, and death; their cycles are illustrated by the Depression’s long season of fear of poverty and the war’s fear of death. The text insists that fear is a state of mind, that thought impulses quickly clothe themselves in physical equivalents, and that mass fixation on poverty after the 1929 crash crystallized into a national depression. Practical work follows: detailed symptoms expose the fear of poverty, and a long self‑analysis questionnaire—“at least one day is necessary” to answer—forces a personal inventory of habits, associates, and uses of time. The remedy is mental hygiene: close the mind against “tramp” thought impulses, use auto‑suggestion to keep it positive, and choose associates who reinforce courage rather than worry. The reader is challenged to make an unmistakable choice between the roads to poverty and to riches and to protect the “spiritual estate” of the mind with will‑power. The core idea is that mastery of fear is prerequisite to converting desire into results, because unguarded thought multiplies the very conditions it dreads. Mechanistically, deliberate thought selection, repeated suggestion, and environment control displace fearful imagery and align behavior with a definite chief aim. ''You have ABSOLUTE CONTROL over but one thing, and that is your thoughts.''
👻 '''15 – HOW TO OUTWIT THE SIX GHOSTS OF FEAR (Clearing the Brain for Riches).'''
 
== Background & reception ==