Lesson Seven - Enthusiasm / Start the Burning Fire Within You

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ENTHUSIASM is a state of mind that inspires and arouses one to put action into the task at hand.

 

It does more than this - it is contagious, and vitally affects not only the enthusiast, but all with whom he comes in contact. Enthusiasm bears the same relationship to a human being that steam does to the locomotive - it is the vital moving force that impels action.

 

The greatest leaders of men are those who know how to inspire enthusiasm in their followers.

 

Enthusiasm is the most important factor entering into salesmanship.

 

It is, by far, the most vital factor that enters into public speaking. If you wish to understand the difference between a man who is enthusiastic and one who is not, compare Billy Sunday with the average man of his profession. The finest sermon ever delivered would fall upon deaf ears if it were not backed with enthusiasm by the speaker.

 

HOW ENTHUSIASM WILL AFFECT YOU

 

Mix enthusiasm with your work and it will not seem hard or monotonous. Enthusiasm will so energize your entire body that you can get along with less than half the usual amount of sleep and at the same time it will enable you to perform from two to three times as much work as you usually perform in a given period, without fatigue.

 

For many years I have done most of my writing at night. One night, while I was enthusiastically at work over my typewriter, I looked out of the window of my study, just across the square from the Metropolitan tower, in New York City, and saw what seemed to be the most peculiar reflection of the moon on the tower.

 

It was of a silvery gray shade, such as I had never seen before. Upon closer inspection I found that the reflection was that of the early morning sun and not that of the moon. It was daylight! I had been at work all night, but I was so engrossed in my work that the night had passed as though it were but an hour.

 

I worked at my task all that day and all the following night without stopping, except for a small amount of light food. Two nights and one day without sleep, and with but little food, without the slightest evidence of fatigue, would not have been possible had I not kept my body energized with enthusiasm over the work at hand.

 

Enthusiasm is not merely a figure of speech; it is a vital force that you can harness and use with profit. Without it you would resemble an electric battery without electricity. Enthusiasm is the vital force with which you recharge your body and develop a dynamic personality.

 

Some people are blessed with natural enthusiasm, while others must acquire it.

 

The procedure through which it may be developed is simple. It begins by the doing of the work or rendering of the service which one likes best. If you should be so situated that you cannot conveniently engage in the work which you like best, for the time being, then you can proceed along another line very effectively by adopting a definite chief aim that contemplates your engaging in that particular work at some future time.

 

Lack of capital and many other circumstances over which you have no immediate control may force you to engage in work which you do not like, but no one can stop you from determining in your own mind what your definite chief aim in life shall be, nor can anyone stop you from planning ways and means for translating this aim into reality, nor can anyone stop you from mixing enthusiasm with your plans.

 

Happiness, the final object of all human effort, is a state of mind that can be maintained only through the hope of future achievement. Happiness lies always in the future and never in the past.

 

The happy person is

the one who dreams of heights of achievement

that are yet unattained.

 

The home you intend to own, the money you intend to earn and place in the bank, the trip you intend to take when you can afford it, the "Position in Life" you intend to fill when you have prepared yourself, and the preparation, itself - these are the things that produce happiness.

 

Likewise, these are the materials out of which your definite chief aim is formed; these are the things over which you may become enthusiastic, no matter what your present station in life may be.

 

More than twenty years ago I became enthusiastic over an idea. When the idea first took form in my mind I was unprepared to take even the first step toward its transformation into reality. But I nursed it in my mind - I became enthusiastic over it as I looked ahead, in my imagination, and saw the time when I would be prepared to make it a reality.

 

The idea was this: I wanted to become the editor of a magazine, based upon the Golden Rule, through which I could inspire people to keep up courage and deal with one another squarely.

 

Finally my chance came! and, on armistice day, 1918, I wrote the first editorial for what was to become the material realization of a hope that had lain dormant in my mind for nearly a score of years.

 

With enthusiasm I poured into that editorial the emotions which I had been developing in my heart over a period of more than twenty years. My dream had come true. My editorship of a national magazine had become a reality.

 

As I have stated, this editorial was written with enthusiasm. I took it to a man of my acquaintance and with enthusiasm I read it to him. The editorial ended in these words: "At last my twenty-year-old dream is about to come true. It takes money, and a lot of it, to publish a national magazine, and I haven't the slightest idea where I am going to get this essential factor, but this is worrying me not at all because I know I am going to get it somewhere!"

 

As I wrote those lines, I mixed enthusiasm and faith with them. I had hardly finished reading this editorial when the man to whom I read it - the first and only person to whom I had shown it - said: "I can tell you where you are going to get the money, for I am going to supply it." And he did!

 

Yes, enthusiasm is a vital force; so vital, in fact, that no man who has it highly developed can begin even to approximate his power of achievement.

 

Before passing to the next step in this lesson, I wish to repeat and to emphasize the fact that you may develop enthusiasm over your definite chief aim in life, no matter whether you are in position to achieve that purpose at this time or not. You may be a long way from realization of your definite chief aim, but if you will kindle the fire of enthusiasm in your heart, and keep it burning, before very long the obstacles that now stand in the way of your attainment of that purpose will melt away as if by the force of magic, and you will find yourself in possession of power that you did not know you possessed.

 

HOW YOUR ENTHUSIASM WILL AFFECT OTHERS

 

We come, now, to the discussion of one of the most important subjects of this Course, namely, suggestion.

 

In the preceding lessons we have discussed the subject of Auto-suggestion, which is self-suggestion. You saw, in Lesson Three, what an important part Auto-suggestion played.

 

Suggestion is the principle through which your words

and your acts and even your state of mind influence others.

 

That you may comprehend the farreaching power of suggestion, let me refer to the Introductory Lesson, in which the principle of telepathy is described.

 

If you now understand and accept the principle of telepathy (the communication of thought from one mind to another without the aid of signs, symbols or sounds) as a reality, you of course understand why enthusiasm is contagious, and why it influences all within its radius.

 

When your own mind is vibrating at a high rate, because it has been stimulated with enthusiasm, that vibration registers in the minds of all within its radius, and especially in the minds of those with whom you come in close contact.

 

When a public speaker "senses" the feeling that his audience is "en rapport" with him he merely recognizes the fact that his own enthusiasm has influenced the minds of his listeners until their minds are vibrating in harmony with his own.

 

When the salesman "senses" the fact that the "psychological" moment for closing a sale has arrived, he merely feels the effect of his own enthusiasm as it influences the mind of his prospective buyer and places that mind "en rapport" (in harmony) with his own.

 

The subject of suggestion constitutes so vitally an important part of this lesson, and of this entire course, that I will now proceed to describe the three mediums through which it usually operates; namely,

• what you say,

• what you do and

• what you think!

 

When you are enthusiastic over the goods you are selling or the services you are offering, or the speech you are delivering, your state of mind becomes obvious to all who hear you, by the tone of your voice.

 

Whether you have ever thought of it in this way or not, it is the tone in which you make a statement, more than it is the statement itself, that carries conviction or fails to convince.

 

No mere combination of words can ever take the place of a deep belief in a statement that is expressed with burning enthusiasm. Words are but devitalized sounds unless colored with feeling that is born of enthusiasm.

 

Here the printed word fails me, for I can never express with mere type and paper the difference between words that fall from unemotional lips, without the fire of enthusiasm back of them, and those which seem to pour forth from a heart that is bursting with eagerness for expression. The difference is there, however.

 

Thus, what you say, and the way in which you say it, conveys a meaning that may be just the opposite to what is intended.

 

This accounts for many a failure by the salesman who presents his arguments in words which seem logical enough, but lack the coloring that can come only from enthusiasm that is born of sincerity and belief in the goods he is trying to sell. His, words said one thing, but the tone of his voice suggested something entirely different; therefore, no sale was made.

 

That which you say is an important factor in the operation of the principle of suggestion, but not nearly so important as that which you do. Your acts will count for more than your words, and woe unto you if the two fail to harmonize.

 

If a man preach the Golden Rule as a sound rule of conduct, his words will fall upon deaf ears if he does not practice that which he preaches. The most effective sermon that any man can preach on the soundness of the Golden Rule is that which he preaches, by suggestion, when he applies this rule in his relationships with his fellow men.

 

If a salesman of Ford automobiles drives up to his prospective purchaser in a Buick, or some other make of car, all the arguments he can present in behalf of the Ford will be without effect.

 

Once I went into one of the offices of the Dictaphone Company to look at a dictaphone (dictating machine). The salesman in charge presented a logical argument as to the machine's merits, while the stenographer at his side was transcribing letters from a shorthand note-book. His arguments in favor of a dictating machine, as compared with the old method of dictating to a stenographer, did not impress me, because his actions were not in harmony with his words.

 

Your thoughts constitute the most important of the three ways in which you apply the principle of suggestion, for the reason that they control the tone of your words and, to some extent at least, your actions.

 

If your thoughts, your actions and your words harmonize, you are bound to influence those with whom you come in contact, more or less toward your way of thinking.

 

We will now proceed to analyze the subject of suggestion and to show you exactly how to apply the principle upon which it operates.

 

As we have already seen, suggestion differs from Auto-suggestion only in one way

- we use it, consciously or unconsciously, when we influence others,

- while we use Autosuggestion as a means of influencing ourselves.

 

Before you can influence another person through suggestion, that person's mind must be in a state of neutrality; that is, it must be open and receptive to your method of suggestion.

 

Right here is where most salesmen fail - they try to make a sale before the mind of the prospective buyer has been rendered receptive or neutralized.

 

This is such a vital point in this lesson that I feel impelled to dwell upon it until there can be no doubt that you understand the principle that I am describing.

 

When I say that the salesman must neutralize the mind of his prospective purchaser before a sale can be made I mean that the prospective purchaser's mind must be credulous. A state of confidence must have been established and it is obvious that there can be no set rule for either establishing confidence or neutralizing the mind to a state of openness.

 

Here the ingenuity of the salesman must supply that which cannot be set down as a hard and fast rule. I know a life insurance salesman who sells nothing but large policies, amounting to $100,000.00 and upward. Before this man even approaches the subject of insurance with a prospective client he familiarizes himself with the prospective client's complete history, including his education, his financial status, his eccentricities if he has any, his religious preferences and other data too numerous to be listed.

 

Armed with this information, he manages to secure an introduction under conditions which permit him to know the Prospective client in a social as well as a business way. Nothing is said about the sale of life insurance during his first visit, nor his second, and sometimes he does not approach the subject of insurance until he has become very well acquainted with the prospective client.

 

All this time, however, he is not dissipating his efforts. He is taking advantage of these friendly visits for the purpose of neutralizing his prospective client's mind; that is, he is building up a relationship of confidence so that when the time comes for him to talk life insurance that which he says will fall upon ears that willingly listen.

 

Some years ago I wrote a book entitled How to Sell Your Services. Just before the manuscript went to the publisher, it occurred to me to request some of the well known men of the United States to write letters of endorsement to be published in the book. The printer was then waiting for the manuscript; therefore, I hurriedly wrote a letter to some eight or ten men, in which I briefly outlined exactly what I wanted, but the letter brought back no replies.

 

I had failed to observe two important prerequisites for success - I had written the letter so hurriedly that I had failed to inject the spirit of enthusiasm into it, and, I had neglected so to word the letter that it had the effect of neutralizing the minds of those to whom it was sent; therefore, I had not paved the way for the application of the principle of suggestion.

 

 

Lesson Seven - Enthusiasm / Start the Burning Fire Within You

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