Reading “Think & Grow Rich” by Napoleon Hill as an Otaku Part III

Chapter 3: Faith

Continuing with my series of rereading Napoleon Hill as an Otaku.

“There is a false saying: “How can someone who can’t save himself save others?” Supposing I have the key to your chains, why should your lock and my lock be the same?” - (Nietzsche, KSA 10:4[4])

I read a very long article going over Napoleon Hill’s life as a scammer and deceiver of women, supposedly failing to listen to his own advice that: “no wealth or position can long endure unless built upon truth and justice,” and ending up losing his wealth over and over again in the process. A similar criticism is levied at Nietzsche as well, not many of Nietzsche’s enemies are brave enough to say it as they actually think it, the more courageous will whisper it to each other in private communities, but only the most stupid among them would voice their criticism that Nietzsche went insane because of his beliefs, and so his beliefs must be wrong because they weren’t useful to him, they didn’t save him and so they must be useless and therefore untrue. Maybe, it is anticipating and replying to this that Nietzsche wrote that posthumously published fragment. Maybe the one coming up with the solution and the one implementing it need not to be the same person. After all, if someone were rich already then why would they not feel the need to write a book about getting rich. I like Nietzsche, and I believe he is a great writer, even though I have never read him in his native language, but behind the rich in meaning in his every sentence is, not much practice. I guess what I am getting at is the disconnect between the theory and practice of philosophy. It’s as if the man of ideas and the man of action are two people these days, since you have got to commit everything to one thing, Nietzsche might call it a life unifying purpose, and Napoleon Hill would call it a definite purpose but in practice, is it that different? Children grow up like their parents and their imagination is gone.

You can read the Anti-Napoleon Hill article here. Unfortunately none of the comments to the article got archived. Well none except one of the 300 odd comments which have been deleted:

“That’s a lot of energy invested in writing such a long article about someone who is no longer alive to defend himself and that has inspired so many thousands of people to go on the most important journey of all: Know Thy Self! The simplification of “you just have to visualize something for it to appear” that is mentioned in this poorly researched article, is an example of the bias and mediocrity in the media that the Cabal has bought over the years. You’ll say anything to keep people away from the empowering knowledge that quantum physics PROVES today: That you create your own reality with your thoughts and emotions - that nothing exists outside your own consciousness and that all you witness as an outside phenomenon is just a projection of your own consciousnesses. That YOU are God, or an extension of source energy, All-That-Is, whatever you want to call it. Every master that walked on this planet said so... All sacred texts mention that you can indeed move mountains. That You are powerful beyond measure - and if you believe that you are nothing, born in sin and at the mercy of circumstances, etc - that’s exactly what you’ll experience... How convenient to write an article that strives to maintain the Status Quo in society, by debunking yet another empowering author and associate it’s teachings to Donald Trump (who is not a Free Mason, Skull&Bones, Bilderberger, etc) as an example of something that we do not want... Journalism? Umm... No, Propaganda! This comment will surely not stay here for very long...But for the many intelligent and capable people that like to base their opinions on real facts and use your own discernment, I suggest you google: #Biocentrism #Stillnessinthestorm #BenjaminFullford #Pizzagate #WikileaksSatanicClinton #BasharDarryllAnka #AbrahamHicks #SethJaneRoberts” - NonSheeple, 12/07/16 11:10AM

This article and the reply are both unfortunately tainted with the political madness which intensified from 2013-2016 but this is not a politics blog so I will not comment on any of it one way or the other.

It sounds like Hill believed in some version of Spinoza’s God, or in other words that God is everything and everyone, and that we are all on; no wonder some of his writing almost sounds like it’s talking about telepathy with an “Infinite Intelligence,” and with other humans both dead and alive. These ideas are dangerous because there is a possibility that you will be taken advantage of by charlatans who tell you they have found what you are looking for. Nevertheless, faith remains a powerful foot both of the rulers and the ruled.

“Life’s battles don’t always go To the stronger or faster man, But soon or late the man who wins Is the man WHO THINKS HE CAN!” - Thinking, a poem by Walter D. Wintle as quoted in Think And Grow Rich.

I rewatched Kimi no Namae wa. I feel like it would have been better as a TV series. In fact, I felt like I was watching a compilation movie from a TV series which does not exist. Nevertheless, this is not a review blog so I will stop there. The important point is that both the time travel/gap and the body switching of the protagonist and the heroine are both typical otaku delusional fantasies. Furthermore, just the resilience of the main characters is admirable, and rewarded with romantic success rather than tragedy. You don’t always get to see a teenager working at a part-time job and having to face bad customers. I think the film also did a good job of showing the beauty and hardships of both the traditions of the countryside and the fast-living of the city. Honestly, even if we can’t bodyswitch with cute girls, I wish it were normalised for young people in the countryside and the city to be transferred to each other to see both. In any case, it is a film that shows that the place where one is born shouldn’t necessarily be the limit of one’s aspirations. There is a novel version of this movie which I might read cause I wanted to see more of the characters.

"Thinking" is a poem written by Walter D. Wintle, it is included in Think and Grow Rich, in the Chapter on Faith. I thought I’d share the whole thing since it is pretty short:

If you think you are beaten, you are;
If you think you dare not, you don’t.
If you’d like to win, but you think you can’t,
It is almost a cinch you won’t.

If you think you’ll lose, you’ve lost;
For out in this world we find
Success begins with a fellow’s will
It’s all in the state of mind.

If you think you’re outclassed, you are;
You’ve got to think high to rise.
You’ve got to be sure of yourself before
You can ever win the prize.

Life’s battles don’t always go
To the stronger or faster man;
But sooner or later the man who wins
Is the man who thinks he can!

The reason why people give up on motivational content is because the psychological high which they give is temporary. It is difficult to maintain a constant positive outlook in the face of adversity. Memorisation and repetition is key to overcome this.

Chapter 4: Auto-suggestion

I think this is an important section of the book, but also a very problematic one, because it claims that our thoughts determine whether we are rich or poor, since material reality is subordinate to our minds and consciousness. That being the case, whether it is true or not, from an individual level it can be useful to believe that you have total free will, because otherwise you may not exert yourself because you will believe that reality is outside of your influence anyway so why bother? The mind is very sensitive so I think you need to be careful what you put in or else you will end up discouraged without any hope and just give up.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that society doesn’t also wants you to believe that you are to blame for your circumstances or that society is blameless. The key, I think is to trust the belief that you are the master of your faith, but to look at it as deflection of responsibility when people try to blame you for your life without offering any help. Not that they owe you help but unsolicited advice is not help, it is just self-satisfaction.

In general I would say to distrust those that tell you to be selfless to control you, not just because they are often transparently hypocritical, but also because their so-called self-lessness and favours are tool for controlling others.

Chapter 5: Specialised Knowledge

This chapter is about education and how to promote personal services. Hill claims that public school is ineffective because it is free. Perhaps he is right but I think that a better motivation to go to school would be to literally pay students to go to school rather than pretend that that going to school is just for their good so they should just go whether they like to or not. I also feel like school should be more like university in terms of school time, extra curricular clubs, and assignments… Especially after the kids have learned to do basic reading and sums. Rather than emphasis of getting the highest marks to get to a good university, there should be an emphasis that it’s not important where you go but what you do when you go there. Perhaps this is just wishful thinking but if it so then it’s mostly because people believe that to be the case. However, this is not a blog about how to fix society, but self-development so I will stop there.

The last half of the chapter is about how to promote personal services. A lot of it is good, except maybe the idea of making a book sized CV, no modern employer is going to care about, but if you can build some kind of portfolio for the field you are trying to get it then it’s better. Part of me though is worried that there are so many people doing these things to appeal to employers that it’s kind of a race to the bottom of who can suck up to an employer the most. I refuse that, and that leaves me with the choice of building some kind of private income.

In any case, the most important point that this chapter makes is that education doesn’t stop after school ends, that is where the true self-directed learning begins, and specialised knowledge is readily available everywhere, and that ideally and in practice you will have to delegate tasks on a large project anyway. Hill calls this kind of ideal group of people a Master Mind. It is kind of an odd name, because it implies it is a singular mind at work but given his belief that God is some kind of Infinite Intelligence then maybe you can square that round peg as a group who is so harmonised that it works as one mind. I would like to have an Otaku Master Mind but the problem is that I need some kind of skill or money for that to work. Am I being too risk averse? Honestly, one reason I said to give people money for going to school is because it might lead them to take some risk and do activities that they wouldn’t do otherwise which would broaden their horizons.

Chapter 6: Organised Planning

The last section of this chapter is about the creation of Coca-cola, except it is regaled in a romantic fashion which to be honest I have never thought about, given what a mundane and maybe even slightly decadent part of life I take Cola to be. But honestly who’s to say I am right and he was wrong. Maybe the only reason why I saw things that way is my pessimism.

“Success Requires
No Explanation

Failure Permits
No Alibis ”

This is quite cruel and true. Elsewhere in the book, Hill quotes someone saying bluntly that the world has no time for a loser. Belief systems which try to claim that no one is really happy even when they are successful, or that we all default to the same mood no matter what happens, I think these are just excuses whether on a social or individual level, for the current state of affairs.

All Powers Are Cheat Powers

I watched Unnamed Memory. It’s a time-loop story, and while it is not great because of how rushed of an adaptation it feels like, I am sure that the source material must be good. In any case, if I was every offered a choice between different super powers then I would certainly pick the ability to to time leap/travel. It might sound like it’s unfair to repeat the past but really what’s a fair super power? If it’s that you need to struggle for it then then time leapers have to struggle too, and if it’s that there needs to be a possibility of definitely failing then that’s just stupid. I also feel like time-leaps and loops have the possibility of teaching us a lot compared to other super-powers. Although we can’t literally repeat time, almost everyone has a predictable routine and so the chance to learn from previous attempts.