238 THE PRINCIPLES OF SELF-MASTERY
at myself for not having discovered the lesson that I had helped another
to learn. I did stand before that same mirror. And as I did so, I then and
there fixed in my mind, as my definite purpose in life, the determination
to help men and women discover the forces that lie sleeping within them.
The book you hold in your hands is evidence that my definite purpose
is being carried out.
The man whose story I have related here is now the president of
one of the largest and most successful concerns of its kind in America,
with a business that extends from coast to coast and from Canada to
Mexico.
A short while after the incident just related, a woman came to
my office for personal analysis. She was then a teacher in the Chicago
public schools. I gave her an analysis chart and asked her to fill it out.
She had been at work on the chart but a few minutes when she came
to my desk, handed back the chart, and said, "I do not believe I will
fill this out:' I asked her why she had decided not to fill out the chart,
and she replied: "To be perfectly frank with you, one of the questions
in this chart started me thinking and I now know what is wrong with
me. Therefore I feel it unnecessary to pay you a fee to analyze me."
With that the woman went away and I did not hear from her for two
years. She went to New York City, became a writer of advertising copy
for one of the largest agencies in the country, and her income at the
time she wrote me was $ 10,000 a year. [In today's terms, and depending on
the nature of the work or the company, this would be in the range of $175,000 to
$200,000.]
This woman later sent me a check to cover the cost of my analysis
fee because she felt that the fee had been earned, even though I did not
render her the service that I usually render my clients. It is impossible
for anyone to foretell what seemingly insignificant incident may lead
to an important turning point in one's career, but there is no denying
that these "turning points" may be more readily recognized by those
who have well-developed confidence in themselves.