189wrong with you and how you operate. But, because I’m
thinking with my feelings instead of my mind, I’m de-
stroying something with my speech instead of creating
an understanding.
People do this without knowing it. They let their
emotions speak for them, instead of their thoughts. So
what you hear is fear, anger, sadness, or other emotions
put to words, but never creating anything.
If you can picture this ladder inside of you, and start
to notice that you are letting your feelings do your
thinking and speaking, you can move up. You can get
creative and really think and then speak. As Emmet
Fox says, “Love is always creative and fear is always
destructive.”
Go ahead and feel your feelings. But when it’s time
to talk, let your mind into the conversation. Your mind
is what motivates you to your highest performance, not
your feelings.
91. Exploit your weakness
Make a list of your strengths and your weaknesses
on separate pieces of paper. Place the list of strengths
somewhere where you’ll see it again, because it will al-
ways pick you up.
Now look at your list of weaknesses and study them
for a while. Stay with them until you feel no shame or
guilt about them. Allow them to become interesting char-
acteristics, instead of negative traits. Ask yourself how
each characteristic could be useful to you. That’s not
what we usually ask about our weaknesses, but that’s
my whole point.
When I was a boy I remember watching a remark-
able tap dancer by the name of “Peg Leg Bates” on the
Ed Sullivan show. Bates had lost his leg early in life, a
Exploit your weakness