203you discover something you want to remember, and draw
upon in the future, read it aloud.
Steve Hardison, one of the most successful business
consultants I have ever known, credits one origin of his
success to when he was a struggling young man without
money or a clue about where he wanted to go. Then one
day he came across Napoleon Hill’s enormous book, Law
of Success, and read the entire volume aloud.
My favorite piece of writing to read aloud is Chap-
ter 16 of Og Mandino’s The Greatest Salesman in the
World. Here’s a part of it, which you may now read si-
lently to yourself. However, if you want a real shot of
adrenaline to your spirit, I recommend you mark this
page and when you’re alone, read it aloud like Lincoln:
“I will act now. I will act now. I will act now. Hence-
forth, I will repeat these words again and again, each
hour, each day, every day, until the words become a
habit as my breathing and the actions which follow be-
come as instinctive as the blinking of my eyelids. With
these words I can condition my mind to perform every
act necessary for my success. With these words I can
condition my mind to meet every challenge.”
99. Laugh for no reason
Become a performer. Be an actor and a singer. Act
like you already feel like you want to feel. Don’t wait
until the feeling motivates you. It could be a long wait.
American philosopher William James put it very
clearly: “We do not sing because we are happy, we are
happy because we sing.”
Most of us believe an emotion, such as happiness, comes
first. Then we do whatever we do, in reaction to that par-
ticular emotion. Not so, insisted James. The emotion
arises simultaneously with the doing of the act. So if
Laugh for no reason