Thoughts to Build On

Any test which has so much to do with success
or failure-and which, if used, will insure your success-
should have your most careful consideration. I am empha-
sizing the word "insure" because insurance presupposes
the existence of other elements and factors; therefore,
other ingredients of success must also be present-but, if
they are, this test will provide the insurance factor.
Here is your SUCCESS INSURANCE test:
( 1) In dealing with others, do not say, write
or do anything until you have asked yourself this simple
question: "Will what I am about to say, write or do-
create goodwiU or incur ill will?"
( 2) If you can answer with asssurance that
what you are about to say, write or do, will create goodWill
(and the other necessary success factors also are present),
do it.
( 3 ) But if you thoughtfully conclude that
what you are about to say, write or do, will incur ill will
(no matter how clever, expedient or even "justified" it
may be)... do not do it.
It is difficult to resist being clever, or doing
what is expedient, or responding in kind to an insult, or
unnecessarily proving that you are right or are smarter
than some other person, or doing so many of the self-
satisfying things which injure the precious ego of another
to please or even placate your own ego. But it is much
more difficult for you to overcome the immediate or future
damage of the ill will which you thus incur.
It is a sinister characteristic of ill will to seem
innocuous at its inception only to escalate to major pro-