Inspirational Living: Life Lessons for Success & Happiness

Listen to episode 501 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Motivation for an Enthusiastic Life. Edited and adapted from The Power of Mental Demand by Herbert Edward Law.

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Today’s reading was edited and adapted from The Power of Mental Demand by Herbert Edward Law, published in 1916.

THERE is no element so important to a successful business or a successful life as enthusiasm. Yet it is an element often not thoroughly understood, or very accurately measured. It is rarely given the degree of importance to which it is entitled. Indeed, it is often neglected altogether. Enthusiasm is faith in action — it puts your beliefs to the test. The enthusiast believes that the thing can be done. They have the faith to believe that it ought to be done; and they have the enthusiasm to do it.

To the unthinking, enthusiasm is but the foam on deeply stirred waters. In truth, it is the striving of the waters themselves. It is the very life of effort. It is to effort what fire is to coal, what steam is to the engine, what a lighted fuse is to a charge of dynamite — the vital force which brings action.

Enthusiasm gives a sparkle to your eye, light to your countenance, spring and action to your step, certainty to your effort, and force and vigor to your movements. It gives character and vitality to your desires. It is the difference between wish and determination; between the inanimate body and the living, acting human being.

Listen to episode 500 of the Inspirational Living podcast: The Sun Dial’s Motto | Motivational Podcasts. Edited and adapted from Peace, Power & Plenty by Orison Swett Marden.

Motivational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. If you enjoy today’s podcast, please help us spread the word by sharing it with your friends on Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn. Thank you. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from Peace, Power, and Plenty by Orison Swett Marden, published in 1909.

On a famous sun-dial it is written: "I record none but hours of sunshine." Every human life would be beautified by making this a life motto. What a great thing it would be if we could only learn to wipe out of our memories forever everything unpleasant, everything which brings up bitter memories, unfortunate associations, and depressing, discouraging suggestions! If we could only keep our minds filled with beautiful thoughts which uplift and encourage, the efficiency of our lives would be multiplied.

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Listen to episode 499 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Overcoming a Poverty Mindset| Law of Opulence. Edited and adapted from Peace, Power & Plenty by Orison Swett Marden.

Inspirational Podcast Transcript: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. Don’t forget to check out our collection of inspirational fashion and gifts at BookofZen.com. Each item features one of my own original thought-provoking sayings inside a zen enso circle. Thank you. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from Peace, Power, and Plenty by Orison Swett Marden, published in 1909.

The worst thing about poverty is the poverty thought. It is the conviction that we are poor and must remain so that is fatal to progress in life. Holding the poverty thought keeps us in poverty-stricken and poverty-producing conditions.

Poverty is an abnormal condition. It does not fit any human being's constitution. It contradicts the promise and the prophecy of the divine within us. The Creator never intended that we should be a pauper or a slave. There is not a single thing in the wonderful human mechanism that indicates we were created for a life of poverty.

There is something larger and grander for us in the divine plan than perpetual slavery to the bread-winning problem. None of us can do our best work — bring out the best within us — while we feel want tugging at our heels, while we are hampered, restricted, forever at the mercy of pinching circumstances.

The very poor (those struggling to keep the wolf at bay) cannot be independent. They cannot order their lives. Often they cannot afford to express their opinions, or to have individual views. Poverty in its extreme form is narrowing, belittling, contracting, ambition-killing — an unmitigated curse. There is little hope in it, little prospect in it, little joy in it. It often develops the worst in us and kills love between those who would otherwise live happily together.

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Listen to episode 498 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Overcoming a Fear of Failure | Success Talks. Edited and adapted from Personal Power by Keith J. Thomas.

Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. If you are interested in podcasts about spirituality and spiritual growth, don’t forget about my exclusive podcasts for patrons Our Sunday Talks, which includes over 140 podcasts. Not only are these my own talks, but I also share with you some inspiring talks from my favorite authors and speakers of the past.

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Today’s reading was edited and adapted from Personal Power by Keith J. Thomas, published in 1917.

When we go to a movie theater to see a film, we often marvel at the splendor of the scenic effects. A beautiful sunrise or sunset is reproduced on the screen with such fidelity that it stirs up emotions within us. Aided by the art of the actors and the drama of the music, the scene often affects us more than the real wonders of Nature which are going on around us every day. In the theater, these things are forced upon our attention and we realize their beauty, while the infinitely greater beauty of the real thing goes unnoticed.

As the old saying goes: "Eyes have we, and we see not". Why? Because we have not trained our eyes to see. Suppose, for one moment, that the sky had always been gray and overcast since you were born, and that one summer evening a wind sprang up and the clouds dispersed, revealing the majesty of the stars and all the wonders of the heavens. Would you not believe that a miracle had happened? Yet how often do you look up and see with discerning eyes this inspiring and uplifting spectacle?

All the gifts of Nature are to be had for the asking. They are your right. But, like all gifts worth having, they must be striven for. You must train your eye to look for them, and your brain to hear and understand. Then you will see how the earth can take on the form of Paradise, and will hear in its sounds the harmonies of heaven.

Listen to episode 498 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Overcoming a Fear of Failure | Success Talks. Edited and adapted from Personal Power by Keith J. Thomas.

Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. I’d like to start today by letting you know that our three books of inspirational life lessons are now available in paperback. That means you now have three versions to choose from: hardcover, paperback, and e-book. To order the paperback version on Amazon, please go to LivingHour.org/amazon. Thank you.

Today’s reading was edited and adapted from Personal Power by Keith J. Thomas, published in 1917.

How many people fail in life only because they are obsessed with a fear of failure! They so fill their minds with the thought of failing that they approach every task as if it were an impossibility. They start with the idea that perfect success (for some reason) is denied to them — that they are unlucky, as compared with those fortunate ones who seem to turn to gold everything they touch.

Someone said to me once: “I would rather start in a humble way and work up gradually, than start big and come down in the world.” But the people who are afraid to "start big" never achieve greatness. They are the very people who do come down in the world. They are so full of the idea of coming down that all thought of progress is crushed out of their minds.

If they would only fix their thoughts on big things and success, and be determined to move forward, instead of dreading to go backward, they would lose their fear of failure. And they would get so used to the thought of success that achievement would become natural to them.

Listen to episode 497 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Becoming a Great Soul. Edited and adapted from Four Minute Essays by Frank Crane.

Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. Get exclusive access to over 200 additional podcasts from our archive by becoming our patron today. Learn more by visiting: LivingHour.org/patron. Thank you. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from Four Minute Essays by Frank Crane, published in 1919.

Would you like a magic formula to help you though life? Here is one that I like to repeat over and over again. It goes like this: Mine own will come to me.

This statement is not provable. The deepest truths of life never are. The creeds of the world that have led humanity up out of barbarism into civilization, out of war into law, out of lust into love, are all open to doubt. We do not reach those sublime conclusions that transform our lives by building Babel Towers of bricks of Logic, for the end of all such work is a confusion of tongues. Instead, we fly to them by the airplanes of Faith.

We believe them. We do not know them. And the best things of existence are believed, not known. We believe them because we are drawn to them, because something in them appeals to something in us.

The most usable and persuasive wisdom has never been included in encyclopedias. It is felt by simple hearts, as sunshine is felt. It comes to us by affinities and repulsions that are as mysterious (yet as potent and undeniable) as electricity. So, that is how I know: Mine own will come to me.

Listen to episode 496 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Being the Victor & Not the Victim of Circumstance. Edited and adapted from The Aim of Life by Philip Stafford Moxom.

Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. I’d like to start today by thanking all of you who have taken advantage of our new e-book special, which is still ongoing. Go to InspirationalLifeLessons.com to get all 3 of our e-books (Evergreen, Everest, and Evermore) for the one low price of $9.99. Each of these books features 50 of the best essays I’ve read on the podcast. Thank you.

Today’s reading was edited and adapted from The Aim of Life by Philip Stafford Moxom, published in 1894.

CHARACTER is a very different thing from reputation, although the two often are used interchangeably. Reputation is what you are thought to be. Character is what you are. The one is opinion. The other is fact. Circumstances and associations (or even artful management) may give you a fictitious reputation for a time. But your character is yourself, and that at last makes your real reputation.

You may run away from a bad reputation, for that is something outside of yourself. But you can never run away from a bad character, for that IS yourself. Your reputation is like your shadow, which (according as the sun is high or low) may be longer or shorter than yourself, or may even disappear altogether, as when the sun is at its zenith. But your character is like the color of your eyes — look which way you will, it is the same.

Listen to episode 495 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Motivation for Making the World a Better Place. Edited and adapted from The Power of Truth by William George Jordan.

Motivational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. If you have been helped by this podcast, please let me know by leaving this podcast a positive review at the iTunes store. Thank you. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from The Power of Truth by William George Jordan, published in 1902.

This world would be a delightful place to live in — if it were not for the people sometimes. They really cause all the trouble. Our worst enemy is always ourselves. We began to throw the responsibility of our transgressions on someone else in the Garden of Eden, and we have been doing so ever since.

The greater part of the pain, sorrow, and misery in life is purely a human invention. It comes through breaking laws: laws natural, physical, civic, mental, or moral. These are laws which we all know, but we disregard. We take chances. We think we can dodge results in some way. But Nature says, "You who breaks my laws, pays.”

Nine tenths of the world's sorrow, misfortune, and unhappiness is preventable. The daily newspapers are the great chroniclers of the dominance of the unnecessary. Paragraph after paragraph, column after column, and page after page of the dark story (accidents, disasters, crime, scandal, human weakness and evil) might be checked off with the word "preventable."

Listen to episode 494 of the Inspirational Living podcast: The Royal Road to Happiness | William George Jordan. Edited and adapted from The Majesty of Calmness.

Happiness Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. Right now you can get all 3 of our eBooks (Evergreen, Everest, and Evermore) altogether for the one low price of $9.99. Each book of life lessons contains 50 inspirational essays that were once featured on this podcast. To get your copies now, go to InspirationalLifeLessons.com. Thank you.

Today’s reading was edited and adapted from The Majesty of Calmness by William George Jordan, published in 1900.

"During my whole life I have not had twenty-four hours of happiness." So said Prince Otto von Bismarck, one of the greatest statesmen of the nineteenth century. Imagine that! Eighty-three years of wealth, fame, honors, power, influence, prosperity and triumph – years when he held an empire in his fingers – but not one day of happiness!

Happiness is the greatest paradox in Nature. It can grow in any soil, live under any condition. It defies environment. It comes from within. It is the revelation of the depths of the inner life, as light and heat proclaim the sun from which they come.

Happiness consists not of having, but of being; not of possessing, but of enjoying. It is the warm glow of a heart at peace with itself. A martyr at the stake may have happiness that a king on his throne might envy. We are the creator of our own happiness. It is the aroma of a life lived in harmony with high ideals. For what we have may be dependent on others; what we are rests with us alone. And what we obtain in life is but an acquisition; what we attain is growth.

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Listen to episode 493 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Optimism & The Keys to Happiness. Edited and adapted from Personal Power by Keith J. Thomas.

Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. If you would like to give back to this podcast with a one-time financial donation, please visit LivingHour.org/donate. Thank you. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from Personal Power by Keith J. Thomas, published in 1917.

Free will means the power to rule our minds. We cannot rule unless we understand. It is not necessary that we should indulge in morbid introspection concerning ourselves. We can learn by studying human nature, and by pondering over the lives of the great women and men of the ages.

Self-control is the first lesson that life teaches us, because without it we cannot succeed in anything we undertake. Success is merely a relative term. To a number of people it stands for happiness; to some, contentment; to others, money. Money is not to be despised. After all, it is the visible and tangible sign of success in business. We must never forget, however, that success in business does not necessarily mean success in life. If you have money, you want to know how to use it so that it will bring you actually what you need, and this demands a cultivated and well-balanced mind.

There is one quality of the mind that makes for power and progress above all others. Without it, life must be a failure and a fraud, hopeless and despairing. With it, all the days are tinged with rose, and all our troubles, defeats, and disappointments are but the sign-posts marking our steps on the road to success and happiness. It is the philosopher's stone of life which turns all it touches to gold.