Inspirational Living: Life Lessons for Success & Happiness

Listen to episode 422 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Combining Thought & Action for Lasting Success. Edited and adapted from Keys to Success by B.C. Forbes.

Motivational Podcast Excerpt: The Empire State Building was once only a thought. Thousands of years ago an Egyptian king had a thought, and lo! every generation since then has gazed on its fulfillment — the Pyramids.

Thought is the parent of progress. Thought creates all. Everything springs from thought. Human beings are distinguished from other animals by this one power: the power of thought. The immortals of this world are they who thought deeper or more brilliantly than their fellow citizens.

Henry Ford once said: “My advice to business people is to read a lot, think a lot, and work a lot. I started that way. I kept on thinking and I am still thinking. The habit of analysis, the ability to get under the surface of things and at the vital essentials, gives you a tremendous advantage over those of your competitors who do not do likewise.”

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Listen to episode 421 of the Inspirational Living podcast: How to Make a Life Worth Living | Motivational. Edited and adapted from A Man Worthwhile by John Phillips Meakin.

Motivational Podcast Transcript: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. Get the best of our podcast in heirloom hardcover or digital e-book by visiting InspirationalLifeLessons.com. Today’s reading was edited and adapted from A Man Worthwhile by John Phillips Meakin, published in 1913.

The all-important question for everyone to ask of themselves if they have the slightest spark of intellectual ambition in them is, “How may I become a true individual?” Then another question will well up from the soul, namely: “What can I do to make life worth the living?” The answer will be: Look to the light, be true to your inner self, and have the faith of the poet who said: —

“Better to strive and climb

And never reach the goal,

Than to drift along with time

An aimless, worthless soul.

Aye, better to climb and fall,

Or sow, though the yield be small,

Than to throw away, day after day,

And never strive at all.”

Listen to episode 420 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Becoming Rich in Wisdom, Love & Happiness. Edited and adapted from A Man Worthwhile by John Phillips Meakin.

Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Men and women of character are the need of the day. People whose minds are developed in strict integrity and honor; people who believe in truth, who are broad-minded, who are deep-hearted, full of love and wisdom — their hearts continually beating in true affection for humankind — just plain, true, honest, thinking men and women, imparting their influence of joy and sunshine not only in their immediate circle, but wherever they may go and to all they may meet on life’s rough highway. 

Success in life does not only mean the winning of some great prize: it ought to mean the attainment of that physical and intellectual condition in the individual where all the various strings which make up the harp of life respond in fullest measure to the infinite vibrations of a throbbing, pulsing world.

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Listen to episode 419 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Be Pleasant & Live for a Great Goal. Edited and adapted from Think (a Book for Today) by William Crosbie Hunter.

Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Be pleasant to live with and you will have more pleasant things to live for. There will be kindnesses, kisses, beauty, health, peace, fun, happiness, and contentment coming your way all along the great big road of life you are traveling.

Be pleasant to live with and the people will turn to you as you pass, and reflect your cheerfulness like the sunflowers turn to face the sun.

Be pleasant. Don't be cross and crabbed because someone else in your household is not pleasant. Do your part. You will likely thereby cure the frown habit on the face of the unfortunate disturber of your peace.

Make yourself right before you criticize your life partner. And it all begins by answering this question: "Am I pleasant to live with?"

Don't fool yourself in the matter. Get right down to brass tacks with yourself. Watch your moves, acts, and attitude for ten days carefully before answering the question.

Listen to episode 418 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Learn How to Say No & Working Until the End. Edited and adapted from Dollars & Sense by William Crosbie Hunter.

Motivational Podcast Excerpt: Since the age of ten years I’ve been thrust upon my own resources, and the 32 years since then have been years of study, work, and play — all blended into a happy life.

The jolts, the set-backs, the sorrows, worries, and discouragements are the things which made me strong. They were but experiences.

Smooth sailing doesn't bring out the stuff one is made of. It takes shadows to make sunlight appreciated. It takes reverses to make success. It takes hard knocks to polish you. And one of the most important things to learn early is to learn to say No.

Look over the history of the thousands who have failed in business, and you will find in nearly every instance the failure was due to an inability to say No.

Listen to episode 417 of the Inspirational Living podcast: The Importance of Perseverance & Punctuality. Edited and adapted from Right Living by Susan H. Wixon.

Motivational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. Get the best of our podcast in book form by visiting InspirationalLifeLessons.com. There you’ll find our trilogy of essay compilations: Evergreen: 50 Inspirational Life Lessons, Everest: 50 Motivational Life Lessons, and Evermore: 50 Life Lessons for Spiritual Growth. Learn more at: InspiriationalLifeLessons.com. Thank you.

Today’s reading was edited and adapted from Right Living by Susan H. Wixon, published in 1894.

The accomplishment of goals, the successes in life, are due to concentration of effort — to energy and perseverance. We see persons plodding along day after day, not showing much for their work at first, but then finally astonishing everyone by their acquirements and prosperity.

"They have genius!" it is said. But what is genius? The French scientist George Buffon famously said "genius is only patience." But it is more than that. Genius is work. It is the power to start work with an object in view; to never let that object out of sight; to keep straight on, no matter what stumbling blocks are in the path. It is keeping steady at one job till the work is complete. It is not being discouraged.

Listen to episode 416 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Living the Golden Rule | The Way of Love. Edited and adapted from Love’s Way by Orison Swett Marden.

Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. Transform your personal and professional life in 30 days with our MAJESTY meditation program. Go to LivingHour.org/majesty. And get 30% off with the coupon code: inspiration.

Today’s reading was edited and adapted from Love’s Way by Orison Swett Marden, published in 1918.

After an ugly scar had been made by a stone quarry in the mountainside opposite John Ruskin's home, destroying the beauty of his favorite landscape, he placed a big chair in front of the window of his study, so that it would conceal the scar from him while working, because it disturbed the harmony of his thought.

If you have received an ugly scar from someone perhaps whom you trusted and believed in; if you have a sore spot, a tender spot anywhere that mars your happiness, don't aggravate your pain by looking at it, keeping the sore open by reviewing a painful experience or cherishing a grudge against the one who injured you. Cover your wound with the mantle of love instead, forgive and forget the injury, and your wound will soon heal.

If you would be truly happy "bless where others curse; love where others hate; forget where others condemn."

Listen to episode 415 of the Inspirational Living podcast: Developing a Strong Personality & Perfect Poise. Edited and adapted from How to Develop Your Personality by Clare Tree Major.

Motivational Podcast Excerpt: Welcome to the Inspirational Living podcast. If you would like to help support our podcast you can do so easily by simply leaving us a positive review at the iTunes store. Or if you would like to make a one-time financial donation, go to LivingHour.org/donate. Thank you.

WHAT is "personality"? Webster interprets the meaning of the word as "individuality," but like many words that assume added meanings through common usage, personality also has acquired the suggestion of a quality not covered by the word "individuality."

You may be discussing a person you dislike very much, one who holds ideas that are rather loathsome, and while you might readily admit that such a person might be "individual," you would never for a moment say "So-and-so has personality." Why? Because the word "personality" has grown to mean magnetic power, the sort of power that consciously or unconsciously dominates and controls the individuals with whom it comes in contact. It is this magnetic power that is at the root of every successful career.

Review the life of any great individual. You will find that their success was the result, not only of careful study and of perseverance, but, more than all, of the subtle influence of personal magnetism. They succeeded because their personality convinced people that they were sincere, that they were strong, someone who could be relied upon. Without a well-developed personality, their good qualities would have lain unnoticed, and they would have been only another in the struggling, discouraged thousands.

Listen to episode 414 of the Inspirational Living podcast: The Happiness Cure | Being Healthy & Anxiety Free. Edited and adapted from How to Stay Well by Christian D. Larson.

Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: True happiness enjoys all things deeply, but serenely. And you can always know when you have had such happiness, because it makes your countenance radiant with a restful beauty.

To gain real happiness, the first essential is to train yourself to think constantly of the great value of happiness — especially with regard to its health producing power. Such thinking will tend to produce a subconscious desire for happiness, and what the subconscious begins to desire it also begins to create.

Train yourself to think of happiness as a mental necessity (just as food is a physical necessity) and you will gradually train every element and force in your body to work for the creation of happiness. By creating within yourself a constant demand for happiness, you will inspire the elements of your own nature to produce the desired supply, and before long the happiness you desire will become a permanent part of your life.

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Listen to episode 413 of the Inspirational Living podcast: The Art of Self-Reliance, Self-Control & Self-Respect. Edited and adapted from Right Living by Susan H. Wixon.

Inspirational Podcast Excerpt: It is observed in life, that successful people are the resolute and self-reliant. What is self-reliance? It is to be in harmony with all laws of Nature and the highest morality — the qualities that stand out, by themselves, alone, but are as firm as granite.

The march of life is onward. It does not stand still. We are on its ocean. We mark our course, or we drift, hither and yonder, at mercy of wave and wind. The person who relies on their own exertion, grows, enlarges, expands.

Never halt or waver when you know you are right. Never think you cannot succeed, but try — make an effort. You cannot know the elements that are in you to command success until you look within and bring out the hidden qualities latent there.

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