Chapter One - Yourself

1. Nothing else in the world is as important to you as YOURSELF. What you are, what you can become, what you can do – these are more important to you than all else. You may be blind to some of your defects. Also, you may be all your life unaware of special abilities that you possess. Self-ignorance is common. You need not passively accept the nature you were born with. You can almost redesign yourself. Many men who became great have done this.
2. Think more highly of yourself than of anything you possess. There is no greatness in being merely an owner. A small man with great possessions is a comic figure. Self-development must keep pace with what you have. As soon as you acquire wealth, spend a generous percentage of it on yourself. Travel. Read the great books. Meet eminent men. Give more time to study and thought. Never allow yourself to be dwarfed by what you possess.
3. You are not a Thing in a world of Things. You are a spirit in a spiritual Universe. All business is mental, which is another word of spiritual. Thought is above all. A human being is thought incarnate. Every invention was first an idea. We are all spirits with bodies on. We are tiny parts of one great Mind. That is the new practical Pantheism that has been made known to us by Science. You are like a wire that is all anthrop with a ceaseless creative energy. You must appreciate yourself. You are linked up with the Eternal.
4. In the last hundred years, we have studied everything but OURSELVES. We have studied every nature except human nature. We have filled the outside world with miracles, but we know very little more about the inner life of a man than Julius Caesar did. We simply do not know what goes on in either our minds or our bodies. We know little about the art of self-development and the technique of human behavior. And as a result we have created new machines and powers that we are not fit to possess.
5. Make the most of yourself. Self-development comes before all else. You are a bundle of possibilities. No man, when he is young, knows his own nature. You have latent abilities. They must not remain latent. Never remain in an easy job. An easy job is your worst enemy. It checks your growth. There is no other waste in the world that can be compared to the waste of undeveloped brains. You must push aside whatever stands in your way. Nothing else matters as much to you as YOURSELF.
6. You can serve your nation best by self-development. If you have no special skill, ability or knowledge, you are not a national asset. Just as a great forest is made by great trees, not by shrubs and bushes, so is a nation made great, not by its numbers but by its great individuals. The nation that shall lead the way in the future will be the one that has the highest percentage of superior-natured people. Your duty to your nation requires you to make the most of yourself. That is our British creed.
7. Your most valuable time is your spare time. Your future depends more upon what you do in your spare time than upon what you do in your working hours. It tests you, to see how determined you are to have a useful career. A good rule is to spend half of your spare time on relaxation and half on self-development. You can advance yourself and prepare for higher positions by what you do that is useful to you in your evenings and week-ends.
8. Use your spare time for self-development. Use half of it to acquire knowledge and the other half for relaxation and sociability. You must develop your mental abilities and your social abilities, both. Your future position in the world will be mainly decided by what you do in your spare time. What you do when you are your own master – that decides your quality as a man. To spend all your leisure on amusement or mere idleness will keep you in the rank and file. You must have a book or a hobby or some activity that compels you to have an active brain.
9. Take stock of YOURSELF. In what ways have you been distinctive? In what ways have you failed? What was your standing in your classes at school? Still more important, what was your standing in the sports field and with your fellow-students? What sort of work do you prefer? Have you had hobbies? Have you steered your course or only drifted? For what purposes have you made an effort? What are your defects of disposition? What sort of reputation have you already acquired?
10. Make the best use of your advantages. There are advantages of location, of personality, of specialized knowledge, of friendship, of efficiency and of character. As every man has competitors, he must make his business distinctive in some way. He must have at least one point of superiority. He must give his business some advantages. He must think – “How can I make my business different and better?” he must make the best possible use of all his assets – money, goods, property, friends, abilities, knowledge and experience.

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