The Power of Thought

James Allen

Here is an extract of James Allen’s book ‘As a Man Thinketh’ which has inspired thousands of people over hundred years. Mahatma Gandhi was so impressed by this that he translated the essay into Gujarati and published in the form of a booklet.}

Circumstances do not make the man; they reveal him to himself. Men are anxious to improve their circumstances but are unwilling to improve themselves.

Let a man radically alter his thoughts and he will be astonished at the rapid transformation it will effect in the material conditions of his life.Man imagines that thought can be kept secret but it cannot; it rapidly crystallizes into habit and habit solidifies into circumstance.

Man is made or unmade by himself, he fashions the tools with which he builds for himself heavenly masons of joy, strength and peace. Man is always the master even in his weakest and most abandoned state but in his weakness and degradation he is the foolish master who misgoverns his household.

A man’s mind may be linked to a garden which may be intelligently cultivated or allowed to run wild but whether cultivated or neglected, it must and will bring forth. If no useful seeds are put into it, then an abundance of useless weed seeds will fall therein and will continue to produce their kind.

Thought and character are one; as character can only manifest and discover itself through environment and circumstances, the outer conditions of a person’s life will always be harmoniously related to his inner state. This does not mean that a man’s circumstances at any given time are indications of his entire character but those circumstances are so intimately connected with some vital thought element within himself that, for the time being, they are indispensable to his development.
Every man is where he is by law of his being; the thoughts which has built into his character have brought him there, and in the arrangement of his life there is no element of chance but all is the result of law which cannot err.

Man is buffeted by circumstances so long as he believes himself to be the creature of outside conditions but when he realizes that he is a creative power and that he may command the hidden soil and seeds of being out of which circumstances grow, he then becomes the rightful master to himself.
Every thought seed sown or allowed to fall into the mind and to take root there produces its own blossoming sooner or later into act. The outer world of circumstances shapes itself to the inner world of thought and both pleasant and unpleasant conditions are factors which make for the ultimate good of the individual.

Circumstances however, are so complicated, thought is so deeply rooted and the conditions of happiness vary so vastly with individuals that a man’s entire soul-condition cannot be judged by another from the external aspects of his life alone.

A man may be honest in certain directions, yet suffer privations; a man may be dishonest is certain directions, yet acquire wealth but the conclusion usually formed that the man fails because of his particular honesty and the other prospers because of his certain dishonesty is the result of a superficial judgment which assumes that the dishonest man is almost totally corrupt, and the honest man almost entirely virtuous. In the right of a deeper knowledge and wider experience, such judgment is found to be erroneous.

Bestial thoughts crystallize into the habits of drunkenness and sensuality which solidify into circumstances of destitution and disease. Thoughts of fear, doubt, indecision crystallize into weak, unmanly and irresolute habits which solidify into circumstances of failure and indigence.

Thoughts of courage self-reliance and decisions crystallize into many habits which solidify into circumstances of success, plenty and freedom. Energetic thoughts crystallize into habits of cleanliness and industry which solidify into circumstances of pleasantness; protective and preservative circumstances.

A man cannot directly choose his circumstances but he can choose his thoughts and so indirectly, yet surely, shape his circumstances.

The body is the servant of the mind. It obeys the operations of the mind, whether they be deliberately chosen or automatically expressed. At the bidding of unlawful thoughts the body sinks rapidly into decay; at command of glad and beautiful thoughts it becomes clothed with youthfulness and beauty, strong pure and happy thoughts build up the body in vigor and grace. The body is a delicate and plastic instrument, which responds readily to the thoughts by which it is impressed. There is no physician like cheerful thought for dissipating the ills of the body. To live continually in the thoughts of ill-will, cynicism, suspicion and every is to be confined in a self made prison-hole.

As you cannot have a sweet and wholesome abode unless you admit the air and sunshine freely into your rooms, so a strong body and a bright, happy or serene countenance can only result from free admittance into the mind of thoughts of joy and goodwill.

Be not impatient in delay.
But wait as one who understands
When spirit rises and commands
The Gods are ready to obey.

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