Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill is probably one of the most appreciated books on self-development. What makes this book so special is the idea that you can accomplish anything you want in life if you imagine you can and if you don’t give up. And the mind can either help you achieve your goals or it can sabotage your efforts.
To make money and grow rich might initially sound like a cliche, but this book doesn’t contain a hack that will help you gain a fortune overnight or without any effort. Instead, it contains valuable self-development lessons that will teach you how to stay on your own path, to use each mistake to develop smarter strategies, and even how to think in order to get better results. Here are the best lessons from Think and Grow Rich that will help you on your path of becoming successful.
Here’s our top lessons, but you can also purchase the book directly at Amazon.
#1 Lesson from Think and Grow Rich: Your thoughts are very important
Thoughts are not only important because they tell you about your inner processes and emotions, but they are also very powerful as they are the foundation of your future actions or inactions. Every business idea that has been materialized was initially only a thought that crossed someone’s mind. Based on that thought, the person has built a business and took all the necessary steps to become successful.
At the same time, what you think and believe can either help you attain your goals or it can lead to your defeat. If you think you can become a better entrepreneur, you will start acting like one and you will do all that is necessary to build the career you desire. Remember, it all starts with only a thought, what you do with it is only up to you.
#2: Desire leads to action
Having an idea or a thought is not enough to get you started, you also need desire. Think about it, how much do you actually want to achieve a certain goal? If your desire is low, chances are you will eventually give up along the way or you might not even start doing the work in the first place. But if you want something badly enough your ideas and thoughts will start being put into action.
You can look at this from any area of your life. Let’s say you really want to buy a house, but you can’t afford it at the moment. But because you want it so badly you will start doing your financial planning according to this new goal and thus taking steps to eventually be able to purchase your dream house.
#3 Lesson from Think and Grow Rich: Have faith in your ideas and skills
You’ve probably had tons of great ideas during your life so far, you wanted to make them happen, but something stopped you from inside. We all have doubts about our plans and goals, but what makes us work for them is faith, as well our capacity to overcome obstacles.
Self-suggestion is a powerful tool you can use to start having more faith in yourself and your goals. You can write positive affirmations that you should repeat each day until your mind will start believing them. Affirmations follow the same repetitive action of mantras, in order to attain a certain desired effect.
#4. Imagination brings forth creation
If you can imagine something, you can also bring it to life. Let’s say you want to gain more financial intelligence so you can grow rich and never stress about not having enough money. If you start to imagine the whole process you will gain a lot of insight into how you can achieve it and it will also boost your desire. You can then start planning for a better financial future and decide what steps you need to take.
#5 Lesson from Think and Grow Rich: Don’t quit because of temporary defeat
If every businessman quit investing every time they had a stepback or lost some money on the stock market, then they would never grow rich. You will need to deal with each obstacle that crosses your path and learn from each mistake in order to achieve your goals. Take the time to reflect and then start taking further action until you get to where you want to be.
#6 Continue to study and gain knowledge
The truth is you will never know everything. The way we evolve is through constant learning. Maybe your business is flourishing at the moment with the knowledge you have, but if you stop studying your field of business you will eventually stagnate and maybe even lose what you have accomplished. Keep exercising your brain muscles and gain as much knowledge as you can in the fields that are of interest to you. It will also help you improve your overall well-being.
#7 Lesson from Think and Grow Rich: Take control over your life and become a decision-maker
The difference between procrastination and decision-making is what they lead to. If you procrastinate you lose important time and you delay your actions, which sometimes leads to quitting them. But if you make decisions and start acting on what you need to accomplish you take control over your life. Things don’t just happen to you, you need to make decisions in order to reach the level you want to be at. Have a plan of action in place and start making all the decisions necessary to achieve your goal.
If you want to grow rich and you don’t know which steps you need to take, here are a few more ways that can help you achieve your financial goals. Want to read other money books? Check out my book lists.
