3.88 AVERAGE

reflective fast-paced

The Magic of Thinking Big is something that I (at least) can name as one of life’s holy book. Here is why,
As the title said, the book elaborate things to help you to think big, even the preface of the book is interesting. I’ve ever attended a critical writing conference and the speaker said, how you start your writing would affect the reader most and the preface tell a powerful story about Harry and his not-very-special abilities yet he was able to gain five times than the average. It was simply that Harry thought big than most people. Harry made me think that the book isn’t a dull one even it was written in 1959. I suppose the principle way of thinking would never expire despite how modern the world we have to face later.
The interesting part of the book is it’s written so accordingly. From the very first chapter until last orderly packed. The first chapter is about to believe. To believe that you could do anything even things seem impossible. It is said, believe that we can move a mountain, then we will. Feeding our mind with a belief will give us ways to make our belief possible. So on, after the book gives you enough vitamin supplies for your mind that everything is possible for you, it goes to the real act. The how’s to live what exists in your mind, the goals (I’m really surprised that Professor Schwartz put goals in the last chapter of the book), and the approach to thinking like a real leader.
After contemplating, I think it is the right decision to intricate about the goals at last because if we didn’t have any strong fundamental for our mind, we can let the goals slip away.
Professor Schwartz said our subconscious mind is always in balance, the conscious mind isn’t. Without full cooperation from the subconscious mind, a person is hesitant, confused, indecisive. If the goals was absorbed into the subconscious mind, the conscious mind would free for clear and right thinking.
This hits because I always am that goal-oriented person. It teaches me that things are achieved at times, we can’t jump in a big leap.
Another interesting part of the book is it gives us a summary of the chapter respectively, even the whole book. Let’s take “Cure Yourself of Excusitis, the Failure Disease” as an example. The chapter sketches about things that possibly prevent us from thinking big and end up being a mere average like health excusitis, intelligence excusitis, age excusitis, and luck excusitis. Professor Schwartz narrates some stories about it, the good case and bad. He then summarizes the stories at the end so we would remember again the main points of each story. One mark that leaves me in amaze is he always emphasizes important thing the so it will linger longer in our mind. Also, he uses psychology approach of human-mind to rationalize the way human behave. He tells us a lot of examples that many things are possible even it sounds naive the first time I read it.
But, we must believe. Believe big and we achieve big.
My favourite chapter is “You Are What You Think You Are”. It has a lot of highlights (p.s I always highlight the remarkable things from my reading, so it shows lol). The idea of ourselves is created by ourselves. If we think that we’re important, we’re significant to others, then we are. The actions are controlled by our thoughts. That’s why when we’re depressed, we tend to belittle ourselves. We let the negative thinking monster eats us away. Truth to be told, the only one who can cure our depression is ourselves because only we can control the way we think.
Another revelation that I can relate to it is a thing called “sell-yourself-to-yourself”. It’s a method of self-praising that can be done only if we talk about it loud and I'm sure that you hear a lot about it too. Basically, our body listens to us. It is a ridiculous approach to remind us that we have assets. It works. Try to converse with yourself out loud, ask what’s going on with you and you will find the answer. Believe me. It’s all because it’s your problem and the only one who knows the exact condition is yourself thus the right answer lies in your brain. Once again, our body listens to us.
After all, the book feeds your brain a lot of good things. If you think that a human is impossible to be like the way Professor Schwartz teaches us, you should’ve asked yourself, are you really thinking that big?
inspiring reflective fast-paced

What a superb book! I wish I had read it 30 years ago.
Life is truly what you make it.

Similar to Think and Grow Rich, a lot of discussion about how positive thinking and planning creates results.

Some concepts:
-Action Cures Fear
-Isolate your fear
-Think positive thoughts
-Put people in proper prospective (many people bark but only a rare one will bite)
-Practice what your concience tells you what is right
-Make everything about you say "I'm confident" e.g., smile big

-Big thinking over Petty thinking (does ____ really matter in the long run)

You win when you refuse to fight "little people"

If you think you are second class, you are.

Look important

Concentrate on your assets

Put other people into proper perspective

When argument seems inevitable, think big (is this important enough to argue over)

Setbacks are lessons, blend persistence with experimentation


Your body moves where your eyes look. Your goals and dreams are no different. Think and believe your goals and dreams are possible, and your brain will move towards it. Make sure you are surrounding yourself with people that push you to be better.

A Book everyone should read at least once in their lifetime. Beautifully explained about most of things ,which one must do to enjoy life at its best. This is again an action book , taking action is necessary to get results after reading the facts in the book. The author done a very good job in touching almost every part of life.

stephensjo's review

4.0
informative inspiring fast-paced

dragosstefany's review

5.0
informative inspiring fast-paced

cliffallison1990's review

5.0
informative inspiring relaxing medium-paced