Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the seed of an equal or greater benefit – Napoleon Hill
Deciding what to review was pretty difficult for me because a lot of the books I read in the last few years of my development had made a big impact on me in different ways. However having thought about it, I’ve decided to review the very first book which was given to me by a friend and was directly responsible for influencing my decision to start my journey towards self-confidence and personal growth.
The book I’ll be reviewing is called Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. My think and grow rich review will typically cover the contents of the book and will go on to explain how it opened my eyes to realize that success isn’t something that just happens and is in fact a process that any one of us can copy and follow.
When I first made the decision to improve myself, I remember my brother in law telling me that in order to see the path to success, you would have to first open your eyes and observe what successful people do. This would eventually help you see patterns and processes which you could then break down and model for yourself in order to see similar results.
This is exactly what Napoleon Hill had done in his book and went on to chronicle his research by interviewing successful people and documenting it in a form of ‘think and grow rich’. His interviews with Thomas Edison and Andrew Carnegie in particular gave me a glimpse as to what causes success and how self-confidence is generated.
I found the book rather fascinating because as you go through the book, you begin noticing similarities in all the people Mr Hill interviews and begin understanding that the journey towards success and achievement all stem towards a strong belief system and mindset which propels you towards taking action.
The Secret
So what was the secret? What I found interesting is that the author gave a hint at the start of the book that there is a secret message hidden within it which becomes very obvious once found and gives you the exact process of success that all of the people he interviewed had used in order to become successful. At first, I was a little unsure and did wrack my brains quite a lot over it. However, it wasn’t until a few reads that I started to see the secret more vividly and wasn’t cemented until I had read a book written by Brian Kim which broke down and explained the secret message in detail and had made complete sense.
Brian goes through in painstaking detail how he breaks down the book and goes onto talk about how and why he believes what he believes by making citations with each chapter. A fascinating read and serves as a brilliant companion to the main book.
Real-World Examples
If you’ve been a regular reader of my blog posts and my email subscriptions, finding and understanding the secret will be a lot easier because it will be much more likely that you’ll be able to notice similarities and patterns due to engrossing yourself in the material and applying it in your daily life.
As an example, the idea that I’m writing a blog post and sharing my knowledge with others is a good indication that my drive to want to help others is what causes me to create content in the first place. Of course, explaining the process will always seem easy, however not as straightforward as putting it into actual practice which is where most of its understanding lies.
Conclusion
It’s definitely a no brainer to recommend the book if you have yet to read it. It’s a classic and perhaps the most popular personal development book ever written. It’s very easy to read and will finish it in a few sittings due to its fascinating insights and stories. It will inspire you to take action on your dreams and will give you a spur of self-confidence to take control of your life, realising that you’re no different to any of the people who were interviewed.
I’ve included both links to the book as well as the complimentary book written by Brian within the content. They are affiliate links and will be making a commission from them, so thanks for helping me to continue my content creation if you decide to buy through them.