Probably
every one of my hearers has been made temporarily half-idiotic by some
great success or piece of good fortune. "_Good!_ GOOD! GOOD!" is all we
can at such times say to ourselves until we smile at our own very
foolishness.
Now from all this we can draw an extremely practical conclusion. If,
namely, we wish our trains of ideation and volition to be copious and
varied and effective, we must form the habit of freeing them from the
inhibitive influence of reflection upon them, of egoistic pre-occupation
about their results. Such a habit, like other habits, can be formed.
Prudence and duty and self-regard, emotions of ambition and emotions of
anxiety, have, of course, a needful part to play in our lives. But
confine them as far as possible to the occasions when you are making
your general resolutions and deciding on your plan of campaign, and keep
them out of the details. When once a decision is reached and execution
is the order of the day, dismiss absolutely all responsibility and care
about the outcome. _Unclamp_, in a word, your intellectual and practical
machinery, and let it run free; and the service it will do you will be
twice as good.
Pages:
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165