In “Think and Grow Rich,” Napoleon Hill states that “without a doubt, the most common weakness of all human beings is the habit of leaving one’s mind open to the negative influence of other people.”
Well, let’s say you are very strong in your convictions, you know what you want, you know how to get it, you have a checklist of actions. Is that enough to get you on your way? Well, I wouldn’t be writing this if it was!
So, at a conference in the late 1990s, the last century! – Candace Pert talks about how our emotions are the glue that holds us together. You can believe that if you think about how you felt in one moment and then something happened and then how you feel in that next moment. You don’t need to be told that thoughts can change your life.
If thoughts can become things, if life can change in an instant, I’m not talking about accidents, but about ideas, then your reaction to something is very important. And it is very important to control yourself as they say, because your reaction can color everything around you. Like other people’s reactions, maybe to you.
Dr. Pert talks about the frontal cortex as the thing, plus our lack of hair all over our bodies, that sets us apart from the other beasts in the world and makes us feel like we’re more intelligent than a lot of other life forms. I’m not going to get into that debate right now, so hold that thought. What the frontal cortex does is give us the ability to be anxious because we can imagine the future, a consequence, bad things, good things. This is what sets us apart and makes us vulnerable to other people’s words.
Another thing he says that led me to write this is that our minds/brains are not the only place for the answer. The frontal cortex may be the receptor, but receptors for emotion exist everywhere in our bodies. Our heart, gut, pancreas, lung, you name it.
So while it’s great to think, to respond with our brain, it’s not always our brain that responds, or initiates the response. Our bodies have to be in tune with our highest goals or else we’ll falter and won’t even know why.
To return to Napoleon Hill, we now know that we must be careful with more than just our minds. We have to take care of our stomachs, lungs, hearts and spleens. We have to be a whole body or we will falter even if our mind says we are fine.
I think this is why there is so much controversy about the claims. If you are all together with yourself, all your parts in the order you want, then saying an affirmation can be very effective. However, the moment our bodies are in craving mode, our endocrine system is weak, our gut is struggling, we are open to many influences that we cannot handle. We are vulnerable to any lost criticism, any ambiguous look from a passerby or a best friend.
Not feeling our bodies, having our senses dull or low because we can’t deal with what they are saying is just as good as inviting negative influence. If you’re eating something you’re allergic to, if you’re drinking substances that make you nervous, restless, comatose, whatever, you’re inviting a negative influence. In fact, it has nothing to do with your own will at that moment: you have no choice but to be upset, offended, feel insignificant. With a body struggling to deal with the environment you put yourself in, the only thing you can do is react.
Self-will, choice, reason – dare I say happiness – is as far away as what you ate this morning or last night, how you feel about where you live, who you’re with, what you’re doing. You can’t expect to beat a list of negative entries to get a beneficial result.
This is where meditation comes in, a diet that suits you, a life that suits you in a supportive environment.
Who are your friends, where do you live, your co-workers – these are the factors of your choice. Dr. Pert mentions that all cells seek pleasure. All the world. And they won’t reproduce without it. They wither and die. Plus point? I hope so.