#111.3 The Science of Getting Rich - Wattles

THE SCIENCE OF GETTING RICH

BY WALLACE D. WATTLES

Part III

So we started with dealing with people and acting in a Certain Way which starts with thought before action and thinking what you like after your own evaluations are satisfied. In the preceding parts and in those which follow the underlined / emphasized are for specific note and if necessary, further study.

CHAPTER 6 - How Riches Come to You

WHEN I say that you do not have to drive sharp bargains, I do not mean that you do not have to drive any bargains at all, or that you are above the necessity for having any dealings with your fellow men. I mean that you will not need to deal with them unfairly; you do not have to get something for nothing, but can give to every man more than you take from him.

I'm going to restate these and give them more emphasis because they form the heart of the Certain Way:

Do not deal with people unfairly. Since there is really a fundamental natural abundance, there is nothing worth cheating anyone out of anything, including their labor. This blog's proposal contains a provision for self financing of labor which provides the means and power to cause riches to come to you, if you work. If all your work, whether full time, part time or by one time contract, all are by some form of contract and recognized as applicable to issuing your own Valuns for the work you do. Since a Valun system honors / values work, it is from where most and eventually all the Valuns will be issued.

You do not have to get something for nothing, though occasionally, you can and will get things for little or nothing, because the more you work and the more you apply the Certain Way to your life, riches, including material things of no particular value to someone else, will come to you. So you don't have to cheat anyone out of anything.

In any contractual activity, any sale, any trade, it is essential to give everyone more than you take from them. This added value comes in many forms not measurable in money; people feel better dealing with you than anyone else, they prefer your work or your products more than someone else's etc. This is know by accountants and others as “good will” and it is very valuable and quite important.

Recognition of all of this is part of working in a Certain Way. Wattles proceeds with examples:

You cannot give every man more in cash market value than you take from him, but you can give him more in use value than the cash value of the thing you take from him. The paper, ink, and other material in this book may not be worth the money you pay for it; but if the ideas suggested by it bring you thousands of dollars, you have not been wronged by those who sold it to you; they have given you a great use value for a small cash value.

Let us suppose that I own a picture by one of the great artists, which, in any civilized community, is worth thousands of dollars. I take it to Baffin Ray, and by "salesmanship" induce an Eskimo to give a bundle of furs worth $500 for it. I have really wronged him, for he has no use for the picture; it has no use value to him; it will not add to his life.

But suppose I give him a gun worth $50 for his furs; then he has made a good bargain. He has use for the gun; it will get him many more furs and much food; it will add to his life in every way; it will make him rich.

When you rise from the competitive to the creative plane, you can scan your business transactions very strictly, and if you are selling any man anything which does not add more to his life than the thing he give you in exchange, you can afford to stop it. You do not have to beat anybody in business. And if you are in a business which does beat people, get out of it at once.

I was fortunate enough to have realized a few of my dreams only to realize that what I was trying to earn my living doing was being involved with making money on money without work. Was I spending time doing the “research” all the other paperwork involved? Wasn't that time out of my life I got paid for? Yes, but was I really involved with adding to people's lives or beating other people? I decided to get out of these businesses. So should you as they are not the Certain Way.

Give every man more in use value than you take from him in cash value; then you are adding to the life of the world by every business transaction.

There are ranges of scale to this, of course, but the results are the same; when people are getting more in use than they pay in cash, people believe (accept) that they have received better for their money than anywhere else.

If you have people working for you, you must take from them more in cash value than you pay them in wages; but you can so organize your business that it will be filled with the principle of advancement, and so that each employee who wishes to do so may advance a little every day.

We have an 80% rule that attempts to keep people honest: if a company within the proposal intends on hiring people to be repaid in their own Valuns, they must have total wages to be paid no higher than 80% of their current income. Whether one likes it or not, it is understood that one hired to do something will provide more than they are being paid to do it. In fact, the usual contracts are followed with this understanding. However we draw a distinction between trying to obtain more value from someone than what we are willing to pay them. Succeeding contracts might include raises in pay entirely based on the perception that more value is being secured than by paying some unknown something less.

You can make your business do for your employees what this book is doing for you. You can so conduct your business that it will be a sort of ladder, by which every employee who will take the trouble may climb to riches himself; and given the opportunity, if he will not do so it is not your fault.

You could spend four years in some business school and never learn that this is the core issue summarized. It is all about WILL and it is all about the exchange of value for value represented in whatever money one might use.

And finally, because you are to cause the creation of your riches from Formless Substance which permeates all your environment, it does not follow that they are to take shape from the atmosphere and come into being before your eyes.

If you want a sewing machine, for instance, I do not mean to tell you that you are to impress the thought of a sewing machine on Thinking Substance until the machine is formed without hands, in the room where you sit, or elsewhere. But if you want a sewing machine, hold the mental image of it with the most positive certainty that it is being made, or is on its way to you. After once forming the thought, have the most absolute and unquestioning faith that the sewing machine is coming; never think of it, or speak of it, in any other way than as being sure to arrive. Claim it as already yours. It will be brought to you by the power of the Supreme Intelligence, acting upon the minds of men. If you live in Maine, it may be that a man will be brought from Texas or Japan to engage in some transaction which will result in your getting what you want.

If so, the whole matter will be as much to that man's advantage as it is to yours.

Do not forget for a moment that the Thinking Substance is through all, in all, communicating with all, and can influence all. The desire of Thinking Substance for fuller life and better living has caused the creation of all the sewing machines already made; and it can cause the creation of millions more, and will, whenever men set it in motion by desire and faith, and by acting in a Certain Way.

You can certainly have a sewing machine in your house; and it is just as certain that you can have any other thing or things which you want, and which you will use for the advancement of your own life and the lives of others.

You need not hesitate about asking largely; "it is your Father's pleasure to give you the kingdom," said Jesus. Original Substance wants to live all that is possible in you, and wants you to have all that you can or will use for the living of the most abundant life.

If you fix upon your consciousness the fact that the desire you feel for the possession of riches is one with the desire of Omnipotence for more complete expression, your faith becomes invincible.

Wattles did not say do nothing and it will come to you. He said to act in a Certain Way and it will come to you. One of the points he is making is for the persistence of your desire. If you don't know what you want or are fickle, someone else will come along and inform you of what you will have and perhaps and usually against your will and against dealing with other people or thinking what you like.

If your thinking and desires be fickle, if you never come to ground about anything, then what good are your thoughts, your will or anything else to you, for that matter?

Once I saw a little boy sitting at a piano, and vainly trying to bring harmony out of the keys; and I saw that he was grieved and provoked by his inability to play real music. I asked him the cause of his vexation, and he answered, "I can feel the music in me, but I can't make my hands go right." The music in him was the URGE of Original Substance, containing all the possibilities of all life; all that there is of music was seeking expression through the child.

God, the One Substance, is trying to live and do and enjoy things through humanity. He is saying "I want hands to build wonderful structures, to play divine harmonies, to paint glorious pictures; I want feet to run my errands, eyes to see my beauties, tongues to tell mighty truths and to sing marvelous songs," and so on. All that there is of possibility is seeking expression through men. God wants those who can play music to have pianos and every other instrument, and to have the means to cultivate their talents to the fullest extent; He wants those who can appreciate beauty to be able to surround themselves with beautiful things; He wants those who can discern truth to have every opportunity to travel and observe; He wants those who can appreciate dress to be beautifully clothed, and those who can appreciate good food to be luxuriously fed.

He wants all these things because it is Himself that enjoys and appreciates them; it is God who wants to play, and sing, and enjoy beauty, and proclaim truth and wear fine clothes, and eat good foods, "it is God that worketh in you to will and to do," said Paul.

The desire you feel for riches is the infinite, seeking to express Himself in you as He sought to find expression in the little boy at the piano.

So you need not hesitate to ask largely. Your part is to focalize and express the desire to God. This is a difficult point with most people; they retain something of the old idea that poverty and self-sacrifice are pleasing to God. They look upon poverty as a part of the plan, a necessity of nature. They have the idea that God has finished His work, and made all that He can make, and that the majority of men must stay poor because there is not enough to go around. They hold to so much of this erroneous thought that they feel ashamed to ask for wealth; they try not to want more than a very modest competence, just enough to make them fairly comfortable.

So then, what would you do that you must do, that is creative, not competitive, that allows you to think what you like and interact with other people, because without them you cannot ever be rich?

I recall now the case of one student who was told that he must get in mind a clear picture of the things he desired, so that the creative thought of them might be impressed on Formless Substance. He was a very poor man, living in a rented house, and having only what he earned from day to day; and he could not grasp the fact that all wealth was his.

So, after thinking the matter over, he decided that he might reasonably ask for a new rug for the floor of his best room, and an anthracite coal stove to heat the house during the cold weather. Following the instructions given in this book, he obtained these things in a few months; and then it dawned upon him that he had not asked enough. He went through the house in which he lived, and planned all the improvements he would like to make in it; he mentally added a bay window here and a room there, until it was complete in his mind as his ideal home; and then he planned its furnishings.

Holding the whole picture in his mind, he began living in the Certain Way, and moving toward what he wanted; and he owns the house now, and is rebuilding it after the form of his mental image. And now, with still larger faith, he is going on to get greater things. It has been unto him according to his faith, and it is so with you and with all of us.

It does happen all the time. But the questions will arise; so why here, why this message? I offer it to empower everyone as they have never been empowered before. THEY (the mainstream of everything and THEIR messages) have pretty much addicted most to THEIR ideas which are daily being proved false, fake, illegitimate, contrary to everyone's desires, etc. except those among THEM that are well connected, etc. If one viewed THEIR messages as the only valid ones, one would never wake to realize what Wattles is talking about … and begin acting in a Certain Way.

CHAPTER 7 - Gratitude

The point of this chapter is explained in the manner of New Thought. Frankly, it doesn't matter whether you believe (accept) that the Formless Substance Wattles references is God or not. You might be an atheist, but you would be able to comprehend what Wattles' message to you is.

THE illustrations given in the last chapter will have conveyed to the reader the fact that the first step toward getting rich is to convey the idea of your wants to the Formless Substance.

This is true, and you will see that in order to do so, it becomes necessary to relate yourself to the Formless Intelligence in a harmonious way.

To secure this harmonious relation is a matter of such primary and vital importance that I shall give some space to its discussion here, and give you instructions which, if you will follow them, will be certain to bring you into perfect unity of mind with God.

The whole process of mental adjustment and atonement can be summed up in one word, gratitude.

First, you believe that there is one Intelligent Substance, from which all things proceed; [By observation, the harmony and rationality of the known universe]

Second, you believe that this Substance gives you everything you desire; and [belief is acceptance, so you accept that the universe provides.]

Third, you relate yourself to it by a feeling of deep and profound gratitude. [You do this instead of dwelling one someone else's “uncertain way,” will, plan, accord, whatever, to do more for the indigent, the bankrupt, the poor, the sick, etc.]

Many people who order their lives rightly in all other ways are kept in poverty by their lack of gratitude. Having received one gift from God, they cut the wires which connect them with Him by failing to make acknowledgment.

It is easy to understand that the nearer we live to the source of wealth, the more wealth we shall receive; and it is easy also to understand that the soul that is always grateful lives in closer touch with God than the one which never looks to Him in thankful acknowledgment. The more gratefully we fix our minds on the Supreme when good things come to us, the more good things we will receive, and the more rapidly they will come; and the reason simply is that the mental attitude of gratitude draws the mind into closer touch with the source from which the blessings come.

If it is a new thought to you that gratitude brings your whole mind into closer harmony with the creative energies of the universe, consider it well, and you will see that it is true.

The good things you already have come to you along the line of obedience to certain laws. Gratitude will lead your mind out along the ways by which things come; and it will keep you in close harmony with creative thought and prevent you from falling into competitive thought.

Don't worry about obtaining patents and copyrights for what you plan to sell when you should be selling what you have developed and as much as you may be able while you may because things change and nothing lasts forever and you very well might want or need to be doing something else. Do what you can now, not planning to do the possible later while contemplating the impossible now. Always being grateful for what one has is a basic good place to start from and to maintain as you get rich.

Gratitude alone can keep you looking toward the All, and prevent you from falling into the error of thinking of the supply as limited; and to do that would be fatal to your hopes. There is a Law of Gratitude, and it is absolutely necessary that you should observe the law, if you are to get the results you seek.

The law of gratitude is the natural principle that action and reaction are always equal, and in opposite directions.

The grateful outreaching of your mind in thankful praise to the Supreme is a liberation or expenditure of force; it cannot fail to reach that to which it addressed, and the reaction is an instantaneous movement towards you.

"Draw nigh unto God, and He will draw nigh unto you." That is a statement of psychological truth. And if your gratitude is strong and constant, the reaction in Formless Substance will be strong and continuous; the movement of the things you want will be always toward you. Notice the grateful attitude that Jesus took; how He always seems to be saying, "I thank Thee, Father, that Thou hearest me." You cannot exercise much power without gratitude; for it is gratitude that keeps you connected with Power.

But the value of gratitude does not consist solely in getting you more blessings in the future. Without gratitude you cannot long keep from dissatisfied thought regarding things as they are.

The moment you permit your mind to dwell with dissatisfaction upon things as they are, you begin to lose ground. [This is the quicksand of ideology, idealism and cynicism; “since things have never been perfect, it will all go bust and why bother?”] You fix attention upon the common, the ordinary, the poor, and the squalid and mean; and your mind takes the form of these things. Then you will transmit these forms or mental images to the Formless, and the common, the poor, the squalid, and mean will come to you.

To permit your mind to dwell upon the inferior is to become inferior and to surround yourself with inferior things. On the other hand, to fix your attention on the best is to surround yourself with the best, and to become the best.

The Creative Power within us makes us into the image of that to which we give our attention. We are Thinking Substance, and thinking substance always takes the form of that which it thinks about. The grateful mind is constantly fixed upon the best; therefore it tends to become the best; it takes the form or character of the best, and will receive the best. Also, faith is born of gratitude. The grateful mind continually expects good things, and expectation becomes faith. The reaction of gratitude upon one's own mind produces faith; and every outgoing wave of grateful thanksgiving increases faith. He who has no feeling of gratitude cannot long retain a living faith; and without a living faith you cannot get rich by the creative method, as we shall see in the following chapters.

It is necessary, then, to cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you; and to give thanks continuously.

And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in your gratitude.

Do not waste time thinking or talking about the shortcomings or wrong actions of plutocrats or trust magnates. Their organization of the world has made your opportunity; all you get really comes to you because of them.

It is NOT the business or purpose of this blog to follow any of that. In the same sense as at any time in any age as the things we have now were made by people and systems, many under THEIR control, according to current methods and materials available.

Do not rage against, corrupt politicians; if it were not for politicians we should fall into anarchy, and your opportunity would be greatly lessened.

Besides which, we should learn to take it for granted that ALL politicians who come to office without their own money, are corrupt or will soon be corrupted and these are among the worst kinds of people. It really is "better to be poor folk than bad people," but we are not advocating that the way to riches is always paved with bad intentions or corrupt practices.

God has worked a long time and very patiently to bring us up to where we are in industry and government, and He is going right on with His work. There is not the least doubt that He will do away with plutocrats, trust magnates, captains of industry, and politicians as soon as they can be spared; but in the meantime, behold they are all very good.

Again, concerning whether any plutocrat, trust magnate, captain of industry or politician will be dispatched is not of your concern. Why waste your valuable emotions, which motivate you to get out of bed every morning, to the destinies of those your already recognize as dinosaurs? Let Nature take its course, and you take yours.

Remember that they are all helping to arrange the lines of transmission along which your riches will come to you, and be grateful to them all. This will bring you into harmonious relations with the good in everything, and the good in everything will move toward you.

In all things be grateful, including that you read this message on this blog. After all, you might not have been so reminded in a long time, bowed your head and in whatever fashion decided to give thanks for what the universe has given you and been grateful. Be grateful when you are able to do work. Be grateful that you have good workers. Be grateful for any new development that shows you and those associated with you are getting rich. Be grateful when your dreams are achieved. There may be more then for you to do.

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