Professor Schwartz wrote his
modern classic in 1959, and the title is familiar to millions of readers ever
since who have used his ideas to sell, build careers, launch businesses, and
generally get ahead. This review will take a retrospective look at the ideas
themselves.

    But first let’s evaluate how
the CD/audio works in relation to the book version. Those who want bigger success,
may indeed want the CD. The reviewed copy did not include any printed outlines,
not even indexing on the disks themselves, which is less than optimum. And
unlike the book, the CD set does present some problems of application. How do
you write down the key idea without transcribing the whole four disks? Should
you use the book as a guide to the CD? Also, if you listen to this CD driving,
you may lose all the value, unless you have first listened to it with pen in
hand, made notes, and listen while driving only for review or as motivation
(say on way to a sales call).

    Now let’s look at the ideas
themselves.

    The basic ideas of The
Magic of Thinking BIG are practical adaptations of philosophical Idealism:
thought governs action and result. But Schwartz adds another major premise: the
size of thoughts will modify the size of success. And he believes, like most
Americans, that happiness is the real goal of life. What is distinctive about
David J. Schwartz’ approach is that he shakes these basic notions out into a
set of precepts, rules of conduct, approaches to thinking and action in which
thoughts become motivators. In other words, use the rules and prescriptions,
and they work.

    Other reviewers have said,
it’s the kind of book to read again and again. So the magic of thinking big may
be only part magic–the rest is the harder work of keeping at it.

    Still, there is magic here.
And the CD preserves it nicely. The magic is that thoughts are things and the
Self can change these things any time the Self chooses to change. It’s
incredibly simple although, in practice as everybody already knows, damned hard
to do. The Magic in what Schwartz provides may simply be the everyday,
down-to-earth ways he brings some lofty concepts into ordinary experience. If
magic is slight of hand, you need to learn the trick in order to practice it;
Schwartz breaks it all down to a point anybody who desires it can get it.

    And there, in the word desire,
is the secret wrapped inside the magic. You have to want to–enough, often
enough, clearly enough. Schwartz provides the things to repeat, the clarity.
You just bring the desire. Together these two things become the ingredients of
true motivation, a being not just thinking anymore but thinking and acting,
doing, becoming, changing, or to use one of the Schwartz’ verbs,
"conquering."

    The main idea is that
"The size of your thinking determines the size of your success." In
other words, those who make five times your salary aren’t five times smarter,
better, luckier–they are thinking five times bigger. A not-so-hidden
presupposition of all this is the arguable premise, bigger is better. Schwartz goes,
it must be said, to great lengths to provide a satisfying understanding of what
he means by "thinking bigger."

    And most self-help buyers
think both thinking bigger is better and bigger (itself) is better. After all,
life occurs in a market economy. And remember the title: it’s not the magic of
thinking more clearly or thinking through things or thinking with a computer
running. It’s thinking BIG. We will get back to that.

    Permit this reviewer an aside.
I have an odd bias. I think it would be better if David Schwartz first leaned
to pronounce the "ee" sound in "belief" before recording.
He says "blief" so much that it becomes distracting. This reviewer
means no disrespect to the departed master motivator, just that perhaps Simon
and Schuster could use some digital magic of their own to edit these vintage
tapes used in the CD. To their credit, however, they have added several other
voices, reading much of the material, giving Schwartz long rests throughout the
four disks–which greatly improves the listening quality generally.

    So, getting back to thinking
BIG, success is linked here to bigness. It’s that link that most indelibly
secures this work to its origins in the 1950s. No escaping that. But is it
wrong? Is it even dated when you consider the even more compelling interest in
bigness in today’s Microsoft- ($359 Billion) and Google- ($60 Billion?)
economy? It’s humbling to see the answer: If bigness isn’t better, it is
certainly dominant in the life of our economies worldwide. Think small and the
world will pass you by.

    Schwartz uses other locutions
that, regrettably, border on what’s terminal in discourse: "excusitis"
is the most salient. That’s a "disease," he says, of the intellect to
be avoided. It’s small thinking run rampant, making excuses for all the little
failings that lead to a life of failure. People make excuses to cover their
self-defeating choices. Instead of your goal achieved, what you have is your
excuse for why you didn’t reach your goal. It’s a disease: excusitis.

    The cure is all the things
Schwartz outlines and describes: creative thinking, eliminating negative words
like "impossible," avoiding the "negators," those downer
people who steal our dreams; developing skills in listening, building
confidence by overcoming fear, building self-belief, solving problems by taking
action, using special techniques like "mind force," smiling to win
support, getting people to support your goals, and generally using thought to
influence people and events toward success.

    The rules Schwartz describes
are more than useful. They are factual, tested, undeniable. And that’s why The Magic
of Thinking BIG is a classic in its field. Thinking includes time out to think
alone, planning, thinking balanced with action, thinking positively, thinking
choices, "directed and undirected thinking," setting goals, thinking
through 30-day plans, thinking through investments in education and "idea
starters" like good books, thinking about attitudes, thinking about
complimenting people. On the whole it’s a powerful program for individuals.

    But it must be said there is no false modesty in
it. Nor is it for those who need or want to look more deeply into the questions
of what comprises happiness, or even success. It assumes that happiness is
linked to material success, which itself can be better when it’s bigger. It’s
not for everyone.

 

©
2004 David Wolf

 

David Wolf is the author of Philosophy That Works,
a book about the practice of philosophy. His book page for orders (hardback
& paperback) is www.xlibris.com/philosophythatworks
; readers can also see the first chapter there.

Categories: SelfHelp