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Word Gems 

exploring self-realization, sacred personhood, and full humanity


 

Honor & Character:

James Allen's

'As A Man Thinketh'

 


 

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25 Powerful Quotes To Help Transform Your Mind, from James Allen's 'As A Man Thinketh'

compiled by Yvonne I. Wilson

 

1. Self-control is strength. Right thought is mastery. Calmness is power. Say unto your heart, “Peace, be still!”

2. A man is literally what he thinks, his character being the complete sum of all his thoughts.

3. The outer condition of a person’s life will always be found to be harmoniously related to his inner state. Men do not attract that which they want, but that which they are.

4. Let a man cease from his sinful thoughts, and all the world will soften towards him, and be ready to help him; let him put away his weakly and sickly thoughts, and lo, opportunities will spring up on every hand to aid his strong resolves; let him encourage good thoughts, and no hard fate shall bind him down to wretchedness and shame.

5. Blessedness and riches are only joined together when the riches are rightly and wisely used; and the poor man only descends into wretchedness when he regards his lot as a burden unjustly imposed.

6. Good thoughts and actions never produce bad results; bad thoughts and actions can never produce good results.

7. Cherish your visions. Cherish your ideals. Cherish the music that stirs in your heart, the beauty that forms in your mind, the loveliness that drapes your purest thoughts. For out of them will grow all delightful conditions, all heavenly environment, of these, if you but remain true to them, your world will at last be built.

8. The man who does not shrink from self-crucifixion can never fail to accomplish the object upon which his heart is set.

9. A person is limited only by the thought that he chooses.

10. A strong man cannot help a weaker unless the weaker is willing to be helped, and even then the weak must become strong of himself; he must, by his own efforts develop the strength which he admires in another. None but himself can alter his condition.

11. He who would accomplish little need sacrifice little; he who would accomplish much must sacrifice much. He, who would attain highly, must sacrifice greatly.

12. The soul attracts that which it secretly harbors, that which it loves, and also that which it fears; it reaches the height of its cherished aspirations; it falls to the level of its unchastened desires, – and circumstances are the means by which the soul receives its own.

13. Calmness of mind is one of the beautiful jewels of wisdom. It is the result of long and patient effort in self-control. Its presence is an indication of ripened experience, and of a more than ordinary knowledge of the laws and operations of thought.

14. All that a man achieves and all that he fails to achieve is the direct result of his own thoughts.

15. The body is the servant of the mind. It obeys the operations of the mind, whether they be deliberately chosen or automatically expressed.

16. Man’s mind may be likened to a garden, which may be intelligently cultivated or allowed to run wild.

17. Not what he wishes and prays for does a man get, but what he justly earns. His wishes and prayers are only gratified and answered when they harmonize with his thoughts and actions.

18. Let a man radically alter his thoughts, and he will be astonished at the rapid transformation it will effect in the material conditions of his life.

19. Calmness of mind is one of the beautiful jewels of wisdom. It is the result of long and patient effort in self-control.

20. He who has conquered weakness, and has put away all selfish thoughts, belong neither to the oppressor nor oppressed. He is free.

21. Thought is the fount of action, life, and manifestation; make the fountain pure and all will be pure.

22. Doubt and fear are the great enemies of knowledge, and he who encourages them, who does not slay them, thwarts himself at every step.

23. Man is the master of thought, the molder of character, and the maker and shaper of condition, environment, and destiny.

24. A noble and Godlike character is not a thing of favor or chance, but is the natural result of continued effort in right thinking.

25. By the right choice and true application of thought, man ascends to the Divine Perfection.

 

 

Editor's last word:

When Word Gems was new, and for 10+ years, its masthead proclaimed, "What is a man but the sum of his thoughts?" This was James Allen's doing. 

Allen's principles are so powerfully transformative; but, this is not "The Secret." This is not "imagine a new bike on your porch and go outside to receive it." No, none of that nonsense. We've discussed this in other writings.

Well, I take it back, sort of. We're headed for worlds wherein one's thoughts will create environment. This will be true, for better or worse. In our world, however, an effort to mentally create a "bike on a porch" usually runs into some trouble.

But let's be clear concerning Allen's dictum, "The outer condition of a person’s life will always be found to be harmoniously related to his inner state." Currently, this is true, but only to a point. In our world there are lots of insane people running around who don't care if your character is golden, they will kill and crucify you just the same.

However, there's a day of reckoning coming, and the words of James Allen will yet become absolute law in a new and better world. Read what Spirit-Guide Abu had to say about the power of thought.