The Power of Mind (Part IV)
For Success in Health & Wealth
As you go deeper into the power of your mind, you come to realize that this is where alchemy occurs, at the level of thought, where nothing becomes something in an instant. Sometimes we call this an idea, a dream, a vision. Other times it can be a doomsday thought, destructive, a nightmare. The good news is that we can dictate what thoughts to accept and nurture.
I received some feedback from someone about how reflecting on themselves and the power of their mind (if you haven’t already, read part 1, part 2 and part 3 on the power of the mind) has unlocked new understandings of themselves, the people around them, and the world.
I believe we are at the tip of the iceberg when it comes to unlocking the power of our mind. This is the most marvellous news. We have so much untapped potential. Physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually.
I see this profoundly as I read the Bible each day.
One person said they knew all that I had written in my newsletter. So I asked, what does Earl Nightingale define success as? I really love his definition of success. I caught her by surprise with the question. I realized that although people say they know and understand, I've come to realize that I do not truly understand. It will take me a lifetime to understand the depths of simple truths and principles.
I just helped my 41-year-old friend rapidly reverse their previously undiagnosed and severe diabetes in just 7 days. It’s even miraculous for me to behold. I sent him a prior newsletter I had written on diabetes. He read it a few months ago but said he didn’t really understand it and didn’t feel it was written for him. Now he understands it much better and feels it was written exactly for him. What changed?
Can we truly understand something if we have experienced it, processed it and delved deeply into it? I am learning that the answer is no. I truly do not understand a thing, even though I think I do. Even if I have learned about it, thought about it, written about it, taught it, and seen it. I have a hard time truly understanding insulin, cholesterol, and blood pressure, even though I kind of understand them and have been able to reverse them in some people. I have many more questions than I have answers. Same with business. Same with people. And ironically, the same with me. Who am I?
Earl’s definition of success?
“Success is the progressive realization of a worthy ideal.”
Dr. Maxwell Maltz: Self-Image Renaissance
You can never outperform your self-image.
Dr. Maxwell Maltz
Dr. Maltz earned his M.D. from Columbia University in 1923. During his internship, he helped deliver a baby with a hare lip, and in that moment crystallized his decision to pursue plastic surgery. But more than just restoring people’s appearances, he was also interested in helping them improve their psychological self-image regarding their appearance, identity, and recovery.
Imagine a plane on autopilot always self-correcting to its destination. Dr. Maxwell Maltz discovered the psychological mechanism behind true transformation to a person’s ideal. It didn’t happen from the outside, but from the inside out. He was a plastic surgeon who repaired faces, but he quickly realized that his patients were trying to repair their ‘self-image.’
Some patients were transformed physically but had the same self-image impairment. Despite their nose, ears, scars or features, which they believed were holding them back, were perfectly reconstructed through plastic surgery, their confidence didn’t change. Their relationships didn’t improve, and their anxiety and self-esteem issues persisted—the human paradox: fixing the outside didn’t always fix the inside.
Maltz wondered why a physical improvement doesn’t lead to an internal improvement and fix the person’s confidence and self-image.
Others changed their internal self-image even before their surgery fully healed.
Maltz realized that our subconscious mind acts like a cybernetic guidance system, like a thermostat for our identity, our behaviour, our habits and our health.
If your inner self-image doesn’t match your goals, your subconscious ‘corrects’ you back to the level of your subconscious mind’s self-image.
To help people improve their self-image, he wrote the best-selling book Psycho-Cybernetics in 1960, which has since sold over 35 million copies worldwide and has a large fan base, from Salvador Dali to Jane Fonda. And this was touted as one of Bob Proctor’s Top 5 books to learn and understand yourself and the world around you.
Your Self-Image
Your self-image is your ceiling.
Dr. Maxwell Maltz
Your self-image is the cybernetic system that guides you, an internal steering mechanism that consistently keeps you in tune with your self-image. If you see yourself as bad with money or always behind, your behaviours will align with that identity, even if you are consciously striving to do the opposite (be good with money and be on time).
So your willpower, the power of your will, is limited by your internal self-image, which will put the brakes on your will to self-correct it back to your self-image.
Maltz, instead, taught people how to retrain their self-image, and he proposed that the mind responds to vivid mental rehearsal almost as if it were real experience. He called this the “theatre of your mind”. Repeatedly see and feel yourself acting like the person who already belongs at the level you aspire to.
“Your nervous system cannot tell the difference between a real and vividly imagined experience.”
If you imagine yourself fully healed, your brain acts as if healing is already underway. Bob Proctor took this concept one step further. He explained how the subconscious mind, which was shaped mainly without your permission and control, can be retrained into your conscious mind through Hill’s belief and autosuggestion, which is repetition and practice.
Try Maltz’s Self-Image Reset:
Write one sentence: “I am the kind of person who _______.” Make this specific and believable.
Close your eyes. Rehearse one scene tomorrow where that identity shows up.
End with one action you will do, even if you don’t yet ‘feel ready.’
Like a pro athlete visualizes and practices shots, passes, and scoring the winning touchdown, both in mind and action, you can do the same for anything you set your mind to.
I realized I would do this when I was asked to speak to a large audience. I would rehearse the speech in my mind many different ways and rearrange the sequence until I felt it was good in my heart. I had already done this in my mind many times, so when it was in person, it seemed like I was ready, for I had practiced it in my mind and in front of a mirror many times beforehand.
And when asked on the spot, even though I wasn’t prepared, I would ask for wisdom from above and then think about a few things I would really like to impart on their hearts and focus on that, because I had also done this so many times with so many people beforehand. Now it was just another opportunity to do so. I advise people to speak honestly from their hearts.
When I look back at myself now versus how shy I was in my high school and university years, I wonder how I became so self-assured and confident, with certain values. I also reflect deeply upon my faults and weaknesses, and the feedback I get from those around me. I deeply consider how important it is for me to adapt and integrate this feedback into my being, and to change my thoughts and actions for those around me.
This next person has helped me take critical feedback and yet be at peace with myself … a lot.
James Allen: The Power of Serenity
“They themselves are makers of themselves.” by virtue of the thoughts, which they choose and encourage; that mind is the master-weaver, both of the inner garment of character and the outer garment of circumstance, and that, as they may have hitherto woven in ignorance and pain they may now weave in enlightenment and happiness.
James Allen
Bob Proctor asked me to write Serenity, the last chapter of James Allen’s most popular book, As a Man Thinketh, for 90 days in a row. He said it would change my life.
I doubt that many people in the world would do this. I am one of the few who have. I wrote it out 100 times in 100 days. I memorized it. I had my leadership team and other teams memorize it and recite it at our quarterly meetings.
It changed my life. It changed my thinking. It changed my heart.
But Serenity is just the 7th and final chapter. I also cherish the first chapter, Thought and Character. I had my leadership team memorize this chapter as well. But what about the middle chapters?
Thought and Character
Effect of Thought on Circumstances
Effect of Thought on Health and the Body
Thought and Purpose
Thought and Achievement
Vision and Ideals
Serenity
I want to share a few of the powerful quotes from each chapter of As a Man Thinketh for you to think about and ponder as this year of 2025 closes. (Please excuse the male gender in his book, written in 1902.
Chapter 1: Thought and Character
“A man is literally what he thinks, his character being the complete sum of all his thoughts.”
“Man is the master of thought, the moulder of character, and the maker and shaper of condition, environment, and destiny.”
“Such is the conscious master… by discovering within himself the laws of thought…”
Chapter 2: Effect of Thought on Circumstances
“Men do not attract that which they want, but that which they are.”
“Circumstance does not make the man; it reveals him to himself.”
“Men imagine that thought can be kept secret, but it cannot; it rapidly crystallizes into habit…”
Chapter 3: Effect of Thought on Health and the Body
“The body is the servant of the mind.”
“Disease and health, like circumstances, are rooted in thought.”
“There is no physician like cheerful thought for dissipating the ills of the body…”
Chapter 4: Thought and Purpose
“Until thought is linked with purpose there is no intelligent accomplishment.”
“A man should conceive of a legitimate purpose in his heart, and set out to accomplish it.”
“He who has conquered doubt and fear has conquered failure.”
Chapter 5: Thought and Achievement
“All that a man achieves and all that he fails to achieve is the direct result of his own thoughts.”
“None but himself can alter his condition.”
“A man can only rise, conquer, and achieve by lifting up his thoughts.”
Chapter 6: Vision and Ideals
“The dreamers are the saviours of the world.”
“He who cherishes a beautiful vision… will one day realize it.”
“Dream lofty dreams, and as you dream, so shall you become.”
Chapter 7: Serenity
“Calmness of mind is one of the beautiful jewels of wisdom.”
“A man becomes calm in the measure that he understands himself as a thought evolved being, for such knowledge necessitates the understanding of others as the result of thought, and as he develops a right understanding, and sees more and more clearly the internal relation of things by the action of cause and effect he ceases to fuss and fume and worry and grieve, and remains poised, steadfast, serene.”
“Self-control is strength; Right Thought is mastery; Calmness is power.”
I invite you to read the book, but if not, at least read Chapter 3 on the Effect of Thoughts on Health and the Body.
For the business-minded, you should read Chapters 4-6.
For those going through difficulties, chapters 1, 2, 4, and 7.
Ultimately, when all is said and done, we will seek chapters 3, 4, 6, 7 and maybe 5 (achievement and mastery).
If you have a chance, take the time to quietly read ‘As a Man Thinketh’ (free online). It’s about an hour’s read.
If you have a chance, listen to Bob recite Serenity. Just 4 minutes.
What a powerful book. And Serenity is worthy of writing out 90 days in a row. It defines serenity as, “that exquisite poise of character, which we call serenity, is the last lesson of culture, the fruitage of the soul. It is as precious as wisdom, more to be desired than gold… How insignificant mere money seeking looks in comparison with a serene life…”
May you have serenity, deep thoughts, as you reflect upon the year of 2025 and enter the new year of 2026, full of dreams, visions, ideals, and see the seed of your strong, healthy, purposeful self-image.
Reflection
We are blessed both by our deep misfortunes and by the height of our loves and joys.
Dr. Kevin Ham
This year, I lost a few loved ones, Rob Thompson, my beloved dear puppy Kona, found out I had clogged arteries, which I am healing and discovered how to heal metabolic disease. I had my first eye shot for my retina in three years.
But I have also been greatly blessed by my grieving, by gratitude, and by the comfort of God, my family, my friends, my peers, and my colleagues, as well as by you who have supported me in my own journey through these writings.
I have not only helped reverse my own diseases, but also the diseases of many close to me in almost miraculous fashion. And my businesses have been greatly blessed by opportunities arising from rapid changes and from God-given gifts.
Thank you, everyone, for your support and love. I wish you good health along with purpose and meaning each day, and to embrace each life opportunity, along with life’s storms, to keep on that narrow path of truth, love and peace.
May God bless you greatly. You are beloved. Know that. You are loved. Love back in your own way, with your own gifts, being, and heart.
Ease the Heartache of Loved Ones
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I’d love to help a lot of people prevent, reverse, heal and ease the suffering of disease.
Life-Changing Question
Who am I really and how can I become who I truly wish to be?
May you spend each thought and word and action to become who you truly wish to be.
Have a Merry Christmas and holidays and Happy New Year!
Next issue:
Power of Mind (Part V).
Why Belief is Essential to Success
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