B J 1595 IT ■rrrrrrrrri I'll r i i r I'l ri . ! jlJ||j| i |j|)|Ulllw||]U lil g || ll| ll lll]llW^ " — ~ ' ' " ^rr-'-—^ ™— ' — ""li,!!Hliai!fl POSSIBL YOU CLARA EWING ESPEY Class. Book. BY THE SAME AUTHOR LEADERS OF GIRLS Small 12mo. Net, 75 cents THE POSSIBLE YOU BY CLARA EWING ESPEY THE ABINGDON PRESS NEW YORK CINCINNATI Copyright, 1917, by CLARA EWING ESPEY First Edition Printed September, 1917 Reprinted April, 1921 THIS BOOK IS ABOUT YOURSELF The You That Can Be How Thinking Starts "Making Connections" The Way To Remember Facts About Habits Using Your Gray Matter What Feelings Do Steering Yourself A Word To The Wise New Out Of Old Seeing Into Things Your Reason For Being THE YOU THAT CAN BE I. ACORNS AND SWEET PEAS II. THREADS AND DESIGNS in. BOWLS AND BASKETS IV. DWARF OR GIANT THE YOU THAT CAN BE I. ACORNS AND SWEET PEAS An acorn has a tree wrapped inside it; sweet peas are vines rolled into little balls, and YOU ! — you are the seed that holds the person you are going to be. As no two oak trees are exactly alike, and as no two sweet pea vines are identical, so the YOU that is to be, is a unique person. You will be '' different " enough to be " interesting " but not ''eccentric,'' ^^peculiar," or "queer," Anybody can be " conspicuous " or do " freakish '' things, but YOU are to be " unusual." Within you is a self that is "exceptional." Let it grow. n. THREADS AND DESIGNS Do you think that the kind of person you are going to be " just happens," or have you found that you may take the many -colored experiences of each minute and weave them according to a wonderful life pattern ? Some folks make nothing but hit-and-miss rugs and crazy patchwork quilts of their lives. Some let their experience threads pile up in a big tangle, and some allow them to work into the hard knots of discourage- ment instead of sewing seams. But YOU are to discover the secret of the pattern, thje process, and the joy of the working. 10 THE YOU THAT CAN BE HI. BOWLS AND BASKETS The potter puts his clay on his revolving wheel and molds a bowl by the pressure of his hands. The basket maker moistens her reeds and shapes them by pressure and tension as she weaves. So YOU may mold and shape your life by choosing what influences shall affect it. The thoughts you think, the things you see and hear, the movies you watch, the books you read, and the friends you have will press upon and shape your life, but YOU may choose them. If you let yourself be misshapen you're to blame. It's hard to make things over. IV. DWARF OR GIANT "Alice," at the bottom of the '' rabbit hole,'' drank something and grew smaller, then ate a little cake to grow tall again. If you drink "no-use," "don't-care," "too-hard- work," and "rather-have-a-good-time" thoughts and moods, you shrivel up into a dwarf; but when you eat the cake of "I'll-try," "I-believe-I-can," "It's-fun-to- work," and "I'11-see-this-through," you grow head and shoulders above the average. Some silly folks keep changing from beverage to cake and go up and down like an elevator. Of course YOU don't. HOW THINKING STARTS I. SNAPSHOTS II. FOCUSING m. MOVIE FILMS IV. AMATEUR STANDARDS HOW THINKING STARTS 13 I. SNAPSHOTS Did you know that you "take a Kodak with you'' wherever you go? Whenever you notice a thing, or receive an impression, it registers on your brain Hke a snapshot. The name of your Kodak is "Attention," and the pictures it makes are the mental impressions from which thinking starts. By paying attention to a thing you press the button of your camera. These mental photographs determine what you will become, for they go into the album of what you know and experience. By referring to them you think and compare and remember. II. FOCUSING Before you take a picture you focus your camera so that the light rays from the subject will center on your film. The thing you use to focus your mental pictures is "Concentration." It centers your interest on the thing to which you are paying attention. It makes you disregard everything else. This is necessary because a mental impression that is vague and blurred is as "'no account'' as a picture that is out of focus. Hunting for something interesting about even a stupid thing will help you to concentrate on it, lessons for instance. 14 HOW THINKING STARTS III. MOVIE FILMS Have you ever thought of the difference between a movie film taken along a street and a photograph of the same place? You see the same people, houses, and vehicles, yet in the movie they are more interesting. When you try to concentrate your mind by thinking hard about a thing you soon get tired and want to go to something else, the way you feel when you look at the photograph of the street. But if you pay attention to one part of it at a time just as if it came along in a movie, you are more interested, know more and can remember better afterward. That's how to concen- trate. Make a movie of what you are thinking about. IV. AMATEUR STANDARDS If you pick up a bunch of pictures such as most people take, you will find them too high, too low, or slanting; poses and grouping are poor; faces look black because they are against a lighter background; the whole effect is gray and flat; or the shadows are wrong because the sunlight was too strong. A little care and thought might have prevented these faults, yet people call the pictures '^good." They are as commonplace and inferior as the think- ing your mind will do unless you train it not to wander and not to register impressions regardless of their value. PAY ATTENTION AND CONCENTRATE. MAKING CONNECTIONS I. THE SWITCHBOARD II. LIMITEDS AND LOCALS m. "NUMBER, PLEASE" IV. WIRELESS MAKING CONNECTIONS 17 I. THE SWITCHBOARD If you ever watched "Central'' at her switchboard, you saw her pick up a plug and insert it in a hole to make the connection asked for. You can discover your mental switchboard and see now you connect with a whole party line if you think backward from a thing to what made you think of it and to what made you think of that. It is a lucky thing for you that your mind "asso- ciates'' things this way so you'll know one thing isn't several. Otherwise, if you looked into a mirror you'd see hair, forehead, eyebrows, eyes, nose, cheeks, lips, mouth, chin, and ears — all separate — without knowing you saw your own face. II. LIMITEDS AND LOCALS You like a limited car or train because it gets you there in a hurry and doesn't stop at every dooryard. That is how your mind saves you time and effort by passing all the local points in your impressions about things and stopping only at main stations. You don't think, "dark," "wet," "shiny," and "something to write with"; you think "ink." If you cultivate this power of "association" furtherj it will make you able to think clearly, to converse in- telHgently, and to tell a story acceptably. Bores tell all the trifling details, and tire folks the way a local does. 18 MAKING CONNECTIONS III. "NUMBER, PLEASE" You probably keep a list of the telephone numbers that you call most frequently, or perhaps you know them by heart. But maybe you do not know that there is a list of mental numbers which you call for — things that indicate what you most intimately "asso- ciate'' with YOURSELF in your mind. Your friends are your preferred numbers as to qual- ity among people, your books indicate your preferences in the thought world, while your way of wearing your clothes and your manner of carrying yourself show your idea of your own personality. YOU are 'phoning from a public booth with the door wide open and calling the numbers so loudly that anyone may hear and know what you are. IV. WIRELESS A wireless station stands like a monster spider, appar- ently unconnected with anything but the ground, yet the invisible fibers of its weaving reach out in all directions to other stations that may be a long distance from it. That is the way with you and your ideals. They often seem such invisible things, so far off and beyond attainment, yet you actually connect with them if you "associate" yourself with them in your thoughts. The effects may not be of the spectacular, fireworks kind, but they are as evident as when a wireless station is in action. You become different because of them. THE WAY TO REMEMBER I. A MAGNET II. LENSES III. HAMMERS IV. WIRE BASKETS AND FILING CABINETS THE WAY TO REMEMBER 21 I. A MAGNET A magnet and some iron filings are fascinating things to experiment with. The bits of iron seem almost alive as they rmi toward the magnet, and the cross bar at the end holds on like a frightened child to its mother when you try to pull it away. If you want things to stick to your mind as the filings and bar to the magnet, you can draw them into your memory by the power of your steady attention and real interest. Then they take hold with such a strong grasp that they are sure to be there when you want to remember them later. II. LENSES When you were ^'little'' you probably had fun play- ing with a magnifying glass in the sunlight. By hold- ing the lens in just the right position you could make a bright spot on a piece of paper and even burn a hole there — simply by concentrating the sun's rays. You have to focus your attention on things when they happen or while you are trying to memorize them if you expect to remember accurately. The rays of your thoughts must come together to burn the subject in- to your mind the way the sun's rays char the paper. If part of them go to some other thing your lens does not focus and you'll likely forget. 22 THE WAY TO REMEMBER III. HAMMERS There is an interesting machine that pounds in logs to make a wharf. A heavy weight is hoisted on a der- rick and allowed to fall repeatedly upon the end of the inverted log until it is driven in far enough. When you want to remember a thing, pound it into your mind by the hammer of "Repetition/' Perhaps in time you can train yourself so thoroughly that, like the machine used to nail wooden baskets, you can drive the thing home with one strong, steady blow. But it is the best plan to keep pounding away. IV. WIRE BASKETS AND FILING CABINETS Some folks toss things into their minds as if they were the wire baskets that office people use on their desks to hold correspondence and papers. Nothing is classified; nothing sorted; everything is piled in a heap, waiting to be attended to. A mind of this sort makes a good "forgettery." When you are putting things into your mind in the hope of remembering them you'll succeed best by mak- ing them into a mental filing cabinet. Find their rela- tions to other things, to something you already know, or connect them with some vivid experience you have had. "Associate" them with something. That will cross reference them so you can find them easily. FACTS ABOUT HABITS I. A RAINBOW II. ROPES AND FIBERS III. HIGHWAYS IV. A CORNER V. COASTING VI. CHEMICAL REACTIONS Vll. A SWITCH FACTS ABOUT HABITS 25 I. A RAINBOW Your habit rainbow gives sign of what you are and will be. Just as a real rainbow is formed by countless particles of water, your habit one is made up of a mul- titude of impressions, thoughts and actions. There are many blending shades, but these are the prominent colors of your rainbow: Red — Physical habits; movement, action, posture, etc. Orange — Emotional habits; feel- ings, moods, impulses; self- control or self-indulgence. Yellow — Habits of mind; associ- ation, attention, remember- ing, reasoning, etc. Green — Habits of will; decision or indecision, procrastina- tion, promptness. Blue — Habitual reactions toward people, conditions, work, etc- Response or antago- nism. Violet — Spiritual habits of faith, prayer, devotion. Is there a pot of gold at the rainbow's end.? Of course — your success as a person. 26 FACTS ABOUT HABITS II. ROPES AND FIBERS Did you ever unravel a rope? If so, you found that it was made up of many separate fibers. When you tested one of these you were able to break it easily. It snapped almost at once, yet the rope itself was very strong. Every habit you have is made up of impression, thought, or action fibers. Each one of these, at the time it is happening, seems as weak and insignificant as one of the fibers of rope. But when you repeat them over and over they twist into a habit rope whose great resisting power is of value to you. Be careful about making your ropes. m. HIGHWAYS Did you ever think how different the world would be without streets and roads and highways.? Most of them began with somebody's steps. Suppose you had to make a new path every time! Without Habits, that would be necessary in many ways. Imagine having to learn to walk and eat and sit and stand, every time you wished to do one of these things! Learning to play the piano, to use the typewriter, to bat a ball, to think straight, to make decisions, etc., all depend on the path your habits form. If it's wriggly, you'll not be a great success. FACTS ABOUT HABITS 27 IV. A CORNER A comer is queer in a way. It is a place that de- cides. When you take one of the streets or roads that meet there, you soon get far away from where you would have been if you'd taken the other one, yet the two are together at the corner. The Beginning of a Habit is like a corner. It de- cides the quality of your new habit; w^hether it will be satisfactory or not. That's why you try to make the right motions or decisions at first. Go slow, or you'll practice mistakes and get far away from the road you should take. V. COASTING Making a Habit is like pulling a sled uphill; long, hard, tedious work, with nothing jolly about it. It is hard to make and keep your thoughts, movements, actions, feelings, and decisions right, at every step of the uphill road. You have to drag the weight of your unaccustomedness and laziness behind you. Using a Habit is like the glorious coast down. At first you go a little slowly, then faster and faster. The thing gets easier all the time. The higher the hill of preparation and training you climb, the finer your coasting will be. 28 FACTS ABOUT HABITS VI. CHEMICAL REACTIONS When you put soaa into vinegar you are sure it will ''fizz/' and when you stir your fudge at the wrong time you know it will ''go to sugar'' or form crystals. If you "get into the habit" of doing or feeling a certain way, that habit will act automatically when you make the opening motions. That's why you "practice'' things. You want to make habits that will guarantee results. Try smiling the next time you're cross and you'll find yourself different before you know it. A smile is part of a Habit that reacts into good nature. VII. A SWITCH Nobody expects anything but a wreck if the rails are torn up before an approaching train. Yet people talk about "breaking a habit." Your life energy is a train that is speeding along the habit rails of practice and custom. If you want it to go another way, try a different method from tearing up the rails. If the habit is undesirable, you can con- trol it by building a new and stronger habit of the right kind to which your energy train can be sent. Build it a switch and a new track that will carry it where you wish. If you try to "break it," look out for trouble. USING YOUR GRAY MATTER I. QUESTION MARKS II. WHEN GREEN IS BLUE III. TAKING THE CLOCK APART IV. PICTURE PUZZLES USING YOUR GRAY MATTER 31 I. QUESTION MARKS The Spanish language uses more question marks than English does. It puts one at the beginning as well as at the end of the question. When you reason things out you are doing a kind of thinking that needs an extra amount of question marks, for it isn't any ''shut your eyes and hold out your hand" affair. You have to know what things really are and not take them at their face value nor trust what they seem to be. Untrained persons take their "general impressions" and draw ridiculous conclusions in consequence. Ask yourseK questions, or you'll get fooled too. II. WHEN GREEN IS BLUE Often at night, or in an uncertain light, when you looked at something green you were sure it was blue. You failed to get the yellow tone that would have modified the color. When you ''jump to conclusions" or make up your mind beforehand how things are and then try to rea- son so AS to prove it, you may be making the same mistake. Unless you get a different light on the subject or see it from a new angle, you may go around insisting that the thing is what it is not and making other folks wonder whether you are color blind. 32 USING YOUR GRAY MATTER III. TAKING THE CLOCK APART If you are going to be intelligent about a thing that you do not understand, you have to reason it out. You pull it to pieces just as you did the old clock when you took it apart to see how it worked. You ask yourseK "who/' "what," "why,'' "when," "where," "for what," etc., until you begin to see the wheels and springs that the thing is made of, how they fit together, and what their relations are. The tools you need are a good set of questions and your ability to "associate" things. Practice helps a lot. IV. PICTURE PUZZLES Sometimes you have a great jumble of facts or a mixed-up heap of impressions from which you must work out some conclusion. This sort of reasoning is like putting a picture puzzle together. "Association" helps you here too. You have to begin sorting things to see what belong together, then you connect them until you see how they are going to work out and where the rest of the pieces fit. But you have to go carefully and be sure to make the right connections between things if you solve your puzzle. Look out for the pieces you choose; they may not fit after all. WHAT FEELINGS DO I. ARTISTS II. A RUNAWAY III. BONFIRES IV. HOLES IN THE KETTLE V. EXPLOSIONS AND AUTOS VI. THE TOWERMAN VII. MERCURY AND MARS VIII. EMPTYING YOUR PURSE IX. HERCULES X. JASON XI. THE TWINS Xn. THE QUEST OF THE GRAIL WHAT FEELINGS DO 35 I. ARTISTS Feelings are artists. They trace their drawings on faces; make pictures in postures; and engrave hues on people's bodies, tk Ever^ feeling you have leaves its mark somewhere. It may draw the alert, vivid self that you were meant to be. It may make a caricature in your long face, drooping shoulders, and sagging walk, to show how weak, burdened, or good-for-nothing you feel. A sketch of good nature or one of petulance may be drawn on your face already. What kind of an etching will you be when you're old — a hard, selfish, mean person.?^ or one full of love.^^ II. A RUNAWAY When an automobile, a locomotive, a Jiorse, or a tiger breaks loose and runs wild, people are terrified and try to keep out of the smash-up that comes. Any person who lets his feelings run unchecked and uncontrolled in anger, discouragement, impatience, hatred, sympathy, affection, or any other emotion, is like such a runaway. In times like these people dread and avoid him. And one whose splendid life energy is running away feels exhausted and smashed when all is over. Don't let yours run away. 36 WHAT FEELINGS DO III. BONFIRES When you indulge in feelings — love, sympathy, ambition, anything — just for the sake of the pleas- ure it gives you to feel that way, it is like setting fire to a lumber yard for the fun of watching the blaze. Lumber is valuable and so is the life force that goes into feelings. Both are intended to make some- thing worth while. The true citizen of the world thinks it a wrongful waste to make a bonfire of either of them. Do you let your feelings burn up, or do you use them? IV. HOLES IN THE KETTLE If you had a perfectly good teakettle you would think yourseK silly to punch holes in the bottom and then fill it with water and set it on to heat. Every drop of water would be gone and the fire would be out before you knew it. But though you have a chance to use a fine life equipment, you don't hesitate to punch holes in it by feeling timid, discouraged, hopeless, lazy, or use- less. Then your life energy leaks away instead of boil- ing up into fine action. Stoj> spoiling your kettle. WHAT FEELINGS DO 37 V. EXPLOSIONS AND AUTOS An explosion is power — ^power that is in violent and destructive action. Yet automobiles are drawn by the harnessed power of many little explosions. Every feeling you have is life power exploding. If you keep it pent up it wrecks your body or injures your neighbors as you ''fly into a thousand pieces.'' Each feeling you have should propel an auto for you by spending its force in definite acts of worth-while conduct. When you feel good, kind, sympathetic, am- bitious — DO SOMETHING TO LIVE IT. A nasty mean feeling generates power enough to carry you up "DiflSculty Hill.'' VI. THE TOWERMAN The towerman gets his warning about an approach- ing train in plenty of time to arrange the signals and then to lock the switches if they are needed. When a feeling starts, you notice it coming before it has grown very strong. You get the warning often in your body; it is limp, tense, etc. elUST THEN your will must set the signal for that particular train of life energy to stop or go ahead. If the feeling is wrong or wasteful, your will can lock the switch that turns your life power to another track. It's great fun to make it go another way and do something worth while. 38 WHAT FEELINGS DO VII. MERCURY AND MARS The old god Mercury was a slippery, treacherous fellow, a thief and the father of thieves. So is fear. It steals your strength and your courage and cheats you out of much that you might have and be. When Fear comes your way, summon Mars, the old war god, your feeling of aggressiveness and combat. He makes you hold up your head and breathe deeply with your chest well up and your hands ready to grasp a weapon. And, strange to say, when your body does this, your feelings change and your courage returns. Don't let any fear crumple you up and cut your breathing short. It will if you let it. VIII. EMPTYING YOUR PURSE When you have a purse full of money you don't go along the street flinging the bills and silver away. You would think you were crazy if you did. But when somebody "makes you mad'' you don't hesitate to fling away your splendid vitality in angry feelings, words, and actions so that your body col- lapses like an empty purse afterward. Anger is power being thrown away, power that you can use in a thousand ways. That is why it "feels good" sometimes when you are angry. You enjoy the sense of power. But what a fool you are to fling away your gold ! WHAT FEELINGS DO 39 IX. HERCULES "Hercules'* and his ''labors'' — who hasn't heard of them? He was such a tremendous worker. He dared even what men thought impossible, and he did it. He worked with his mmd as well as with his body. You have a Hercules — your instinct of constructive- ness, A LIKING FOR WORK. You like to make things or to accomplish something with mind or body. Lazy, are you? Still you can't avoid Hercules! You really work harder than ever when you try to get out of working. That's why you're worn out when you put off work or don't get up on time. It's more fun to work than to be idle. X. JASON Jason sailed and sailed through all sorts of difficul- ties in search of the golden fleece; and he got it. Curiosity is Jason among your feelings. It sends you out exploring among things you don't know, in quest of knowledge, information, experience. That's how you learn things. Aren't you always wanting to know? Why do you go and look into a show window where there is a crowd? You want to find out. Curiosity is the '"first step toward a well-stored mind." And when you have secured a mind like that, you'll find you have your golden fleece. 40 WHAT FEELINGS DO XI- THE TWINS Twins are supposed to be inseparable, no matter if they are unlike. Where one is the other wants to be. There is a "together'' feeling about them. Among your feelings there are such twins — "LOV- ING" and "BEING LOVED." They belong together, though they don't always succeed in accomplishing it. Although "LOVING" is the one that should make the advances, most people expect "BEING LOVED" to do it and are disappointed. "BEING LOVED" is the twin that follows "LOV- ING." If you would be loved, you must love first — purely, wisely, unselfishly, sanely. "BEING LOVED" ^nii come along. XIL THE QUEST OF THE GRAIL The old-time knights rode on many a quest in search of the Holy Grail, the cup used at the Last Supper. You yourself go on a similar quest, seeking the Grail of religious experience. Your religious feeling is one of the strongest and deepest of your nature. No matter whether you belong to a church or even attend one, you are more or less consciously seeking, seeking — seeking for God. You may search in the way of pleasure, ambition, service, or devotion; your quest is the same though you do not know it. It is God you desire. STEERING YOURSELF I. RAFTS AND POLES II. A RUDDER III. THE LIGHTHOUSE IV. THE CAPTAIN STEERING YOURSELF 43 I. RAFTS AND POLES As long as you are in shallow water you can easily steer a raft with a pole, but when you get out too deep to reach the bottom there is nothing to do but to drift. Some people have wills like that. As long as a de- cision is easy they have no trouble in making it, but give them something hard to decide and they float around irresolutely or drift whichever way circum- stances or their friends carry them. Since an undisciplined Will is as hard to steer with as a pole when you are out in deep water, you'd better train yours by practice in every decision. II. A RUDDER If you've ever sat in the stern of a sailboat, or if you've been at the pilot wheel of a launch, you know what fun it is to see how the boat responds to the rudder. A single act of your Will can turn you around to exactly the opposite direction from the one you've been taking. You respond just as the boat does to its rudder. But before you can have the fun of steering yourself skilKully, your Will must have a lot of practice on small decisions so as to establish a habit that you can rely upon in an emergency. Otherwise you might turn the rudder wrong and upset the boat. 44 STEERING YOURSELF III. THE LIGHTHOUSE A lighthouse says two things to the sailor: "Don't come here, for there is danger/' and ''You can reckon your course by me." If your WILL is of any account, it says the same two things to you. It forbids you to give in to your weak- nesses or to do what is wrong or risky; and it insists that you must do other things that are right and that lead to your progress and success. As the light in the tower has to be watched and tended, just so you have to look after your will to see that it is in good working order. IV. THE CAPTAIN Your Will is really the captain of your craft. It commands and disciplines the crew of your habits, it directs the management of the ship of your body, it decides on the life route you will take, and it says when and where the cargo of your work shall be taken on and discharged. If your Will is weak or subject to erratic moods, your voyage may be perilous or your ship may be wrecked. If it becomes intoxicated with a sense of its own importance, you may run on the shoals of stubbornness and obstinacy. But if it is well trained and disciplined, you may depend upon it to take you through in safety. A WORD TO THE WISE I. MALLET AND CHISEL II. A GOOD SAMARITAN HI. YOUR TOUCHSTONE IV. THE CONDUCTOR A WORD TO THE WISE 47 I. MALLET AND CHISEL Michael Angelo saw an angel in a rough block of marble and worked with mallet and chisel until he had revealed it to the world. You yourself are at work on a living statue, bringing it into being, line by line. The scientific name for your chisel is ''Auto Suggestion'' and your hammer, of course, is ''Repetition.'' "Auto Suggestion" is nothing more than telling your- self what to be and to do. You wield it every time you think or feel anything about yourself. If you think ill of yourself or give way to wrong feelings, your statue is marred or you make it a hideous thing. Believing in yourself, aspiring and trying, releases the angel. II. A GOOD SAMARITAN Did you ever have some one who believed in you no matter what happened.*^ Somebody who would give you a "boost" just when you needed it.^ Then you know what is meant by this special kind of good Samaritan. It isn't patronizing and it isn't simply lending a hand. It is making the other person believe in him- self because you believe in him, like him, trust him, appeal to him, or challenge his best self. You may say it, you may imply it, you may act it, or you may insinuate it by a subtle "suggestion." It works wonders and makes you a friend worth having. 48 A WORD TO THE WISE III. YOUR TOUCHSTONE The learned men of olden times kept searching for a stone that would turn the baser metals into gold. There is a faculty that will turn all kinds of con- ditions into the gold of success for you. Some call it tact, and some call it influence, but Suggestion is its real name. By means of it you make people want to do things, or think that they like things, or feel in a good humor, or give you their friendship. It works wonders. When you use it backward by implied or direct criticism, disapproval, antagonism, or discouragement, there is a dreadful chemical reaction. IV. THE CONDUCTOR Every car, train, or excursion has its conductor, the man who is in charge of it. If you have to ''speak" in meetings, are chairman of a committee, president of your class, or if you want the ''bunch" to do things, your power of "suggestion" will help you to be a successful conductor. Suggest pictures when you talk; arouse interest by making folks "feel" what you say. Make your ideas striking, attractive, picturesque. "Come on, let's — ," or "Don't you think it would be nice.?" will start the "bunch" in the direction that you want them to go. Suggestion does it. NEW OUT OF OLD I. BUILDING BLOCKS AND AIR CASTLES 11. YOUR FAIRY GODMOTHER HI. ALADDIN'S LAMP IV. GATHERING HONEY NEW OUT OF OLD 51 I. BUILDING BLOCKS AND AIR CASTLES Children use the same blocks in diflFerent ways when they are building a castle, a tower, or a garden wall. When your Imagination plays it takes the ideas that you already have and puts them together in new ways, to build air castles, life dreams, and plans. By cultivating it you may become ''original" in your thoughts and conversation. If you apply it right, you may create new designs, processes, or inventions. The secret is to combine old material in new or dif- ferent or startling ways. II. YOUR FAIRY GODMOTHER It is easy to see how Imagination is the fairy god- mother who will bring you success as an architect, designer, artist, decorator, landscape gardener, a mu- sician, or a writer. But if you want to be a merchant, banker, farmer, or mechanic; or if you think of being a teacher, doctor, salesman, home-maker, business woman, or almost any- thing else, your Imagination can help you just as much. You'll need to imagine beforehand how things, and conditions, or people, will work together or act; what is going to happen, and what you'll need to meet the circumstances when they arise. Let Imagination put two and two together for you and keep you from failure. 52 NEW OUT OF OLD III. ALADDIN'S LAMP When Aladdin rubbed his lamp the genie appeared, to do his bidding; and when you polish your Imagina- tion you arouse a power that will serve you. Have it tell you the sort of person you may become, and the things you need in order to be what you desire. Bid it help you to put yourself in another's place so that you may understand and sympathize and make allowances for faults. Make it show you ways to put fun and romance mto common, everyday, humdrum tasks. It's a mighty good servant, you see. IV. GATHERING HONEY As the bees go to thousands of flowers gathering their honey, so you obtain from countless sources the materials for your Imagination to use. The wider your experience and the fuller your knowl* edge of life, the more resources you have. Inquire into diverse occupations, and the processes by which things are made. Study people, books, pic- tures, and music. Learn about the out-of-doors world. From all of these you will obtain and store away a multitude of ideas and impressions that your im- agination may use in new combinations later on. SEEING INTO THINGS I. A SEARCHLIGHT II. SIGNALS ni. YOUR MICROSCOPE IV. FIELD GLASSES AND TELESCOPES SEEING INTO THINGS 55 I. A SEARCHLIGHT If you have a searchlight in your hand or on your auto, you do not mind the dark. You can see ahead whether you are on the highway, following an obscure trail, or going where there is no path. But you may go through life stumbling and groping and bumping into situations and people unless you learn how to look ahead and find your way in new or diflBcult experiences. Observation is your searchlight and gives you vision for living. It shows you what to avoid and where to find the path of gracious conduct, opportunity, and success. II. SIGNALS Have you stood on a bridge to watch the signals change along a railroad track .^ As a Scout you may have learned to wigwag and read weather signals. If you live in the city you know what the traffic police- man's whistle means. But have you learned to read the other signals in your everyday life.^ A signal usually means that something is to happen or that it ought to stop. Do you know when to stop talking, when to change the subject, when a laugh would help, or the thousand other things that are being signaled to you all the time by conditions and circumstance s.?^ 56 SEEING INTO THINGS III. YOUR MICROSCOPE What do you know about yourself; your abilities, your faults, your limitations, your tendencies, your habits of thought and action; why you succeed or fail in the things that you do; what your relations to people are; what promise there is of your contributing something of value to the world? If you aren't beginning to know a little about these things it's time that you put yourself under the micro- scope of a searching analysis, to find out. You needn't do it all the time, but a day off now and then to inves- tigate yourself should do no harm and ought to illuminate many of your problems and difficulties. IV. FIELD GLASSES AND TELESCOPES How big is your world? Are you interested only in yourself, your friends; your concerns and theirs? Then you need both field glasses and a telescope. Contact with people who are doing things or who have traveled intelligently; worth-while movies, thought-provoking books, whether fiction or non- fiction — all these will lengthen out your vision and increase your knowledge of life. If you become interested in what is going on m the world by looking into the telescope of community, national, and world affairs, you'll be a person worth knowing. YOUR REASON FOR BEING I. MIDAS II. KING ARTHUR AND NAPOLEON III. FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE IV. SAINT FRANCIS OF ASSISI YOUR REASON FOR BEING 59 I. MIDAS King Midas was a funny old chap to wish that everything he touched might turn to gold. It's a wonder he didn't see what he was getting into. There are many people in this world as simple as ne. They exist for money, fine clothes, an exciting time, houses full of luxury, a retinue of servants; things, things, things FOR THEMSELVES, as if that could satisfy them. And they wonder why they aren't happy. King Midas finally had enough of it, but most of the people who make his mistake haven't sense enough to see what is wrong. Are you fooling yourself too? II. KING ARTHUR AND NAPOLEON King Arthur suggests personal development and per- fection; Napoleon stands for personal ambition and dominion. Together they are the type of a self- centered life, the thing that some people are content to make their reason for being. Arthur's kingdom went to pieces and Napoleon's empire was broken. Whoever lives a self -centered life will find his kingdom will fail as surely as theirs did. Things are to be desired within a reasonable limit, but not as the supreme end of being; personal am- bition and DEVELOPMENT are right and admirable if there is a great purpose beyond them. Do you think them enough to live for? 60 YOUR REASON FOR BEING III. FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE Florence Nightingale, who labored so unsparingly for the sick and wounded soldiers of the Crimean War, was a wonderful example of "doing things for people/' This big motive is sometimes spoiled by becoming a subtle form of self -gratification, and results in a kind of pride and an attitude of patronage toward those who are being helped. Sometimes it exhausts a life unwisely and needlessly. To desire things is a baby's reason for being; to seek personal development and expression characterizes a child; to do things for others is worthy of a young person; but the finest maturity calls for something still greater as a reason for being. IV. SAINT FRANCIS OF ASSISI Saint Francis of Assisi was like a light in a dark age of the world. A thousand legends reflect his Christ- like spirit of fellowship; his love of sharing. Although he was born in wealth he chose to snare the life of the lowly. He was their "brother" because he loved both God and them. Discord and strife dis- appeared in his loving presence. He had learned the supreme reason for being — ^fel- lowship with God and man; THE LOVE THAT SHARES. Have YOU.? I ■ ■ I ■ I ■ iilllinillfniijRitar^lH!! W JLPU^ 022 208 243 2