Success Principle #4 Accurate Thinking

Written by Lindsey Arndt on Mar 30, 2010 6:28 am

You Are What You Think

What do you think?

How straight is your thinking?

We all have things that clutter up our mind and our thinking process from time to time. According to Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude(STPMA): "There are certain mental cobwebs that clutter up the thinking of almost everyone, even the most brilliant minds."

Our thoughts get caught in the webs of negative feelings, emotions, passions--habits, beliefs, and prejudices.

There is a conflict between our conscious and our subconscious mind. We can either give up and endure this conflict, or we can learn how to use this process for success.

The one thing we can control is our mental attitude. If you've read the previous posts, you know how important it is to have a positive mental attitude.
Combine it with accurate thinking and you can avoid the negative cobwebs, or sweep them away if they start to develop.

How to Think Accurately

To do this you must use reason. Another term for accurate thinking is logic. The problem is, we don't only act from reason. "...every conscious act is the result of doing what we want to do." (Hill & Stone). In other words our subconscious mind can control our conscious mind. We tend to draw conclusions based on what our subconscious wants to do.

It's like that little kid inside you that tells you what it wants to do, and most of the time reason doesn't have anything to do with it. This is a lot like my 3 year-old son, Zavian. I can give him the reasons and pitch him my argument all day long and it doesn't matter. He wants what he wants, when he wants it...and won't forget about it.

Our goal in all this is to be able to direct our thoughts, control our emotions, and step into our destiny. Before I go into more detail about how to think accurately and clear away the cobwebs, I want to give you a list of common mental cobwebs from the book: STPMA.

Negative: (a) feelings, (b) emotions, and (c) passions; (d) habits, (e) beliefs, and (f) prejudices.
Seeing only the mote (Matthew 7:3-5) in the other fellow's eye.
Arguments and misunderstandings due to semantic difficulties.
False conclusions resulting from false premises.
All-inclusive, restrictive words or expressions as basic or minor premises. (ex: always, only, and never)
The idea that necessity forces dishonesty. (ex: "I had to...because...")
Unclean thoughts and habits.
Fear that it is sacrilegious to use the powers of your mind.

Now, these might not all be relevant for your situation, but you can see how these things could create cobwebs. There are so many types of cobwebs. If you looked at a list of your own, you would be surprised to find that they are all spun by NMA.

So, to me, the obvious way to think accurately is to apply PMA to every aspect of your life. In doing so you will prevent the cobwebs from being created. You will be more open to change and opportunity and in turn...Success!

I will dig deeper on my next post about the affect NMA and PMA have on our openness for change and opportunity. I will also give you some more thoughts to steer by in regard to accurate thinking. Before I go Be the {Coach} and learn more about you.