Self-Development and the Way to Power | Page 9

overcome to a
surprising degree by simply using a little will-power. Everybody is
familiar with the fact that it is sometimes much easier to think and act
than at other times. But perhaps it is not so well known that the dull
periods can invariably be overcome by an effort of the will and the
physical body be made to do its proper work. An actor or lecturer after
months of continuous work may find the brain and body growing tired
and dull. He may feel when going before his audience that he has not
an idea nor the wit to express it were someone else to furnish it. Yet by
an effort of the will he can quickly overcome the condition and change
from stupidity to mental alertness and intensity of thought. The self is
never tired. It is only the physical body that grows weary. It is true that
it has its limitations and must not be overtaxed and driven beyond

endurance as a tired horse is sometimes cruelly urged forward with
whip and spur. Judgment must always be used in determining one's
capacity for work. But that which is to be done should never be done
draggingly, with the inertia of the physical body marring the work. We
should be fully awake instead of "dead" while we "are walking about."
If a person resolves to be the master of the body he may soon acquire
the power to arouse it to activity and alertness during all his waking
hours, very much as one may acquire the habit of keen observation and
be conscious of what is occurring in his vicinity instead of being
carelessly unconscious of the major portion of what is going on
immediately about him.
This matter of giving attention to the things that may properly engage
the mind, and of using the will to arouse and control it, is of very great
importance. Is it not what we call "paying attention" that makes the
connection between the ego and the objective world? Giving attention
is a process of consciousness. The person who fails in attention misses
the purpose of life and throws away valuable time and opportunity. To
give attention is to be alive and awake and in a condition to make the
most of limited physical life. Yet many people cannot give sustained
attention to an ordinary conversation nor direct the mind with sufficient
precision to state a simple fact without wandering aimlessly about in
the effort, bringing in various incidental matters until the original
subject, instead of being made clear, is obscured in a maze of
unimportant details or lost sight of altogether.
Such habits of mind should be put resolutely aside by one who would
hasten self-development. The attention should be fixed deliberately
upon the subject in hand, whatever it may be, and nothing should be
permitted to break the connection between that and the mind. Whether
it is a conversation or a book, or a manual task, or a problem being
silently worked out intellectually, it should have undivided attention
until the mind is ready for something else.
Perhaps few of us give to any subject the close attention which alone
can prove its own effectiveness and demonstrate the fact that there goes
with such steadily sustained attention a subtle power of extended, or

accentuated, consciousness. When ten minutes is given to a certain
subject and other thoughts are constantly intruding, so that when the ten
minutes have passed only five minutes have actually been devoted to
the subject, the result is by no means a half of what would have been
accomplished had the whole of the ten minutes been given to
uninterrupted attention. The time thus spent in wavering attention is
practically without effect. The connection between mind and subject
has not been complete. Mind and subject were, so to say, out of focus.
Attention must be sustained to the point where it becomes
concentration. The mind must be used as a sun-glass can be used. Hold
the glass between sun and paper, out of focus, for an hour and nothing
will happen. A yellow circle of light falls on the paper and that is all.
But bring it into perfect focus, concentrating the rays to the finest
possible point, and the paper turns brown and finally bursts into the fire
that will consume it. They are the same rays that were previously
ineffective. Concentration produced results.
The mind must be brought under such complete control of the will that
it can be manipulated like a search-light, turned in this direction or that,
or flung full upon some obscure subject and held steadily there till it
illuminates every detail of it, as the search-light sends a dazzling ray
through space and shows every rock and tree on a hillside far