Written in 1910, The Science of Getting Rich is one of the source documents upon which the movie The Secret was based. When I watched The Secret, I could sense the truth of the message and was eager to learn how to apply the Secret to my own circumstance. But there seemed to be something missing from the Secret, as if they had kept the actual Secret of it, well, secret.
In one episode of South Park (season 2, episode 17), one of the children, Tweek, has a big problem with underpants gnomes. They keep coming into his room in the middle of the night and stealing his underpants. Since no one believes him, the kids all wait up one night to catch the underpants gnomes red handed. After Cartman hits one of them in the head with a stick (Cartman's like that, you know), the gnome explains why they steal the underpants: "Phase One, steal underpants. Phase Three is profit." So then, what's Phase Two, the kids want to know? The gnomes all look at each other as if none of them had ever thought of that question before. "Phase One, steal underpants. Phase Three is profit," the gnome smugly repeats, as if that explains everything. Well, The Secret felt a bit that way to me, too. As if they had left out Phase Two.
The Science of Getting Rich is all about Phase Two. According to Wattles, one of the biggest lies we've ever been taught is that there is a limited amount of resources on this planet, and that we must compete to get our share before it is snatched up by someone else. This erroneous belief is at the root of all competition and greed. The truth is, all of nature is abundant and excessive. There is more than enough of whatever we could possibly want. There is no need to scrap and compete.
First, we must realize that things are produced by thought. All things. In other words, whatever we think about consistently and with great emotion, is what manifests in our lives. That is why we speak of "manifesting abundance." This idea lies at the heart of the Prosperity Project. We all seem to realize that if we can change the way that we think about money, we will be able to allow money to flow to us more freely. This is the same idea that prompted Napoleon Hill to write Think and Grow Rich.
Second, we must understand that it is perfectly normal and healthy to desire to be rich. All of nature seeks to grow to its ultimate fullness of being. As people, we need money in order to be and do all that which we are capable of being and doing. In order to live life to its fullness, we absolutely need money. Being rich is not wrong or evil, as some of us were taught to believe.
When I first started exploring my strained relationship with money, I realized that I had been trained to believe that anyone who had more money than we did had necessarily done something immoral to get it. Or, that once they got the money the having of it corrupted them in some way. So, naturally, if you want to be good and pure, you have to be poor. Boy, was that ever a messed up point of view. There are still vestiges of that lurking in my mind, which is why I was so excited about trying the Prosperity Project.
I think one of the biggest hurdles many of us face in attracting wealth is this belief that money is somehow bad. It isn't. Money doesn't make us evil any more than spoons make us fat. The Science of Getting Rich spends the first couple of chapters convincing the reader that it's ok to want money. Really. It is the nature of life to continually increase. In order to know more, do more, and be more, it is necessary that we have more of whatever it is that we need to make those things happen. Money helps, although money, in and of itself, is not wealth. Abundant life is wealth.
The real Secret, if you will, is to go about earning and spending our money In a Certain Way. Wallace cautions that we must be careful to examine WHY we want more money. If we want it so we can have more power, women, drugs, booze, toys; if we want it just so that we have more than everyone else; if we want money just to hoard it so we can get to a really big number in our portfolio, then we are acting out of a competitive mind, not a creative one. That is not the Certain Way of which Wattles speaks.
So what is the Certain Way? The attitude we must take concerning every single thing that we do is that of More Life for All. Always give the other person more in value than they give you in exchange for your goods and services. In every transaction, you must have the idea of INCREASE for all concerned. If you provide a service, give them more than they pay for. If you are an employee, give your employer more in services than your paycheck requires. If you continually add value to every person that you encounter in your daily life, then the universe will respond by adding value to you. That added value will often take the form of money.
If you want to be and earn more than you currently do, then the way to grow is to be LARGER than the place you are now. If you more than fill your current position, then growth is inevitable. For example, if you are paid only $10 an hour but you feel you are worth more like $50, then do your $10 an hour job as if you were being paid $50. If, on the other hand, you do mediocre work because you are insulted that you're only being paid $10 an hour, you are pretty much proving that you are being overpaid at $10 an hour. Who would want to put someone like that in a high-paying position? I mean, really? That is the Certain Way. It is a way of excellence, and of More Life for All.
Since attitude is an important part of the Certain Way, Wattles spends a lot of time talking about my favorite topic, Gratitude:
"The more gratefully we fix our minds on the Supreme when good things come to us, the more good things we will receive, and the more rapidly they will come; and the reason simply is that the mental attitude of gratitude draws the mind into closer touch with the source from which the blessings come."There are a lot of clues in The Science of Getting Rich. Over the past year I've read this book three or four times. I've listened to the audiobook in my car dozens of times, over and over again, like when my daughter was three and she watched The Wizard of Oz three or four times a day. Every day. She learned that movie by heart. That's how well I want to know the truths set forth in this little book.
WHERE TO GET A COPY OF THE BOOK:
The really good news is that this book was written 100 years ago, and the copyrights have long since expired. Here is a link to a pdf file of the book. If you want to get the book for free, you can print it out, as I did, or just read it online. (iPhones are great for reading online books.) Just click on this link:
Finally, if you are intrigued by Wallace D. Wattles and his Science of Getting Rich, I encourage you to check out the following link to Certain Way Productions. There you will find a link to an e-course that is well worth whatever money you decide to pay. She leaves you on the honor system to pay whatever you believe the course will be worth to you. If you feel like you really cannot afford to pay anything, she will honor that decision, because she believes that if you take this course and apply what you learn, that you cannot help but get rich. She knows that when that happens you will come back some day and pay the money you did not pay today. I think she may be right. I took the course for free, but as I write this review I realize that one day, I will go back and pay her. The audio course is exceptional, and I urge you to take the time to listen and do the workbook exercises. Here is the link:
I'll see you back here tomorrow for Day 7 of the Prosperity Project.
Remember, Phase Three is PROFIT!
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