Success

"What I wish you to do," said he, "is to mix the fat with the lean and let me take a look at your very soul, not from its most favorable side, but from all sides." For three hours I talked while Mellett listened!

I omitted nothing. I told him of my struggles, of my mistakes, of my impulses to be dishonest when the tides of fortune swept against me too swiftly, and of my better judgment which prevailed in the end, but only after my conscience and I had engaged in prolonged combat. I told him how I conceived the idea of organizing the Law of Success philosophy, how I had gone about gathering the data that had gone into the philosophy, of the tests I had made which resulted in the elimination of some of the data and the retention of other parts of it.

AMONG the other things you intend to "cut out" in your New Year's resolution, include the word "Impossible!"

After I had finished Mellett said:

"I wish to ask you a very personal question, and I hope you will answer it as frankly as you have told the remainder of your story. Have you accumulated any money from your efforts, and, if not, do you know why you have not?"

"No!" I replied.

"I have accumulated nothing but experience and knowledge and a few debts, and the reason, while it may not be sound, is easily explained. The truth is that I have been so busy all these years in trying to eliminate some of my own ignorance so I could intelligently gather and organize the data that have gone into the Law of Success philosophy, that I have had neither the opportunity nor the inclination to turn my efforts to making money."

The serious look on Don Mellett's face, much to my surprise, softened into a smile as he laid his hand on my shoulder and said:

"I knew the answer before you stated it, but I wondered if you knew it. You probably know that you are not the only man who has had to sacrifice immediate monetary remuneration for the sake of gathering knowledge, for in truth your experience has been that of every philosopher from the time of Socrates down to the present."

Those words fell as the sound of music upon my ears! I had made one of the most embarrassing admissions of my life; I had laid my soul bare, admitting temporary defeat at almost every crossroad which I had passed in my struggles, and I had capped all this off by admitting that an exponent of the Law of Success was, himself, a temporary failure!

How incongruous it seemed!

I felt stupid, humiliated and embarrassed as I sat in front of the most searching pair of eyes and the most inquisitive man I had ever met.