How effective is Napoleon Hill's Six Step Method? (My thoughts on Think and Grow Rich Chapter 2 - Desire)

If you haven’t yet, check out my review of “Think and Grow Rich” Chapter 2. I go through Napoleon Hill’s discussion on Desire as well as his Six Step Method. The Six Step Method is interesting but there are some caveats. I talk about how to best handle these types of suggestions.

People like certainty. And what looks more certain than a list with numbers? 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, 48 Laws of Power, 12 Rules for Life…You familiar with any of these books? Also, aren’t there 10 Commandments? Or the Noble Eightfold Path? How about the 1 Golden Rule? It seems self-help and Religion have something in common.

What’s going on?

A universe without rules would be chaos. We are bound by the scientific laws of physics, chemistry, biology, etc. But after we’ve figured out the physical world, are there other rules that govern our lives?

Intuitively, the answer is yes. But what are they?

We are social creatures. And, therefore, there are social rules that significantly govern our lives. However, unlike the scientific laws, these rules are not explicit and few are universal and constant.

What if I told you that I had the social rules figured out? What if I told you that Psychiatry and Religion could help you sort through these fundamental social dynamics? What would you say? How much would you pay for me to divulge this information?

Do you see what I did there?

We are social creatures. As individuals, we are powerless without being part of a larger society. But in a society, we can work together to protect ourselves from the chaos of nature. We can design social systems to create shelter, provide food, propagate as a species. There’s one major problem…

Society sucks. And it’s annoying to deal with.​

This fundamental conflict is a significant source of anxiety and suffering. It is preferred to the anxiety and suffering of starvation or being eaten by a lion. However, for some, they believe they can overcome the anxiety through understanding social laws and rules. Rules that come conveniently in a to-do list.

What if we applied the scientific method to the way we interacted with society? What if we discovered the most relevant social rules that directly apply to our own lives? Something worth thinking about…

Go in depth on how to apply the scientific method in Chapter 2 of my paid program here.