Man Is What He Believes

Every writing of serious and permanent nature not only lays stress on action, but also celebrates it, as it has been found to be the basis of survival since man started thinking. Without action it is almost impossible to continue living. This truth has been perceived by all the great philosophers and thinkers. Only men of action have succeeded in shaping the society that has become for us worth being part of. In the words of William James—”Believe that life is worth living, and your belief will help create the fact”. In fact, it is people, who have the belief that their action towards making the society an ideal place will change everything for the better for humanity at large, matter the most to us. They have the will to carry on their action with faith, dedication and confidence. If you do the same, there is all likelihood that you will go higher in life. Actually, “faith is love taking the form of aspiration.” Without faith in yourself, you will not be able to march towards the fulfilment of your goal in a steady way.

You must have come across many successful people who have made it big in life, because they have full belief in their own strength. You might have noticed that they all have had initial setbacks, but they did not lose heart and continued their efforts with renewed zeal. On the contrary, those who had all the potential to succeed could not reach their destination because of their lack of will. You will find that they failed in their attempt, because they gave up their efforts when they were faced with minor setbacks. Your lack of will always compels you to think negatively and minor challenges will appear to you many times bigger in form. Always remember, “positive anything is better than negative nothing”. Your positive thinking will always
encourage you to show resilience while your negative thinking will fill your mind with such thoughts that will keep you from setting out on a journey to success that will add a lot of meaning to your life.

You are, therefore, required to become a man of action who defies all odds en route to success. There is a beautiful quote by Henri Bergson—”Think like a man of action and act like a man of thought”. It means that your action should be the result of a well-thought-out plan. Before embarking on a journey to success, you should lay out your course of action. That will not allow you to make any effort aimlessly. An aimless effort is never fruitful. Every action with an aim is sure to succeed. Jawaharlal Nehru said, “Actions to be effective must be directed to clearly conceived thoughts”. It means that you should never act before giving every idea a second thought and knowing the full implication of that idea. Your complete knowledge of an idea helps you decide the direction of your effort. Such an effort, more often than not, dispels the doubts and you can proceed with your action in a confident way.

In a nutshell, there should be good coordination between your thought and action. If the two are in harmony, there is nothing in this world that can shake your faith in yourself, your self-confidence. In fact, it is the amount of your self-confidence which decides your way of thinking. And your way of thinking decides your personality. In this world, only those people are supposed to succeed who have the ingredients responsible for making a strong personality. One of the greatest Russian writers, Anton Chekhov has rightly observed, “Man is what he believes”. Therefore, believe in yourself.