The Think and Grow Rich Review

The “Think and Grow Rich” book by Napolean Hill was published in 1937 and has changed many lives over the years. It is a life-changing philosophy of success. Napolean Hill shared the famous Andrew Carnegie formula for money-making using the 13 proven steps to riches.

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Average Customer Rank: 4.8 out of 5

Category: Business, Money & Self Help

Cost: varies with Kindle, audiobook, book with different edited versions available

Creator: Napolean Hill

Think and Grow Rich was considered one of the most read self-help books of all time. The book contained more than 20 years of research in collaboration with more than 500 distinguished men of great wealth including Charles M. Schwab, Harris F. Williams, Dr. Frank Gunsaulus, Daniel Willard, King Gillette, Ralph A. Weeks, Judge Daniel T. Wright, John D. Rockefeller, Thomas A. Edison, and many other well-known Americans who understood and applied the practical philosophy to reach high achievement and financial success in life.

The book was promoted as personal development and self-improvement. It was published during the Great Depression and has sold more than 15 million copies. According to Wikipedia.org, Think and Grow Rich remains the biggest seller of Napolean Hill’s books. BusinessWeek magazine’s Best Seller List ranked the sixth best-selling paperback business 70 years after it was published.

Mr. Hill provided the readers with 14 principles in the form of a philosophy of achievement. They are

Thoughts are things
Desire
Faith
Autosuggestion
Specialized Knowledge
Imagination
Organized Planning
Decision
Persistence
Power of the Master Mind
The Mystery of Sex Transmutation
The Subconscious Mind
The Brain
The Sixth Sense

The book dove further into detail for each of the principles. Many people have applied the principles to their lives and achieved successes in any line of work, to be, do, or have in anything that they can imagine.

Mr. Hill presented the book to the readers as unveiling a hidden secret and intrigued the readers to read further to unveil the secret for the master key. It compelled the reader to think and engage in solving a riddle to find success.

After reading the book, many of the principles resonated with me. I was inspired to study the principles further. One way to dive deeper is to write about it. It is a great way for me to review at any given time when I feel down or full of doubts. It is also great for everyone else who is looking for ways to improve himself or herself.

About the Author

330px-Napoleon_Hill_headshot

I will touch briefly on the author’s life in this article. There are many different biographies about Napolean Hill available online if you are interested to learn more. I will list certain aspects about the author that I feel are important to me. Napolean Hill was born near the Appalachian town of Pound in southwest Virginia on October 26, 1883. He was an American self-help author and his best-known book was “Think and Grow Rich”.

According to Wikipedia.org throughout his lifetime, Mr. Hill was a controversial figure. He was accused of being a fraud or a conman. Mr. Hill claimed his turning point in life was in 1908 when he was assigned to interview Andrew Carnegie. Carnegie challenged him to take on a twenty-five-year project of interviewing wealthy and successful people to learn and discover the simple formula or philosophy for success. Mr. Hill took on the challenge. He spent twenty-five years of his life documenting great men’s successes while going through his own failures and successes of building businesses.

The authenticity of many of Mr. Hill’s claims has been controversial and widely disputed. There has never been confirmed either by Carnegie or the Carnegie estate that there was a collaboration between Andrew Carnegie and Napolean Hill. There is also lacking evidence for many other of Mr. Hill’s claims in meeting other famous men.

Through the different paradox writing of Napolean Hill biography articles on the internet, I found one biography that I gravitated toward most ==> Napoleon Hill Biography – The Paradox written by John Rogers. The article mentioned that Napolean Hill had a troubled start but then transformed as he was engaged in his own teaching the central message of the New Thought movement.

Regardless of the controversy of the claims, the fact remains that his book “Think and Grow Rich” has impacted positively for thousands of people. The philosophy has helped people become millionaires. Through his books, Mr. Hill coined the phrase “Master Mind”. He was awarded an honorary Doctor of Literature degree (Litt. D.) by Pacific International University for the development of the Master Mind concept and other principles of success.

Mr. Hill completed the eight-volume “Law of Success” in 1928. He wrote “Think and Grow Rich!” in 1937 with the assistance of his second wife, Rosa Lee Beeland. From 1952 to 1962, Mr. Hill continued to teach his philosophy of personal achievement, lectured on the science of success in association with W. Clement Stone, and published a few more books until he retired. He passed away on November 8, 1970, at the age of 87.

The Good and The Bad Pro

Many people found the book gave new ways or perspectives to look at life and provided steps to positive conditioning the mind. Many people followed the steps and became successful in life.
Readers were inspired by reading the book. It helped with focusing their thoughts on a plan and purpose to achieve success in life.
For many people, follow the steps from the book helped not only financially but many other aspects of their lives.
The book was short and also an easy read.

Con

Because it was written in 1937, the American culture was different. The book mentioned only successful white men. For today’s standard, it would be considered prejudiced, and racist.
There were complaints that it was hard to read, very repetitive, too slow, and had outdated information.
For the most recent hardbound book, many people found it has poor quality paper and bad book constructions.
A number of people found negative biography articles of Napolean Hill when he was young on the internet regarding fraudulent, charlatan, and anecdotal evidence. That information discredited Mr. Hills and tainted the readers’ judgment and beliefs when reading the book.

My Thoughts

Initially during my research, when I came across different biography articles of Napolean Hill, I was shocked to read his negative past. My positive thoughts of him dwindled. However, people do make mistakes. I do believe that Mr. Hill had transformed over the years as he aged. He learned about himself through researching others. I like the article written by John Rogers under “About the Author”. I believe he wrote a fair and non-biased written biography of Napolean Hill.

Mr. Hill’s philosophy resonates with me regardless of his past. It is definitely uplifting and very inspiring. I strive to apply those principles to my life. It is not easy to have full control of your mind every moment of the time. My mind often wonders and gets off course or takes the easier route to escape from looking bad. It is great to listen or to re-read Think and Grow Rich annually or as often as I need to deter myself from doubts and/or spiraling down to self-destruction.

You can find Think and Grow Rich with different edited versions everywhere on the internet. It is also in audio as well as pdf. Here is a pdf version available to download ==> Napoleon Hill – Think and Grow Rich pdf (soilandhealth.org). I also enjoyed listening to a youtube version with the editor’s comment for today’s standard. It is almost 11 hours long. Below is the embedded video of that youtube audio:

The hardback book and softback book are also available on Amazon. Here is one version that has been edited for the 21st century ==> Think and Grow Rich Book – edited with updated information. There are people who prefer to have the original book unedited. Click here for the original and unedited version ==> Think and Grow Rich – original and unedited.