What is your mental attitude in regard to your own ability? Do you see yourself as a person of self worth? Do you put high value on your attainments and capabilities? You must, if you are to succeed in life. The Bible calls man a worm, but that idea is to exalt the concept of God by comparison, rather than to degrade the concept of man. When rightly understood, all the teachings of the Bible exalt the true value and inherent greatness of man. The true value of man is the God within each and all individuals.

Man alone is nothing, but Man and God are one. The very heart of Christ teachings is that man is a god. All institutions are of real worth only as they minister towards the unfoldment of man. Man is God expressed in this realm of existence. God’s unfoldment is expressed is the spiritual and mental evolution of mankind. You are not a worm, you are a god. You may not be manifesting much god-power yet, but you are going to. You have it within you, and you only need to discover and develop them to fullness.
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It does not matter how many failures you have made in the past. You did not make them for lack of ability, but for lack of the technical knowledge how to apply your ability so as to produce results. Differences in ability are not differences in faculty, but in the development of faculty. All have exactly the same faculties, but ability in any special area is according to the development of faculty in that area. Since there’s no faculty that cannot be developed, there’s nothing in way of ability that’s impossible to anyone.

You have as much ability as anybody has. You have to think and speak of yourself as the class you wish to be in. It is not constructive to class yourself below the level you wish to belong. Classing yourself as a lower level is actually destructive. This does not mean you go around bragging about yourself and telling how great you are. But you must take the mental attitude of knowing that you are one who can. Do not brag or boast but take quietly the attitude of being able and men will recognize your ability.

The really able man never speaks boastfully about himself, and if he is wise, he never speaks in a belittling way about himself either. Modesty, when it causes a person to underestimate himself, cease to be a virtue becomes a vice. Nothing can dampen your chances more than to underestimate yourself. No one would want to work with a person who gives a poor account of himself. Stop speaking in a depreciating way about your ability, but speak of it when you have to and do it with quiet, good assurance.

Never speak in an apologetic way of your own knowledge or attainments. Speak as though you have a good opinion of them. Always remember that the ideal is attained by faith, and faith is the substance of things hoped for. Do not speak of yourself as becoming, but as having become. Do not speak of yourself as one who is going to become able to do great things, but speak of yourself as one who is able to do them now. Speak of yourself not as becoming wise but as having already acquired wisdom.

Modesty that depreciates your value, or power, or attainments, or ability to do, is a false modesty. Even pride is better than false modesty because it is better to be in a position of superiority than inferiority. Criticism of others may be destructive, but self criticism is even more so. Never use your words against yourself. By your words you are justified and by your words you are condemned. Always speak of yourself in a positive and powerful way. It does more good to exalt yourself than to diminish yourself.

Do you habitually think of yourself, and speak of yourself as being a person of power? If not, how can you expect to be a person of power? Many people do not dare to do so because they are afraid to think too highly of themselves or to project an image of self highness to others. But the truth about how reality works is power to him who power exerts. Power exists in its active expression. Only those who express power will manifest power and hence contain it. You form your own reality with your thoughts.

We have been taught a false ideal in regard to modesty and self appreciation. It has been considered praiseworthy to belittle one’s self in speech and action, to keep in the background and to even avoid to appearance of self confidence. No more destructive idea could possibly be given to any person. Nothing can be more fatal to your hopes than to take the mental attitude of distrusting your own ability. We must remember that the subconscious only moves when reached by faith, and never by distrust.

The conceited person is one who holds himself to be better than others. The truly modest person is one who exalts himself, while admitting that everyone else is as good, and as great as he is. If you take the attitude of incompetence, you’ll impress upon your subconscious the idea of incompetence, and the subconscious will only give you the measure of power which goes with incompetence. To take the attitude of lacking in any power or ability is to make yourself unable to demonstrate that power or ability.

You can claim all power for yourself, without being offensive, if you concede to others all that you claim for yourself. The essence of conceit is that when you are exalting yourself, you are by inference belittling others. It is not at all conceited to exalt yourself if you exalt all others at the same time and to the same extent. You can know your own power, your own ability, and your own value and yet draw no comparisons between yourself and others. True humility is seeing greatness in you and all else too.[/hidepost]