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This episode — episode #17 — pushes us over the edge and officially half way through our study of The Master Key System. We’re on Week Thirteen: The Dreams of the Dreamer and it contains some of Charles F. Haanel‘s most inspiring prose as well as some of his most poignant observations.

Since Week Thirteen marks us passing the halfway point, I took the opportunity to deliver a special message. This message will not only help you in your study of The Master Key System, but in everything that you do.

You see, most people don’t make it halfway through The Master Key System.

Frankly, most people don’t even make it this far. Most stop by Week Four.

Of course, there are sundry reasons: life interrupts; people get busy with other things; something new and shiny comes along.

Whatever the reason, it’s sad.

You see, I’ve been studying The Master Key System for about fifteen years. I’ve been publishing it for over ten years. Through all that time, I’ve seen amazing things happen because of an intelligent application of all that the book teaches.

I began with nothing — NOTHING! — and now I not only publish all of the books by Charles F. Haanel, I also publish over a dozen others — with more on the way!

I’ve had book translated and published in so many countries that I can barely count them. China. Japan. India. Russia. Germany.

I’ve been blessed to meet and work with some of the most amazing people you can imagine — from Master Key Coaching clients to fellow publishers like Tracey Jones at Tremendous Life Books.

And more great things are on the way. (Stay tuned!)

I’m not the only one applying Haanel’s ideas and methods, though. Other people are as well — and they are being greatly rewarded.

• One person became debt-free, secured over $100,000 in capital, and opened her own practice. All in under ONE YEAR!
• Another person built her dream business — a beautiful bed & breakfast.
• Yet another person saved their business from collapsing and then went on to double their profits.
• A fellow we coached in Haanel’s methods got his dream job.

The stories I’ve heard and the things I’ve seen would make your head spin.

But they all come down to one thing: Committment.

Are you willing to commit to learning this “stuff”?

More importantly, are you willing to commit to applying it?

Even with all this opportunity — from the free Master Key to free coaching — most people drop out. They don’t commit. They look for something new. They continue on their fool’s quest for the “silver bullet.” Whatever…

This applies to just about everything we do in life! Think about people who hop from one opportunity to the next, never allowing any one thing to have a chance to set roots.

It’s been said that it takes about ten years — ten thousand hours of study — to become excellent at something. From practicing the violin to building a business, it’s all the same. There is no such thing as an “overnight success.” Rather, it’s about practice and work and trial and error … And mastery is the result. The greats didn’t just drop from the sky. Even those born with amazing talent and ability had to train and master their gift. Why is it that we expect things to happen in a fortnight?

A famous saying is

A wise man changes his mind some of the time; a fool changes his mind all of the time.

Sure, it is OK to change your mind every so often, to find that you don’t enjoy something and then move to something else; but when it becomes a way of life, it has a detrimental effect on your life.

Luckily, it’s not too late! You can still commit yourself to attaining your dreams. You can commit to learning this wonderful system of self-mastery.

You can do it.

Start tonight.

I hope that you take this message to heart. It is at the heart of the Master Key System. Haanel espouses this idea at various times and in different ways in the book. Many people — far too many people! — miss it. Please don’t be one of them.

Let’s get into Week Thirteen: The Dreams of the Dreamer.

In the Letter of Transmittal, Haanel quoted Mr. Herbert Kaufman. This is some of the most wonderful and inspiring prose you will read.

“They are the architects of greatness, their vision lies within their souls, they peer beyond the veils and mists of doubt and pierce the walls of unborn Time. The belted wheel, the trail of steel, the churning screw, are shuttles in the loom on which they weave their magic tapestries. Makers of Empire, they have fought for bigger things than crowns and higher seats than thrones. Your homes are set upon the land a dreamer found. The pictures on its walls are visions from a dreamer’s soul.

“They are the chosen few—the blazers of the way. Walls crumble and Empires fall, the tidal wave sweeps from the sea and tears a fortress from its rocks. The rotting nations drop from off Time’s bough, and only things the dreamers make live on.”

Read that and then read it again. Inspiring? Even if just a little?

Some people say that they don’t write things like that any more. I disagree.  To prove my point I humbly submit for your perusal — and inspiration — the famous advertisement for Apple computers aptly called “Here’s to the crazy ones…”

Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes.

The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can praise them, disagree with them, quote them, disbelieve them, glorify or vilify them.

About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They invent. They imagine. They heal. They explore. They create. They inspire. They push the human race forward.

Maybe they have to be crazy.

How else can you stare at an empty canvas and see a work of art? Or sit in silence and hear a song that’s never been written? Or gaze at a red planet and see a laboratory on wheels?

While some see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.

Whenever you feel down, feel free to bookmark this page and come here to watch and read that.

Let’s move to points #5 to 7.

5. It is more than two hundred years since Lord Bacon recommended this method of study, to which the civilized nations owe the greater part of their prosperity and the more valuable part of their knowledge; purging the mind from narrow prejudices and denominated theories more effectually than by the keenest irony; calling the attention of men from heaven to earth more successfully by surprising ex- periments than by the most forcible demonstrations of their ignorance; educating the inventive faculties more powerfully by the near prospect of useful discoveries thrown open to all, than by talk of bringing to light the innate laws of our mind.

6. The method of Bacon has seized the spirit and aim of the great philosophers of Greece and carried them into effect by the new means of observation which another age offered, thus gradually revealing a wondrous field of knowledge in the infinite space of astronomy, in the microscopic egg of embryology, and the dim age of geology; disclosing an order of the pulse which the logic of Aristotle could never have unveiled and analyzing into formerly unknown elements the material combinations which no dialectic of the scholastics could force apart.

7. It has lengthened life; it has mitigated pain; it has extinguished diseases; it has increased the fertility of the soil; it has given new securities to the mariner; it has spanned great rivers with bridges of form unknown to our fathers; it has guided the thunderbolt from heaven to earth; it has lighted up night with the splendor of day; it has extended the range of human vision; it has multiplied the power of the human muscles; it has accelerated motion; it has annihilated distance; it has facilitated intercourse, correspondence, all friendly offices, all dispatch of business; it has enabled men to descend into the depths of the sea, to soar into the air, to penetrate securely into the noxious recesses of the earth.

This is what Haanel is teaching us in the Master Key System: the power of thought and the power of thinking. As we’ve discussed, this is what The Master Key System is really about. It’s not about “manifesting” something from nothing; it’s not about using the awesome power of the Universe to supply you with trinkets; it’s about learning how to use this awesome power of thought — this ability to think — to solve our problems great and small.

So, how do we get tangible results with all of this? How do we get to the point where we can see and enjoy the fruits of our labours?

22. In the first place, we must put our knowledge into practice. Nothing can be accomplished in any other way. The athlete may read books and lessons on physical training all his life, but unless he begins to give out strength by actual work he will never receive any strength; he will eventually get exactly what he gives; but he will have to give it first. It is exactly the same with us; we will get exactly what we give, but we shall have to give it first. It will then return to us many fold, and the giving is simply a mental process, because thoughts are causes and conditions are effects; therefore in giving thoughts of courage, inspiration, health, or help of any kind we are setting causes in motion which will bring about their effect.

23. Thought is a spiritual activity and is therefore creative. But make no mistake: Thought will create nothing unless it is consciously, systematically, and constructively directed; and herein is the difference between idle thinking, which is simply a dissipation of effort and constructive thinking, which means practically unlimited achievement.

24. We have found that everything we get comes to us by the Law of Attraction. A happy thought cannot exist in an unhappy consciousness; therefore the consciousness must change and, as the consciousness changes, all conditions necessary to meet the changed consciousness must gradually change in order to meet the requirements of the new situation.

It begins with a thought.

We then must put our knowledge into practice.

We must work and probably work hard. Nothing comes for free and we must give before we can get.

Before a book hits the shelves, before one penny is made by me, countless hours and many dollars are invested into a book I publish.

Before you see the band that you love hit the stage at their sold-out stadium convert, that band practiced for hours on end, they played seedy bars where the audience consisted of a few drunks, and they sent countless demos to record companies and agents.

Read Harrison Ford’s story.

How about Lady GaGa?

Use Google to discover the stories about the people you enjoy. See what it took for them to make it to “the top.”

You’ll find the Haanel “formula” within them.

The exercise for Week Thirteen is one in which Haanel gets somewhat “spiritual.”

26. We can best conserve our interests by recognizing the Infinite Power and Infinite Wisdom of the Universal Mind, and in this way become a channel whereby the Infinite can bring about the realization of our desire. This means that recognition brings about realization. Therefore for your exercise this week make use of the principle. Recognize the fact that you are a part of the whole, and that a part must be the same in kind and quality as the whole; the only difference there can possibly be is in degree.

27. When this tremendous fact begins to permeate your consciousness, when you really come into a realization of the fact that you, not your body, but the Ego, the “I,” the spirit which thinks, is an integral part of the great whole, that it is the same in substance, in quality, in kind, that the Creator could create nothing different from Himself, you will also be able to say, “The Father and I are one” and you will come into an understanding of the beauty, the grandeur, the transcendental opportunities which have been placed at your disposal.

As you know, I don’t get into the “spiritual” aspects of this much. I don’t think one needs to . Haanel specifically wrote The Master Key System the way he did so that we can see it from all angles: scientifically, philosophically, and spiritually.

With this exercise, though, just realize — come to your own personal conclusion — in whatever way makes sense to you that you are a part of something bigger, something greater, be it mankind, planet Earth, the Universe, or whatever.

That’s the point in this exercise.

Do it.

Next week, we’ll explore Week Fourteen: The Creative Power of Thought.

Until then, please get for yourself the best of everything.