Million Dollar Habits

Million Dollar Habits – Page 61 
Self-discipline is the key to self-mastery and self-control. The more capable you 
become of disciplining yourself to do what you have decided to do, whether you 
feel like it or not, the more positive and powerful you will feel.
The Source of Personal Power 
There is a direct relationship between self-discipline and self-esteem. The more 
you discipline yourself to behave in the manner that you have decided, the more 
you like and respect yourself. The more positive and confident you will feel. The 
stronger and more in charge of your life and situation you become.
Every act of self-discipline strengthens every other discipline at the same time. 
Every weakness in self-discipline weakens your other disciplines as well. Like 
working a muscle, your ability to discipline yourself to behave in the way that you 
have decided grows stronger each time you exercise it. This is why the happiest, 
most successful and most respected men and women in our society are all men and 
women of great self-control, self-mastery and self-discipline. And this is a habit 
you can learn, with practice. 
Become A Lifelong Optimist 
Perhaps the most helpful mental habit you can develop is the habit of 
optimism
. 
Optimists are usually the happiest, healthiest, most successful and most influential 
people in every group and society. According to Dr. Martin Seligman, in his book 
Learned Optimism
, people learn to become optimists by thinking the way that 

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Million Dollar Habits – Page 62 
optimists think. They in effect learn to be optimists just as pessimists learn to be 
pessimistic.
We said earlier that the greatest discovery, and the summary statement of 
psychology, religion and philosophy is, 
“You become what you think about most of 
the time.” 
What is it that optimists think about most of the time? In its simplest terms, 
optimists think about 
what they want
and 
how to get it
, most of the time. They 
think about where they are going and how to get there. The very idea of thinking 
about what they want makes them happy and positive. It increases their energy and 
releases their creativity. It motivates and stimulates them to perform at higher 
levels. 
Pessimists, on the other hand, are the opposite. They think and talk about what they 
don’t want
most of the time. They think about the people they don’t like, the 
problems that they are having, or have had in the past, and especially, they think 
about 
who is to blame
for their particular situation. And the more they think about 
the things they don’t want and who is to blame for their problems, the more 
negative and angry they become. The more negative they become, the faster they 
attract into their lives exactly those things that they do not want to happen.