PERSONAL INITIATIVE
“There are two types of men,” said Andrew Carnegie, “who never amount to anything. One is the fellow who never does anything except that which he is told to do. The other is the fellow who cannot do even that which he is told to do.
“The man who gets ahead,” Carnegie continued, “does the thing that should be done without being told to do it. But he doesn’t stop there; he goes the extra mile by doing a great deal more than is expected or demanded of him.”
Personal initiative bears the same relationship to an individual that a self-starter bears to an automobile! It is the power that starts all action. It is the power that assures completion of anything one begins.
There are many “starters” but few “finishers.” Personal initiative is the dynamo that pushes the faculty of the imagination into action.
- It is the process of translating your definite major purpose into its physical or financial equivalent.
- It is the quality that creates a major purpose, as well as all minor purposes.
- It reveals favorable opportunities for self-advancement and inspires you to embrace them, and to make the most of them.
- It reveals many faults and helps to correct them.
- It gives you an unquenchable thirst for knowledge, new ideas and better ways of doing things.
- It is the twin brother of the principle of going the extra mile.
- It inspired the writing of the Declaration of Independence and helped translate that document into the freedom which we enjoy today.
- It gave us the American system of free enterprise, which insures all men the right to act on their own personal initiative…
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