Penury to Prosperity

As there are habitual criminals and also naturally successful people, so there are habitual failures. My friend and student, John, was such a born failure. He was young, intelligent, diligent, and painstaking in his pursuit of money-making, but it seemed that no matter what job or business he gave his attention to, it resulted in abject failure. Harassed, deserted, penniless, he sought the shelter of my advice.

I questioned John as to the cause of his troubles. He replied: “Sir, I am a great failure. For some mysterious reason, not only do I lose my job but usually my employer loses his business after employing me. I hate to seek a job for fear of destroying the business of my new employer through the deathly grip of my failure vibration.”

Through my influence John got a job in a small business concern and I advised him to affirm daily, before going to bed and upon waking: “Day by day, in every way, I am succeeding more and more in my job.”

A month passed and John returned: “Honored Sir, the business concern you got me into is starting to fail. Please take me out before it goes on the rocks completely. Perhaps my resignation will save the business from destruction."

I told John to keep up his affirmation of success and to hold on to his job. After a fortnight John came to me one evening, and with a sigh of relief exclaimed: “It happened: the business concern collapsed.”

I turned to John and remonstrated: “While you have been affirming ‘Day by day I am getting better and better,’ isn’t it true that, way in the background of your mind a little octopus of obstinate mentality has kept on mentally saying: ‘You little simpleton, day by day, in every way, you know that you are getting worse and worse, no matter how much you repeat that you are getting better?’”

He admitted the truth of this.

I advised John to be sure to cast out all strong negative vibrations as soon as they visited his mind, because a convinced, conscious mind influences the subconsciousness, which in turn, through the law of inner psychological reciprocity, influences the conscious mind through the power of habit.

I told John that his success was conditioned by his creative ability, his environment, and his pre-natal and post-natal habits and tendencies, and that if he contacted the all-powerful, unlimited superconscious mind, then alone could he create a new cause for absolute success.

I succeeded in getting John into a bigger business and after six months he said to me: “Sir, this business has also failed.” “John, never mind, I will get you another job.” I secured for John a very good job in a very big concern. A year passed and nothing untoward happened.

I asked John now to invest his money in a business of his own. He was beside himself with fear: “If I invest the money I have saved, I am sure to lose it.” I firmly assured him: “You must invest your money and energy in some good project which requires no large investment nor overhead, and I am sure that you will succeed.” In the course of a few years, John became the successful owner of a handful of chain stores.

Once he was thoroughly convinced of his success, he found himself succeeding in everything that he undertook. One day he laughingly said: “Through God and you I am now changed from a great failure to a great success. Pray tell me the reason? I can understand my own failure due to lack of understanding, but I cannot understand why I succeeded in demolishing other people’s businesses.”

I replied: “You were not the cause of their failure. The law of attraction which governs people of like vibrations operated in the case. Being a failure attracted you to a business about to fail, and vice versa. You were a failure and the business was about to fail too. By law of affinity, you went down the hill of failure together to explode at the same time.”

Let it be remembered that absolute success signifies “the power to create at will what you need by developing your unlimited superconscious power.” This superconscious power can be awakened by knowing the definite technique of meditation, as taught by the Master Minds of India in order to produce prosperity, health, success, wisdom, and God-contact at any time, at will, and without limitation.  --Paramhansa Yogananda from Healing with Life Force, Vol 3 (Magnetism)