Outwitting the Devil

You might not know this but Napoleon Hill, the same person who wrote think and grow rich wrote a book in the 1930’s called outwitting the devil.

In the book he interviews the devil and makes him tell us all of his dark little secrets.

It is absolutely amazing. If you have not read this book yet, do it! 

Go out and get it today, don’t wait any longer.

There are so many takeaways from this book I just had to write a blog about it.

First off, I want to thank Russell Brunson for recommending the book to me.  It was amazing.

Let’s get into it a little more.

Remember this book was written in the 1930’s and was not published until 2011. 

The reason it was not published was because when Napoleon’s wife read the book, she wouldn’t let him publish it.  In fact, when his daughter read the manuscript after both Napoleon and his wife passed on she wouldn’t allow it to be published either.

Only after 2 generations passed was the Napoleon Hill Foundation allowed to publish the book. 

One amazing thing is that even though it was written in the 30’s it holds 100% true today.  

One of my favorite parts of the books was when he talked about how the devil uses fear to keep 98% of the people “drifting”.

It made me think about if I had ever drifted because of fear.

You might be asking “what is drifting?”

Drifting is when a person drifts through life, not trying to figure out how to improve themselves or their situation.  They simply allow things to happen instead of taking control of the situation.

Another way to explain it would be to say that when drifting, you don’t really have any control over where you are, where you are going, or what you are doing.  

When you stay in a dead end job that you hate, you are drifting.

When you continue to make the same mistakes even though you know that they are damaging you personally or even physically, that is drifting.

Back to the fear thing.  

When was the last time you chose not to act because you were scared of the outcome?  

When was the last time you didn’t answer a question because you were afraid of being judged?

You get the point.

When we live in fear, (COVID is a great example) we are allowing the devil to win.

Another point that the book really drove home to me was that we have to have a direction.  

When we have a definite purpose, we cannot “drift”.

That purpose keeps us motivated and on track so that we do not have time to drift along.

In fact it really made me reevaluate my purposes for why I do what I do.

Here’s what I found. 

I write and email out devotionals because I want to help spread God’s word.  Not only that though I also do it because I need to hear the word I write.

So often I have devotionals and blogs written months in advance and when I read them again as they are published it is a gentle (sometimes slap in the face) to listen to what he says.  I even think, man, the guy who writes these is spot on. Lol

We are designing a software for Eclipse DOT not to earn more money but to make DOT so simple that everyone can do it.

We continue to help companies because we can do it for them, saving them time and money, not to mention bringing them industry specific best practices.  

What is your purpose for what you do?

Think about it for a hot minute and see if you are “drifting” or if your purpose is true and defined.

There are so many amazing points throughout the book, and I don’t want to spoil them all for you, 

But I do have one more that made a huge difference in my life.  

That is that you have to continue to think outside the box.  

Too often we get caught coloring inside the lines of every picture.  What I mean is that we encourage our kids to always stay in the lines when they color a picture.  

Stay with me here.

Why aren’t we encouraging them to draw their own picture?  

By giving them praise for doing it the same way as everyone else we aren’t really helping them. 

When we encourage them to create their own pokemon, or clothing, or hunting calls, or decorate unique cakes, we are helping them to learn how to get it done.

The devil wants us to always color inside the lines.  

He doesn’t want us to think for ourselves. 

When we start to question how things are done, that’s when we break free from drifting with him.

Here’s what you are going to do now.

You are going to go to wherever you buy a book, or audio books if you are like me, and grab a copy of Outwitting the Devil, by Napoleon Hill.

I promise you won’t regret it.