布朗·蘭登/Brown Landone
Wishes are but wishes; they lead only to wishing more wishes. Desires are heartbeats of soul; they demand and impel to action. A wish turns ever to itself, wishing that something will come to make itself true. A desire goes out from self; it daringly reaches out, demanding the thing desired, and divinely creates it in reality.
Put the following truths together: Desire is the heart of your ideal; in this heart are the fires of attainment; sometimes they die down and are dim; sometimes they burn brightly and glow with hope and set fire to action; unless they thus burn with the light of hope and the fire of action, your ideal will not come true. When the fires of desire are dimmed by disappointments or discouragement, or memories of the failures of the past, what are you going to do about it? Feed the fires with your feelings and emotions! Your thoughts will not do; they are but damp wood and wet sand. Desires are of the heart; they cannot be made to burn brightly by adding ideas and thoughts of the mind.
Is it a thing—a material thing—you have desired and for which desire burns low because of past failures to attain it, or is it a new desire that dares not burn brightly for fear of disappointment should it not be attained? Fire your desire so that it will come true. Fire it with your feelings and emotions.
Are you a young woman and is it a dainty rose-colored gown you desire? Image the color of it and feel the joy of gowning yourself in that color. Feel the pleasure it would give you to look at yourself in that color. Think of its color again,—the color of roses. Imagine that you have perfumed the gown with just a touch of essence of roses. Feel the joy of smelling the sweet odor of roses. Feel the joy of smelling the perfume with which your dress is scented. Think of the feel of the material,—how soft and delicate. Feel the joy you feel in feeling it. Is not your desire fired and burning with impulse to act? Will you not do something to get that dress; and, idealizing your doing, you will do it in the right way and get it in the right way.