Think Big: Unleashing Your Potential for Excellence by Ben Carson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Ben Carson’s book, Think Big is actually a book about how to have success in your life. He using the acrostic THINK BIG for an outline to teach the steps a person would use to have success. The T stands for talent. He says, “If we recognize our talents, use them appropriately, and choose a field that uses those talents, we will rise to the top of our field.” The H stands for honesty. He says, “If we live the rule of honesty and accept our problems, we can go far down the road of achievement.” I stands for insight. Carson says, “If we observe and reflect and commit ourselves to giving our best, we will come out on top.” N stands for nice. He says, “If we are nice to others, others respond to us in the same way – and we can give our best for each other.” K stands for knowledge. Carson say, “If we make every attempt to increase our knowledge in order to use for human good, it will make a difference in us and in our world.” B stands for books. He says, “If we commit ourselves to reading, thus increasing our knowledge, only God limits how far we can go in this world.” I stands for in-depth knowledge. He says, “If we develop in-depth knowledge, it will enable us to give our best to others and help to make a better world.” G stands for God. He says, “If we acknowledge our need for God, He will help us.”

Carson uses personal examples as well as examples from others to expand and verify each of the points listed above. I really enjoyed this book. It does repeat a few stories from his other books. This man is very wise and offers a lot of truth that can be applied to all lives. As I write this I see that Ben Carson is gaining in the polls as a presidential candidate. I think he would be an excellent president and is what this country needs. I trust you will enjoy and be challenged by the quotes below:

If things go bad for you-
And make you a bit ashamed,
Often you will find out that
You have yourself to blame …
Swiftly we ran to mischief
And then the bad luck came.
Why do we fault others?
We have ourselves to blame …
Whatever happens to us,
Here are the words we say,
“Had it not been for s0-in-so
Things wouldn’t have gone that way.”
And if you are short of friends,
I’ll tell you what to do-
Make an examination,
You’ll find the fault’s in you …
You’re the captain of your ship,
So agree with the same –
If you travel downward,
You have yourself to blame. ~Mayme White Miller

After I got acquainted with God and we entered into partnership, I knew that God did not make any race or nationality to be inferior or superior. We were black, but that did not mean we were dumb and supposed to fail. God loves everybody and wants only good things for us. I tried to get my sons to grasp that what God does for one – He’ll do for anyone else. I use to tell Ben and Curtis, “I think God made different nationalities to see what our reaction was going to be toward each other. Maybe God made it for a special measurement just to see if we could really love someone who is different from us.” One day while I was reading, I came across this verse in the Bible: “If anyone says, ‘I love God,’ yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. And He has given us this command: Whomsoever loves God must also love his brother” (1 John 4:20-21). ~Mary Carson

A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops. ~Henry Brooke Adams

The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be ignited. ~Plutarch

Anyone who can’t learn from other people’s mistakes simply can’t learn, and that’s all there is to it. There is value in the wrong way of doing things. The knowledge gained from errors contributes to our knowledge base. ~Don Long

You must have a sound rationale for what you are doing right now. ~Don Long

Be nice to people – all people – even when you don’t have to be. Everybody is important. ~Don Long

Isn’t it strangeThat princes and kings,
And clowns that caper
In sawdust rings,
And common people
Like you and me
Are builders for eternity?
Each is given a bag of tools,
A shapeless mass,
A book of rules;
And each must make-
Ere life is flown-
A stumbling block
Or a steppingstone. ~R.L. Sharpe

No one can make us feel inferior without our permission. ~Eleanor Roosevelt

Every man who knows how to read has it in his power to magnify himself, to multiply the ways in which he exists, to make his life full, significant, and interesting. ~Aldous Huxley

It is chiefly through books that we enjoy intercourse with superior minds. … In the best books, great men talk to us, give us their most precious thoughts, and pour their souls into ours. God be thanked for books. They are the voices of the distant and the dead, and make us heirs of the spiritual life of past ages. Books are true levelers. They give to all, who will faithfully use them, the society, the spiritual presence, of the best and greatest of our race. ~William Ellery Channing

Here are three significant serendipities that reading furnishes us:
1.) Reading activates and exercise the mind.
2.) 2.) Reading forces the mind to discriminate. From the beginning, readers have to recognize letters printed on the page, make them into words, the words into sentences, and the sentences into concepts.
3.) Reading pushes us to use our imagination and makes us more creatively inclined.

When books are opened, we discover that we have wings. ~Helen Hayes

God helps us by:
- encouraging us to use our intelligence
- -urging us to take advantage of learning opportunities
- inspiring us to acquire the necessary skills and knowledge we need to work effectively in whatever area we have chosen as a career.

More things are wrought by prayer
Than this world dreams of. ~Tennyson

God cares about every area of our lives, and God wants us to ask for help.

Humility is not groveling and telling everyone how worthless we are – humility is knowing who we are and what God is doing and has done in our lives.

I have worked out a simple formula for humility.
IF WE RECOGNIZE THAT:
1.) God created this universe, including us, and
2.) God shows that He is much more powerful than we are by what He does and has done in our world, and
3.) God gives each of us abilities that we cannot supply to ourselves or explain our worthiness of, THEN WE ARE HUMBLED.

Remaining a victim of circumstance is a state of being that we choose, a choice that
- allows us to blame other people
- lets us blame circumstances
- permits us to avoid responsibility for our lives
- encourages us to feel sorry for ourselves, and
- guarantees that we will stay victims.
No one has to be a victim!

To some, success in life means putting more into life than we take out. I think of success as reaching beyond ourselves and helping other people in specific ways.

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