Page 25 - 100 Ways to Motivate Yourself

people say, “My sister’s creative, she paints,” or “My father’s creative, he sings

and writes music.” We miss the point that we are all creative. One of the reasons
we don’t see ourselves that way is that we normally associate being creative
with being original. But in reality, creativity has nothing to do with originality—
it has everything to do with being unexpected. You don’t have to be original to
be creative. In fact, it sometimes helps to realize that no one is original. Even
Mozart said that he never wrote an original melody in his life. His melodies were
all combinations of old folk melodies.

If you believe you were created in the image of your Creator, then you must,
therefore, be creative. Then, if you’re willing to see yourself as creative, you can
begin to cultivate it in everything you do. You can start coming up with all kinds
of unexpected solutions to the challenges that life throws at you.

11. Find your master key

I used to have the feeling that everyone else in life had at one time or another
been issued an instruction book on how to make life work. And I, for some
reason, wasn’t there when they passed them out. I felt a little like the Spanish
poet Cesar Vallejo, who wrote, “Well, on the day I was born, God was sick.”

Still struggling in my mid-30s with a pessimistic outlook and no sense of
purpose, I voiced my frustration to a friend of mine, Dr. Mike Killebrew, who
recommended a book to me. Until that time, I didn’t really believe that there
could be a book that could tell you how to make your life work.

The name of the book was The Master Key to Riches by Napoleon Hill. It sat
on my shelf for quite a while. I didn’t believe in motivational books or self-help.
They were for weak and gullible fools. I was finally persuaded to read the book
by the word riches in the title. Riches would be a welcome addition to my life.
Riches were probably what I needed to make me happy and wipe out my

troubles.

What the book actually did was a lot more than increase my earning capacity
(although by practicing the principles in the book, my earnings doubled in less
than a year). Napoleon Hill’s advice ultimately sparked a fire in me that changed
my entire life.

I soon acquired an ability that I would later realize was self-motivation.
After reading that book, I read all of Napoleon Hill’s books. I also began buying