Text of the meditation
The silent, calm people will manifest a more enduring form of success than those who are noisy and restless. When a person exchanges coppers for silver, and silver for gold, they do not thereby give up the use of money; they exchange a heavy mass for one that is lighter and smaller but more valuable.
So when a person exchanges hurry for deliberation, and deliberation for calmness, they do not give up effort; they merely exchange a diffusive and more or less ineffective energy for a more highly concentrated, effective and valuable form. Yet even the crudest forms of effort are necessary at first, for without them to begin with, the higher forms could not be acquired.
The child must crawl before they can walk; they must babble before they can talk; they must talk before they can compose. A person begins in weakness and ends in strength, but from beginning to end they advance by the efforts they make, by the exertion they put forth.
The root of success is in character.
James Allen (1864–1912), Book of Meditations for Every Day in the Year (1913) – public-domain text, gently modernised.
The original 1913 text is in the public domain.
