You At Your Best

During the last fifty years the world has suffered through two terrible world wars, several lesser conflicts, and a heart-rending depression.

Fortunately, these major disasters taught us a great deal about many things.  One of the most important of the many lessons learned was the incalculable and many-sided value of efficiency - the increased effectiveness of men and machines; the saving of man-hours of work, of energy, of materials, of money costs, and above all the conservation of life, and the strengthening of the human spirit.

Fifty years ago, in the business world, for example, most things were done by habit and guess. Today businessmen want to know the reason "why." To know the reason "why" is to increase efficiency enormously. Efficiency is the watchword, and efficiency means getting maximum results with minimum effort.
Our problem as human beings is, then, to find out what we must do in order to attain maximum efficiency - what we must do to get out the best that is in us!

I suppose there is hardly a truer lesson in all science and philosophy than the unity of man. Man has a threefold nature, a physical, a mental, and a spiritual nature. This being true, no man can attain maximum efficiency - get out the best that is in him - unless he attains a healthy and harmonious development of all three of his natures.

During my senior year in college I studied and trained - as an extracurricular activity - to become a book salesman during the summer vacation months in order to earn additional funds to enter Harvard University Law School in the fall.

One day my instructor made a statement that impressed me profoundly, and it has been in my mind ever since. Discussing the rugged career of a book salesman, he stressed the importance of personal efficiency, of being a "whole" man, a fully developed person - physically, mentally, and spiritually. Then he added with great seriousness: "Mr. Gravengaard, it is going to make a tremendous difference to you what sort of a man you take to your prospect."

Later on during the summer when I went from house to house, and office to office, and from field to field to find the farmer at his work, I came to a full realization of the real and broader meaning of those words. And on the basis of that summer's gruelling experience, and the experience of over thirty-five years in business, I want to emphasize to you this vital truth: It makes a tremendous difference what sort of a man you take to your job in this hotly competitive world in which we live and work.

Your body must be healthy and efficient - the instrument and not the tyrant of your mind. Your mind must be sharp and alert, educated and trained - knowledge and culture must be its power. And your spiritual nature must be developed and utilized, to insure spiritual power, strength of character, emotional balance, and breadth of vision - without which there can be no fullness of life, no feeling of worthwhileness.

To be deficient in any of these parts is to be only in part a man. To develop your three natures to the fullest, into a harmonious and vital oneness, to be a whole man, to get out the very best that is in you - that is life's great purpose, life's ringing challenge.

The celebrated English poet, Alexander Pope, once said: "The proper study of mankind is man." This being true, let us study man - the whole man - by examining each one of his three component parts, the physical, the mental, and the spiritual natures; and find out how these great natural resources of man can be developed to a maximum of efficiency, and brought into a harmonious and powerful oneness in order that you may achieve a full measure of success and happiness.

What Do You Want?
You Have The Talents
You Are The Master
Start Where You Are
Change If You Must
Dormant Power