Poise: How to Attain It Part 17

Far from avoiding this, one should seize every occasion to utilize it to one's advantage.

The determined student should even create opportunity for so doing, which, in forcing him to break down his reserve, will make it necessary for him to come to definite decisions and to carry them out.

Every chance to exhibit real and honest activity should be seized by him.

Between two decisions, equally favorable to him, of which one will leave him to his peaceful retirement and the other will involve active measures, he should not hesitate for a moment.

He will make choice of that which will compel him to exhibit physical activity.

It is, however, important that manifestation of purposeless energy should be rigidly represt. They are always harmful to one's equilibrium and to the qualities needed for the attainment of poise.

One should never forget the well-known proverb:

"Speech is silver, but silence is golden."

Silence, in a vast number of instances, is the indisputable proof of the empire that one has over oneself.

To be able to keep quiet and to close one's lips until the moment when reflection has enabled us to discipline our too-violent emotions, is a quality that belongs only to those who have obtained the mastery over themselves.

The weak become excited, indulge in protests, and expend themselves in angry denunciations that use up the energy they should retain for active measures.

The man of resolution is most careful not to allow it to be known at what point he has been wounded. He keeps silence and reflects.

Resolves form within his mind and, when he at last is ready to speak, it is to utter some firm decision or to put forward arguments that are unanswerable.

To tell the truth, those who instantly and noisily voice their antagonisms, who, under the sting of a hurt to their vanity indulge in threats of violence, are actually dangerous.

Their accusations, dictated by anger and heightened by the sense of their own inferiority, are always characterized by impotence.

They make people smile, provoke perhaps a little pity, but never cause any fear.

They are like the toy guns of children, which have the air of being most deadly weapons, but which are constructed of such fragile materials that a vigorous blow will cause them to fall to pieces.

The self-control of the man of resolution in the face of insult and provocation is far more impressive than these idle threats.

His silence is ominous. It is a sort of mechanical calm which produces decisions from which all pa.s.sion is excluded.

His answers, well thought out and adapted exactly to the circ.u.mstances of the case, impress one by their coldness and by their tone of finality. His words are always followed by deeds, and are the more weighty for the fact that one knows that they are merely preliminary to the actions that they foretell.

This is one of the marked advantages of those who possess poise, one of various methods of conquering and dominating the minds of others.

There are other strong points belonging to those who cultivate poise, which, judiciously employed, unite in giving them an incontestable superiority over the majority of the people they meet.

The man of poise will not be overgay or too boisterous. Still less will he be taciturn. Moody people are nearly always those who are convinced of their own lack of ability and quite certain that the rest of the world is in a conspiracy to make them miserable.

They lack all pride and make no bones about admitting themselves to be defeated.

These, we must admit, are rather difficult conditions in which to effect anything worth while.

In "Timidity: How to Overcome It," M.B. Dangennes tells us that one day a party of men agreed to undertake a journey, the object of which was to attain a most wonderful country.

"There were a great many of them at the start, but only a few days had pa.s.sed when their ranks became sensibly depleted.

"Certain members of the party, the timid ones, who were enc.u.mbered with a load of useless scruples, soon succ.u.mbed to the weight of their burdens.

"Others, the fearful ones, became panic-stricken at the difficulties they encountered in battling with the earlier stages of the journey.

"The modest, after several days' marching, fell to the rear, from fear of attracting too much attention, and were very soon lost sight of.

"The careless, wearied by their efforts, took to resting in the ditches along the road, and ate all their store of provisions for the journey without worrying at all about the time when they might be hungry.

"The braggarts and the boasters, after exhibiting a temporary enthusiasm, gave out at the first dangers encountered on the march.

"The curious, instead of striving to maintain the courage of those who walked at the head of the column, kept leading them into difficulties, in which many of the foremost were lost.

"The rash were greatly reduced in numbers by their own foolhardiness.

"The final result was that only a handful of men, after many weary days and nights, reached the Eden that they had set out to attain.

"These men were disciples of energy, those to whom this virtue had given courage, ambition, the self-control and the self-mastery needed to vanquish and overcome the perils of the way; those who, by their cool and courageous bearing, had been able to impress upon their companions, now become their disciples, the indomitable hardihood with which they were themselves filled."

We see in this fable how all the qualities of poise worked together for the accomplishment of the destined end.

First courage, which must not be confounded either with rashness or with effrontery.

Courage, the perfect manifestation of confidence in oneself.

This quality is at the bottom of all great enterprises, of which all the risks, however, have been carefully considered in advance.

The man of courage does not deceive himself as to the dangers of the deeds he has determined to perform. He accepts them bravely. He has foreseen them all, and he knows how to act in order to turn them to his own advantage.

The coolness characteristic of all men of poise gives them the power of estimating wisely how things are likely to turn out.

They do not fail to appreciate the importance of certain circ.u.mstances, to realize their bearing, and to admit the dangers to which they may give rise. Thus they are ready for the fray and are armed at all points for a well-considered defense.

Shame on the superficial people who close their eyes in order not to see the obstacles that their own lack of foresight has prevented them from antic.i.p.ating.

Let us press back the timid; declare war on the boasters; show our contempt for the inveterately modest (who are only so to flatter their own vanity); express our hatred of the envious, who are always incapable; distrust the slothful; and arm ourselves with a justifiable pride, which, by imparting to us a sense of our merits, will enable us to acquire poise, true index of those who are legitimately sure of themselves and are conscious of their sterling worth.

But, above all, let us raise in our inmost hearts a temple to reason, the author of that quiet confidence that makes success a certainty.

This is the work of the man who has achieved the conquest of poise. It is the one particular evidence of this priceless quality.

Poise, by inspiring its possessor with a belief in his merits, that is productive of good resolutions, enables him to employ in relation to himself the fine art of absolutely sincere reasoning.

There are, as is well-known, many ways of looking at things.

Every thing has several sides and, in accordance with the angle at which we examine it, seems to us more or less favorable.