The Magic of Thinking Big

Schwartz, a marketing professor, published this in 1959 as a self-improvement manual arguing that the size of a person's thinking determines the size of their results, and that most limits people encounter are self-imposed rather than external.

The practical content covers a set of habits. Belief is treated as a mechanism rather than a sentiment, on the argument that a person who believes something is achievable generates the methods for achieving it while a person who does not stops looking. He attacks what he calls excusitis, meaning the habit of explaining current position through health, intelligence, age or luck, and gives a treatment for each. He argues for building confidence through action rather than waiting for it, using specific behaviours including sitting at the front, walking faster, speaking up first and making eye contact.

Other material covers thinking in terms of what can be added rather than what cannot be done, the argument that people are judged on the size of their thinking rather than on their qualifications, managing the environment including the people a person spends time with, and treating setbacks as information. The book has sold enormously and has influenced most subsequent self-improvement writing, including material that does not credit it.

It contains no research and the claims are asserted. Schwartz's examples are from 1950s American corporate life and the gender assumptions are of their period. Some of the advice, particularly on projecting confidence, will read as superficial. The observation that most constraints people cite are self-generated, and the treatment of belief as something that changes what a person notices and attempts, is the durable content.