© Elliot Essman 2005. All rights reserved.

These pages contain the complete 2005 revised text of Building Yourself, public speaking trainer Elliot Essman's guide to living the successful life.

Elliot Essman Public Speaking Training
Building Yourself Table of Contents
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• It is now high time that it should return to the plainness and soundness of observations on material and obvious things. Robert Hooke (1635–1703)

Billions of people combine and interact in thousands of ways. The actual number of combinations is too large for any of us to grasp, or even guess at. Leave that to the mathemati­cians. But what we can certainly grasp is the largeness of the world. It's this dynamic size of the world, the market for our efforts and plans, that really excites us.

If we're selling something—a product, our skills, our ideas—we have the option in this big wide world to ask and ask and ask and ask. We can change our jobs, move into other professions, start new businesses. Our flexibility is one of our tools for success. In such a large arena—our mar­ket—we know that if we keep asking, keep finding new forums to sell in, we'll eventually hit pay dirt. The large numbers can't help but create opportunity.

The pace of change, the immensity of the arena, are frightening to the losers in life. They want certainty in life, but life deals them only constant change. They can handle one or two simple choices, but life offers them hundreds. The world was not created to nurture and favor them. They have nowhere to hide.

Successful people, by contrast, thrive on the volatility of life, on the sheer number of choices in life. They know they cannot fail. If they seem to fail at the moment, they can pick up and try it or something else again. Failure simply doesn't have a place in their concept of reality. It doesn't agree with the law of numbers.

The law of numbers is an immutable law. It's your best friend in life. It has many aspects, but perhaps its key facet is the fact that in life, in the big world, you get an unlimited number of shots at success. You never run out of opportunity. You never run out of time. If you miss, you shoot again, and again, and again. You're the only person who can decide that your turn at life is over.

The law of numbers has many practical applications. Looking to buy a business? They tell you you'll never get an offer like this again? You have qualms but you're ready to snap the opportunity up? Don't. If the shoe doesn't fit, don't wear it. It's the small mind that jumps at the “one‑time offer.” The law of numbers dictates that, for the creative mind, opportunity is unlimited. It applies to nearly every decision, in business, education, love, or day‑to‑day life.

The law of numbers gives you choice. The law of numbers allows you to keep sweating at it even when things don't look good. The law of numbers lets you reflect, plan, lick your wounds, then bounce back into the arena.