One of the most famous texts of the self help, personal development movement is James Allen's As a Man Thinketh. This fascinating book was first published in 1905 and has been cited ever since by almost every personal development guru, especially American guru. And for good reason: from its central contention – “As a man thinketh in his heart so is he” – comes the corollary so dear to American experience that you can be whatever you want to be. That life and potential are unlimited. In other words, the American dream.
I don't myself fully subscribe to unlimited human potential, but I do subscribe to James Allen's view that our thoughts create our reality, our happiness or otherwise, and ultimately our destiny. As he says, “Strong, pure and happy thoughts build up the body in vigour and grace”; and further, “a particular train of thought persisted in, be it good or bad, cannot fail to produce its results on the character and circumstances”.
James Allen doesn't fall into the sloppy thinking of asserting that the virtuous are always rewarded, and the vicious are always punished because he sees that even 'vicious' people may have some good qualities that enable success (and virtuous people faults which block their progress). And 'time and chance' happens to all people. But, critically, good seed produces good fruit, and bad seed does not.
With that in mind it is worth commenting on the recent death of Jane Russell, the glamorous Hollywood movie star. Her greatest film success was probably in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes when she co-starred alongside Marilyn Monroe. They became friends; but oh how different their careers and outcomes.
For me the most interesting thing is Monroe's 'smart' comment on Russell: “Jane tried to convert me to religion and I tried to introduce her to Freud”. In this one sentence, may be, one can see those whole destinies forming.
Jane Russell was a committed Christian; she had problems, including alcoholism after the death of her third husband (two of her husbands died, one of a heart attack after only 3 months of marriage). But what you see as she lived on till she was 89 was a resilience, a toughness, a belief in God and herself, that could not be completely displaced by devastating external circumstances. She achieved things and had a real life.
Monroe, on the other hand, five years younger than Russell, dying at only 36, in thinking that Freud was some sort of liberating 'god' abandoned herself to the priests – psychoanalysts – of this particular and obnoxious and hopeless religion. Hence the dark and chthonic forces that seem to have been with her from the beginning. Happy? It doesn’t appear so – and her death, suicide or murder, is as murky as the values she espoused.
Of course, Hollywood loves Monroe more than Russell, as do the public: she is ranked sixth in the all time greatest female legends list. But this 'love' is exactly the same kind of love that Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and currently Amy Winehouse and Charlie Sheen experience: we want the spectacle of talented or artistic people self-destructing in the name of freedom, in the delusion of liberty, in the craze of excess. Somehow this provides justification for our more modest indulgences, and also vicarious pleasures.
Perhaps. But there is no getting away from What a man thinketh – ultimately we pay the piper. So it is better right at the start to find role models who really do inspire us to do good and to be good, rather than the celebrate the helpless wrecks pretending they have achieved freedom and personal expression when – it is quite clear – they are so unhappy and hate themselves. Thus, three cheers for Jane Russell!
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