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Martin P. Seligman, author of Learned Optimism created a ground-breaking experiment which
was first performed with dogs back in the sixties. Three dogs went through each experiment. The first dog was given mild electrical
shocks which stopped whenever it pressed a panel with its nose. It got shocks, but had the power to stop them. The second
dog got shocks whenever the first dog got them. This means that it received exactly the same amount and duration of electrical
shocks as the first dog, but it had no chance to affect this. The third dog got no shocks. The next day each dog is placed
in a special “shuttlebox”. Here the dog is given an electrical shock that it can easily escape by jumping over
a low barrier. And the results were, that dog number one (who’d recieved shocks it could turn off itself) quickly jumped
over the barrier. So did dog number three that had gotten no shocks. But dog number two just lay there whimpering, feeling
powerless to change its conditions.
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If you think you are beaten, you are,
If you think you dare not, you don't.
If you like to win,
but you think you can't,
It is almost certain you won't.
If you think you'll lose, you're lost,
For out in the world we find,
Success begins with a fellow's
will.
It's all in the state of mind.
If you think you are outclassed, you are,
You've got to think high to rise,
You've got to be
sure of yourself before
You can ever win a prize.
Life's battles don't always go
To the stronger or faster man.
But soon or late the man who wins,
Is
the man who thinks he can.
~Anonymous~
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