When Extensive Paralysis Becomes A Key To Success

This is the story of a man who, late in life, became totally paralyzed. He had been healthy all his life, working hard like everyone else, and then, out of nowhere, he became paralyzed from neck to toe. Totally confined in a bed and with no way of providing for his family through farming. His success story is well told by Napoleon Hill and Clement Stone in Success Through A Positive Mental Attitude.

His name was Milo C. Jones, and he lived in Wisconsin. Throughout his life, he had worked hard and the fruits of his labor could barely provide for his family. He was an honest man who desired a better life, but to him, there really seemed to be no way out of the rut that he had found himself. He hoped one day for something better – for a better life. And then, something happened. He got paralyzed!

He was the breadwinner in the family and by now his youth was long gone. It all seemed like a disaster. Everyone was certain that there would be nothing but misery and hopelessness in the life of Milo C. Jones. Everybody pitied him, except himself.

Rather than scream at the top of his lungs about how unfair life was, or of how much he deserved better or of why his life was over; Jones decided in his mind to remain positive and to remain grateful. As you can imagine, there was really nothing easy about it because it was real-life. He started counting his blessings and being thankful for them as he looked for a way to be useful to his family.

“Milo C. Jones chose to develop a positive mental attitude. He chose to be hopeful, optimistic, happy and to convert creative thinking into reality by starting right from where he was. He wanted to be useful. And be wanted to support his family, instead of being a burden to them. but how could he turn his disadvantage into advantage? He didn't let this vital problem stop him.”

His paralysis, while it limited his movement, gave him a lot of time to think. He soon came up with a plan. Rather than plant the family land with food for his family, he decided that his family should plant every tillable acre with corn which would then serve as food for pigs. The pigs, they would then slaughter while young and tender. To quote Success Through A Positive Mental Attitude: “… And then we can package and sell them under a brand name. we'll sell them in retail stores all over the country." And then he chuckled as he said: "They'll sell like hot cakes!" And they did sell like hot cakes!”

And indeed they sold like hotcakes. They sold so well that the paralyzed Milo C. Jones lived long enough to see himself become a multimillionaire. As Napoleon Hill concludes: “… Milo C. Jones lived to see himself a millionaire. He had achieved something even more through a positive mental attitude. For he bad flipped his talisman to PMA. And thus although he was physically handicapped, he became a happy man. He was happy because he was useful.”