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There is an interesting article in one of the past PSYCHOLOGY TODAY magazines that I think carries a wonderful message. I will not include the whole article here, just the jest of the story:

There was a young man who was a straight "A" student in high school. He applied for entrance into a university. As a part of the admission he had to take the SAT test. When he got his letter back from the University they said they were admitting him and in the papers was the results of his SAT test. He got a 98. He assumed that the 98 was his IQ.

He went to the University and got all "D's" and "F's" the first semester. At the end of the semester the counselor called him in to talk to him. He asked him why he was failing in school when he had been a straight "A" student in High School. The work was only one year advanced yet he was failing. The boy said, "YOU CAN'T BLAME ME. I ONLY HAVE A 98 IQ".

The counselor had his records in front of him and saw his past performance. Normally you need to have at least a 120 IQ to do well in college but 98..... He asked him where on earth he got the idea that he only had a 98 IQ. The boy said that when the University sent his entrance papers back it had the SAT test results with his IQ score on it.

The counselor then explained that a 98 percentile on the SAT means that you did better than 98% of all the other kids in America who took the test that year. He told him he was one of the brightest kids in the country. With that understanding, the boy went back to his classes and got straight "A's" the rest of the time he was at the University.

I wonder how often we feel we are worthless by the bidding of others. I wonder how often we do not even reach for our potential because we have been convinced that we can not do better. I believe that there is no limit to what we can achieve if we just believe we can. I wonder what would happen to some one with a 98 IQ who was told in error that they got a 98 percentile score on the SAT. That would be interesting. I am sure they would double their performance and do things that were thought impossible before, just because they started believing that they could do it.

Are you having percentile belief troubles in your life? Norman Vincent Peal said, "You can be anything you want to be, IF YOU WANT TO BE". And I believe it.

Your millionaire making friend

Cordell Vail, W.B.