I’m learning day trading, and I joined an organization of women learning trading skills. One of the activities they coordinate is an online book club that reads one book per month about either financial habits, abundance mindset, or trading. They also have recordings of their weekly discussions going back to October of 2024. Being the overachiever that I am, I am going back and reading the past books they covered and watching the recordings. Because I have never felt confident in my financial literacy, I figure it can’t hurt to learn as much as possible before I ever attempt to trade with real money. Everything I am doing currently is with a demo account they call paper trading. There is no real money involved.

The first book I heard the tail end of was Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. It sounded intriguing, so I found a used copy and got started reading. Boy, was I in for a ride. Yes, there were some interesting tidbits, but mostly I was repeatedly horrified by the outdated examples of financial geniuses we were supposed to admire. Charles Schwab was regaled for many a chapter. The same Charles Schwab who was just in the news for being in the oval office with President Trump laughing about the enormous amounts of money he made when the stock market plummeted. Yikes.

There are so many things in this book that I find reprehensible that I don’t even know where to begin. Mr. Hill refused to allow his son, who was born without ears, to learn sign language because he believed his son would someday hear. He drilled hard work and determination into his boy and was proud of the fact that he never allowed his son to have accommodations for his hearing loss. His son’s future success is provided as evidence that his way is the right way, and the fact that his theories are based on 20 years of interviews following rich and powerful people.

Robert E. Lee is praised for his courage in siding against the union, knowing he and many others were putting their lives on the line for their cause. Booker T. Washington is praised for his tolerance and described as someone handicapped by race. Anyone in poverty is there because they have accepted poverty as their fate and succumbed to a lowly state rather than doing all the right things to make themselves rich. Unions, organizing, or criticizing capitalism are evidence of stupidity and small minds because there is no possible way to have an organized, civilized, functioning lifestyle if the giant capitalistic machinery is not in charge of it all. All people should gladly praise the powers that be for their brilliance in making our lives better with their riches.

Ahem…I almost couldn’t get through the book. Then I got to the spot I started listening to in the weekly book club gatherings and was reminded that I liked the ending. The last third of the book is much more tolerable and focuses on concepts I can get behind. The ideas center on finding mentors and experts in the fields in which we want to better ourselves or learn more about. There are brilliant examples of visionary exercises that can be done to deepen our awareness of our subconscious connection to wisdom and theories about creativity and drive that are quite excellent. There is an entire section on developing intuition and overcoming fear that are wonderful practices for all areas of life, not just financial growth.

I cannot recommend this book to anyone because the outdated parts are simply too icky, in my opinion. It says it has been revised and updated for the 21st century. If that is so, I don’t even want to imagine what the original version included.

Hill, Napoleon. Think and Grow Rich. Jeremy P Tarcher, 2007.