By H. GREENHOUGH SMITH
(Editor of "The Strand Magazine").
THE ILLUSTRATED LONDON NEWS, June 15, 1918.
I am going to write something about the Pelman System because I believe in it. I am anxious to take my share in calling the attention of the outside public to that system because I have become convinced that it is a real and great promoter of efficiency.
And efficiency, in every walk of life, is what alone can save us, as a people, when, in the ever-intensifying competition which will come when peace returns, we have to keep our flag flying in the never-ending battle for the survival of the fittest among nations. If any word of mine can help the cause, I feel that I should be guilty of remissness if I failed to speak it.
Long before I knew anything about the Pelman System in its methods, I knew a good deal about it in its results. What I mean I can best explain by a few typical examples of cases which have fallen within my own experience.
The first case that comes into my mind is that of a certain bridge-player of my acquaintance—his life exists in every club—who was the very type of the happy-go-lucky and haphazard player:
- the kind who forgets his partner’s call or the suit he led from,
- who has been known to play a spade hand under the impression that the call was a no-trumper, and
- who every now and then embellishes his game with a revoke.
Suddenly, within a few weeks, his style of play improved beyond all knowledge.
- He was simply bringing into use, for the first time, his memory, his observation, his power of concentration, and, what depends on these, his faculties of deduction.
- He was able not only to remember what cards his opponents had played, but to infer why they had played them.
- He had been taking the Pelman Course—not for the sake of improving his bridge-playing—that was only a side issue. But the result, as shown in the card-room was, in a familiar phrase of Carlyle’s, "eloquent of much."
- He had become a more capable individual all round.
It was not merely that he could play a better game of bridge, which was a matter of comparatively small importance, but he had become equipped to play his part with a far larger measure of success in the great game of life itself.
And here it may be remarked that, although money is not everything, it would be folly to ignore the fact that, whether in the small game or the great one, it is the better player who, in the long run, sweeps in the stakes.
Is the Pelman System, then, really able to turn a nincompoop into an expert? Well, hardly that, of course. But in many cases, if you can cure a man of woolgathering, it really almost comes to the same thing. A pamphlet issued by the Pelman Institute has an apt remark on this point:
"‘Mind-wandering’ is one very destructive form of Brain-waste. The untrained brain cannot concentrate wholly upon its subject; it has a tendency to drift, and its owner does not know how to prevent it. A Pelman training corrects this, and enables the worker to bring all his brain-power to bear upon any subject whenever he wishes, and for as long as he wishes."
My next example is that of a young journalist in whose work I take an interest. He is a man of no small natural gifts, endowed with a power of easy expression, which always made his writing a delight to read. Yet there was something wanting.
His descriptions did not seem quite vivid and alive; they were like pictures somewhat blurred. He, too, went in for a course of Pelman study. What he lacked, without knowing it, was the knack of seeing things.
His powers of observation were untrained and undeveloped. Now his descriptive writing is as full of graphic detail as a Dutch painting. His scenes start up before the reader’s eye as if he saw them. And I am glad to say that, like all work that is getting better, it is getting better paid.
In my youth I read a book for children entitled, "Eyes and No-eyes." I do not know whether it is still obtainable, but for the sake of children of the present day I hope so. It narrates the experience of two boys who went one morning for a country walk, and who were asked by their father, on their return, how they had enjoyed themselves.
No-eyes had not enjoyed himself at all. He had seen nothing of any interest; he had never been more bored in all his life.
Eyes, on the contrary, had had a most delightful time. At every step he had found something to awake his interest and amusement. The fact is, he was one of those who are born with the seeing eye.
He would go through life as he went through his morning ramble, finding all round him things of interest and of profit, while his companion would be gaping his head off with ennui.
Now, one of the special aims of the Pelman System is just this—to convert No-eyes into Eyes.
Again, I number among my acquaintances two young women, sisters, very much alike in character, who were married, and set up housekeeping at nearly the same time. “A” was a Pelman student—“B” was not.
Now, explain the matter how you will, the fact remains that A’s house, from nursery to kitchen, was all spick-and-span, while her sister’s, although she spent—or, rather, wasted—twice the money, was—not to put too fine a point upon it—an eyesore. In short, A’s house was a model, B’s a muddle.
The fact is, few people realize what systematic training means for women. Few realize that to run a house is to run a business; that a woman has to look after a house, a husband, tradesmen, servants, has to be an organizer, a manager, an accountant, a buyer, a caterer, a nurse, a teacher, a seamstress, and several other things, in one.
To run an office is child’s play beside it—for this, among a host of other reasons, that it is easier to replace a clerk than to replace a cook. Yet to this business, this profession, which emphatically demands a trained professional to conduct it with the best results, most women are amateurs.
No wonder that, until in course of time they have bought experience with suffering, they so often make a mess of things. And it is only the plain and literal truth to say that nine-tenths of this trouble could have been spared them.
Every girl, whether married or looking forward to the prospect of being married in the future, should take a course of Pelman training. Every husband should send his wife—every lover his bride to-be.
They will save their money a hundredfold, to say nothing of their comfort. And what about the children? Which was likeliest to turn out the better citizens, or the most successful in their own careers, the children who come from a well-ordered household, or those whose earliest impressions have been acquired in an atmosphere of inefficiency and waste?
One more example. A young man, a connection of my own, whom I had not come across for several months, called the other day to see me. He was one of those young fellows whom everybody knows in plenty, breezy, good-hearted, fairly clever, but giddy, pleasure-loving, and with all the makings of a slacker.
He came to tell me that his guardian had promised to give him a trial in his own business on condition that he first went through the course of Pelman training.
He had done so, and had discovered, to his surprise, that work—a thing for which, as Dr. Johnson said of his clean shirt, he had never had a passion—could become an interesting and even fascinating occupation.
He had gone into the business and had been assured by his delightful guardian that he was "making good." I could see, myself, that he was altered and improved, and I told him my impression. "It has evidently made you," I said, "more assured, more manly."
"Pelmanly," he grinned—he was always an incorrigible joker—and as I winced, he added, "If you want to make the journey of life easy, take a ticket by Pelman car."
These examples from my own experience will suffice to show how I had come to know and to judge the Pelman System in the best and fairest way by which any system can be judged—by its results. Such experiences led me, as a natural sequence, to ascertain how such results were brought about.
And so I was led to understanding how it came to pass that, by the scientific study of the mind and body, that system gives its students, as one of them expressed it, "something other people haven’t got," and explains the fact that everywhere, in every rank and calling, one sees them, men and women, rising to the top as surely as a cork in water.
H. GREENHOUGH SMITH.
The end.
Remember, What matters most in your life is YOU and what you do with your life.
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