Developing the Qualities of Success

Chapter 1

Planning, Preparing and Expecting to Win

How to Stay Motivated; Developing the Qualities of Success, is literally for everyone. Whether you're a mechanic or a physician, a college professor or a kindergarten student, this information is something you will benefit from. This book is about hope. Alfred Adler said that hope is the foundational quality of all change. It's my conviction that encouragement is the fuel of that hope, and so this entire book is designed to encourage and inform.

With this in mind, I encourage you to let the entire family and, for that matter, the people you work with, read this, regardless of their age and regardless of what they do. Countless adults have shared with me that these concepts have had a dramatic influence in their lives. In this book I will give you an idea which you will agree is absolutely significant. I will give you four concepts that, if you apply them, will make a difference in your life.

Let's start with this. Do you honestly and sincerely believe there's something you can do in the next two weeks that would make your personal life, your family life, and your business life worse? Do you believe there is something you can do that will make all of them better? Do you believe that the choice is yours? Do you believe that every choice has an end result? Do you believe making the right choices is your responsibility?

Whether you realize it or not, you have just said, "Regardless of how good or bad my past has been, regardless of how good or bad my present is, there is something I can specifically do now that will make my future either better or worse-and the choice is mine."

Everything is a choice. For example, for 24 years of my adult life, by choice, I weighed well over 200 pounds. Now, the reason I say "by choice" is simply because I have never accidentally eaten anything. It's always a choice. Now, if I choose to eat too much, then I choose to weigh too much. You are where you are in many ways because of a series of choices you have made.

Let me say something I think is very important. You made the observation that the responsibility is yours to make the right choices. Responsibility carries a lot of weight in life. Barbara Tuchman, two-time Pulitzer Prize winner said, "The number one need we have in our society today is people who will accept responsibility." That is so tremendously true. Most people I speak to think I'm in my early thirties, but actually, I'm 68. What that means is I was raised during the Depression. My dad died when I was five years old; there were six of us too young to work. I come from a small Mississippi town, Yazoo City; we don't even have a village drunk-we share with the little community next to us. But it's exciting. About once a month a train comes through town and I know that doesn't sound like excitement until I explain we don't have tracks there. We used to hang a mirror at the end of Main Street to make the town look bigger.

Now, let me say something here. I can tease about my hometown for one very good reason; it's an amazing little town. The former president of the American Medical Association is from Yazoo City; the former president of the American Bar Association is from Yazoo City; the former president of the Southern Baptist Convention is from Yazoo City. The former editor of Harper's magazine is from Yazoo City. The former Secretary of Agriculture is from Yazoo City. The chairman of the Republican Party is from Yazoo City. Jerry Clowers is from Yazoo City. Now, I have no idea what happened to the other three, but I can tease about my hometown because it has been so productive. We're going to use humor throughout this book because it helps people learn faster, learn more and remember longer. The major point I'm making is we can tease about that little town because of its productivity. People who are confident and productive, they don't mind you kidding them along-good, clean kidding and humor definitely has a place.

Now, I don't need to tell you that as the tenth of 12 children, six of them being too young to work, in the heart of the Depression in a small Mississippi town, we had a tough time financially. Other families had it tough too, but I'm so grateful that, for whatever reason, I did not choose to notice what we did not have. What I did notice was what a lot of people did have in that little town. Even in those times, I noticed some people wore nice clothes, they drove nice cars, they lived in a nice house, and they took nice trips. They even had dinner out. Some of them played golf at the country club. You know what I've noticed in every decade of my life since-and this is the message I really want you to get-I've noticed, that regardless of the economy, there are some people who don't pay any attention to it at all. As you well know, the media has accurately predicted 27 of the last two recessions. There are some people who just don't pay any attention to what other people are doing. For example, I've noticed that in some instances, when the economy is absolutely magnificent, there is a bunch of folks going broke. I have noticed that in some instances when the economy is absolutely horrible, there is a bunch of folks getting rich. How many of you have noticed exactly the same thing? Now, this is major point number two. Major point number one is, you do have a choice. You can do something now about your life, making it either better or worse, and the choice is yours.

Number two is this: it is not what is going on out there. A lot of that you cannot change. There is something you can do about you and your future and that's what I want to talk about. It's not what happens out there that makes a difference in your life, it's what goes on between your own two ears. That's what makes the difference.

Neil Rudenstine was the president of Harvard University. His mother was a part-time waitress and his father was a prison guard. It's not who your mama and your daddy might've been; it's not what they have done. The question is what kind of legacy will you leave to your children and your grandchildren? It is what you do. A lot of times we encounter people who have a pity party on a regular basis. They have what we call the PLOM disease-PLOM, that's "poor li'l ol' me," and the problem with pity parties is that very few people come, and those who do don't bring presents.

Let me point out, there was a study of 300 world-class leaders. Now, I'm talking about Roosevelt and Churchill; I'm talking about Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi. I'm talking about Clara Barton, Helen Keller and Mother Teresa. Seventy-five percent of them were either raised in poverty or abused as children, or had some serious physical impairment. They understood point number three: it's not what happens to you-it's how you handle what happens to you that is going to make the difference.

I think of the Edsel automobile, which many people recognize as being by far the most profitable motorcar that Ford built. Now, I know what you're thinking right now. You're thinking, 'Ziglar, that sucker was a dog! Why, you know, it cost 'em a whole lot of money! They stopped production! Whaddya mean it was the most profitable one?' Remember I said a moment ago it's not what happens to you, it's how you handle it? Out of the Edsel came the Mustang; out of the Mustang came the Taurus. They took the mistake, learned from it, capitalized on it, and look at what happened as a result. It's not what happens to you, it's how you handle it.

John Foppe was recognized as one of the Top Ten Young Americans by the United States Junior Chamber of Commerce. I met John when he was speaking for the Department of Defense up in Colorado Springs. He had admirals and generals, CEOs of the Fortune 500 companies in front of him. As a 19-year-old young man, he spoke with confidence, clarity, conviction and power. John had graduated from college three and a half years cum laude, working his way partially through. You ought to see John drive a car and scramble eggs and go skiing and paint portraits and do those sorts of things. You ought to watch him just eat. You see, John Foppe was born without any arms. But as John said to me one day, "You know, Zig, if I had the longest, strongest arms ever put on a human being, there'd still be only so high I could reach, only so much weight I could lift. I don't care how long and tall and strong and big your arms might be, they have a limit. But, Zig, you know, I've faced more situations every day where I have to use my creative imagination than the average person does in a month, and there is no limit to what we can do internally."

Now this message, basically, is the power of hope, because if there's hope in the future, there is power in the present. My objective in this book is to share with you how you can get more of the things money will buy and all of the things money won't buy. Money is important. There are some people who are literally struggling for survival. Part of our objective is to help those people. All of us-at least in one or two instances in our life-have been in that situation where if we had a flat tire it was a financial disaster; if we spilled something on a dress or tore a suit or something, it really represented difficulty.

I want to share with you how to move from survival to stability, from stability to success, and from success to significance. Money is important. Now, don't misunderstand, it's not...