"Great Effort Springs From Great Attitudes"

Henry Ward Beecher, the 19th century preacher once said that “Words are the pegs to hang ideas on.”

Have you ever noticed that people who are underachievers are always talking about bad breaks, the lousy economy, the unfairness of life, how they don’t have the right network, the deal they just lost, etc?

On the other hand, people who tend to become achievers in all areas of life seem to talk enthusiastically about challenges, new opportunities, fresh approaches, how to expand their network of influential people and their successes rather than their “failures”.

What words do you use as pegs to hang ideas about yourself on? Do you constantly say, “I can’t do it”, “It’s too hard”, “What’s the use (it won’t do any good)?”, “I’ll never be able to finish it”, “I’m not treated fairly”, “There’s no business out there”, “I don’t have the ability”, “They’ll just turn me down”. If so, then you are building a case against yourself and talking yourself into mediocrity both as a person and in your career.

These mental pegs grow into attitudes that either create great, self-empowering attitudes or weak, self-limiting attitudes. We all know how important attitude is to success because as NBA coach Pat Riley so aptly put it, “Great effort springs naturally from a great attitude.”

Great attitudes empower us because they create an expectation of excellence from ourselves. This expectation kindles the desire to put forth the effort required to do what needs doing. This means that we formulate our goals and devise either a formal or informal plan to make it a reality. When we approach our job with half-formulated goals, fuzzy plans and an “I just gotta make it to the week-end” attitude, we are really saying we don’t expect much, and we usually get it. However, if we approach the week with well-formulated goals, solid plans and an expectation that by the week-end things will have moved along toward reaching those goals, we often are surprised by the results.

I heard a speaker us this illustration about our mindset (attitude) in the early 1980’s and have used it myself on several occasions. The speaker called an attractive young lady up on the stage, ascertained that they didn’t know each other and then said to her, “Would you give me a kiss?”

She looked somewhat stunned, and said “I don’t know you…no I won’t give you a kiss.”

The speaker thanked her and turning to the audience said, “Those who think I just lost please raise your hands.” And hands when up all around the room.

“You are wrong,” declared the speaker, “I broke even!” Then he explained, “Did I have a kiss when I asked her to kiss me? Of course not, that’s why I asked for one, you can’t lose what you don’t have. When I asked her for a kiss, one of two things could have happened. First, she could have kissed me—in which case, I’d have won. Second, she could have refused to give me kiss, which she did—thus I broke even. When we break even what happens? We gain insight into how we can do things better the next time we try.”

Applying this more directly, he continued, “Never take the attitude that you’ve lost anything when someone refuses to buy your product, endorse your idea or set an appointment to see you. You didn’t have the sale, endorsement or appoint when you started—therefore you simply broke even! Breaking even means you just move on to the next person on your list! If you don’t get anything else out of this talk remember that in everything you try to do—you always start out even—therefore you always either win or break even because you can’t loose what you haven’t got!”
Have A GREAT and PROFITABLE WEEK!
Robert Hidde
bob@confidentliving.com