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Transcription
Winning requires dedication and discipline. Successful people like Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods are dedicated and disciplined. Self-confidence is important for success. The speaker used personal development, books, audios, and seminars to build self-confidence. Associating with successful people and seeking their advice can also contribute to success. Like attracts like, so it's important to choose the right people to be around. This principle applies to children as well. So, you know, winning requires dedication and discipline, you guys. You've got to be really dedicated and have discipline if you're going to be successful. You think of all the greats in life, right? I mean, I'm a big sports nut, so you think of people like Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, you name it. Anybody that's really Roger Clemens, et cetera, et cetera. There's so many great examples. Today, Tiger Woods in golf. The one thing that these people have in common is they're incredibly dedicated and committed to what they do, and they have extreme discipline, all right? They really are disciplined, which is what allows them to take whatever God-given ability they have and to turn it into something really extraordinary, right? You've got to have dedication. You've got to have discipline. There's no way to get to the top of anything, of any field, without it. It's not possible, okay? So you might as well know that going in. You're going to have to develop that. If that's not been part of your M.O., then you're going to have to work on that. So persistence, focus, tenacity, having a clear vision of where we are going has much to do with our self-confidence, okay, because doing well has a lot to do with you being self-confident because if you're not self-confident, you're not going to make the attempts, okay? So I was, in fact, really self-conscious, okay, shy, kind of an introvert. I was the kind of guy, when I would walk, you know, I remember when I was a kid, you know, I was younger, even when I was in college, I'd be walking down the mall and I might see somebody coming towards me that I knew, right? And I didn't, you know, a lot of times I didn't know what to say to people, so I would just like step into the store and wait until they passed because if they hadn't seen me, I didn't want to have to talk to them because I didn't know what to say to them, so I would just avoid it, avoid even talking to them. I still have a tendency to do that. I mean, I'm not anywhere like I used to be, but I was like that, so for me to build a business like this where I'm speaking to people and all that, it's really kind of, you know, a lot of people that I grew up with and people that I knew going to school with, I mean, when they find out what I do for a living today, they just can't believe that I do this because they didn't see that in me, so the point I'm making is no matter if you see yourself shy or introverted or not a salesperson or whatever, you can change all that if you want to. If you want to be successful, you can make the changes you need to be successful. It's a choice. Nobody's born one way and that's the way they're stuck. You believe that, you stay there. You change your beliefs, you change it. It's how it works, okay? So this is how I developed self-confidence. This is a process I used to develop self-confidence. What I did is I really dedicated myself and committed to a continuous personal development. That's like reading books, listening to tapes, all that kind of stuff. I'll talk about that as I go through here. As I grew, my time management, my sales skills, my leadership ability, I began to feel like I could be successful and I therefore felt more motivated to work harder. I started really believing that I could succeed. The more I believed to succeed, the easier it was for me to stay focused and to work hard. This led to becoming more successful than I initially ever thought possible, just having that kind of focus. These are some of the things I did, okay? I read, I don't know how many books. I mean, I've read a lot of books. I'm kind of a voracious reader, read well over a thousand books on all kinds of things, having the success from biographies of successful people, sales leadership, books on people skills, books on time management, books on overcoming the fear of what others think about me, books on prospecting, on conversation, on just winning. There's going to be a list of books and audios that I've read or listened to on our website and on this program. So you'll have all those things I've read. So if you want to read them, you'll be able to read all the things I've read. I've read a lot. I don't know if you want to read as many, but a lot of the stuff that I've read, I've put into this program. So you're going to get a lot of it. You're just going through this program. I listened to audio recordings, having to do with success also. I turned my car into a success university, what I called it, you know, the success university mobile. Once I decided that I really wanted to win financially in my life, I very rarely listened to the radio or watched TV. Instead, I invested that time in growing me and my self-confidence. So listening to these different audios, having to do with success, this allowed me to stay super focused on my goals and dreams and to feel like I could ultimately win. See what happens, you start listening to different things on success, you know, what successful people do. You start acting like a successful person, you're going to start becoming a successful person, you know. So the more you know about how people in your field, you know, what they think like and what they operate like and what they do, the greater the probability you're going to be able to repeat that success, okay? You start doing the same things they're doing, you're going to start getting the same results, possibly even better results than them, depending on you and who you are. The next thing I invested thousands of dollars in books, audios, seminars of the most prominent success teachers. I've been to all kinds of seminars over the last 25 years. Those seminars were a godsend to me to hear firsthand from the great leaders and winners in business. It motivated me to want to be like them. I'd watch, you know, I got to the point where I went to so many of these, I could actually visually see myself up there doing that someday. That was actually an intention of mine. Once I started doing this, I thought, man, it would be great to make a living teaching people and coaching people and mentoring people and doing that and be able to do make a great living like that. It just seemed like such a great thing to do. Some of you might be thinking, man, you're crazy. I don't want to public speak. That's the scariest thing on earth. But I didn't really think like that in the beginning, so I started doing it and getting into it. I started seeing how much they inspired me and how much better I felt and how it impacted my life and how I was doing better because of the thing I was learning from them. I just thought that would be really awesome to be able to do that for other people, which is what I do for a living today. I made it a point to associate with success-oriented people, especially those more successful than me. I think it's really important that you kind of elevate the kind of people you associate with and really make an effort to make friends, meet and be around people that are great in whatever it is you do, especially in Primerica. I'd make it a point to call people up or try to have lunch or go hear them speak or talk to them whenever I could. If I met somebody that was doing really well, I wanted to be around them because there's a natural law that says like attracts like. I figured the more I thought like and acted like successful people did, I would automatically attract those kinds of people in my life, and I have, and so will you. Even today, I'm doing very well today, but so many of my friends, and I seek them out intentionally. I make an effort to make friends with them and to get to know them. These are people that are infinitely more successful than I am. I've got some friends that have built great companies that are worth $200,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 a billion dollars, right, or more, and I make an effort to get to know these people and befriend them because I want to keep growing. I want to keep being stressed. There's always another place to go, not that it's just doing well financially, but the fact is these people, they're really interesting to be around. They're really fun to get to know. They have experiences that I love hearing about, and they have had experiences that are helping me in what I'm trying to do. They're the kind of people, when you make friends with them, they'll coach you, they'll mentor you. What I've found about successful people is that if you're seriously committed to being successful and you actually put forth the effort, that these people are more than happy to give you advice. The ones that are the most successful are more willing because they don't feel threatened, and they remember when they were struggling or when they were trying to get it going and how most everybody's had some help and mentorship along the way, and then they want to reciprocate, and they know there's enough to go around, and it's really an amazing thing. Don't be shy about asking people for help and asking people for advice, but don't do it unless you're going to act on it. Make sure you act on what they tell you. If you have children, I'm sure you're very concerned about who they hang out with. I know Jan and I were ultra-predictive of our children, Dak and Janae, and we really were careful about who they associated with. We made sure that their families were good families, the kids were good kids. We would make it a point to meet their friends and meet their friends' parents whenever possible, monitor everywhere they went, who they would be there with. We were very, very, very, very protective of who they were around because I understood that principle of like attracts like, and whoever you're around, you become like those people. When you start hanging around a certain group of people, you start talking like those people, and you start acting like those people. That could be good if they're the right kind of people, and that can be scary if they're the wrong kind of people. If you have young children, wow, is it important to make sure they do that. It's so true for yourself as well, even if you're an adult. Step back and look at the people you're around the most. What are they like? Where are they going? What are they doing with their life? Are they motivated? Are they moving in the right direction? Are they good people? Very important. We believe that we become like those we frequently associate with, and we wanted our kids to become great people. It makes sense. We would make sure they associate with great kids from great families, just like you should associate with great people who have great families. By the way, Dak and Janae are now 26 and 27 years old, and it worked. I'm here to tell you it worked. Today themselves are very selective of the company that they keep today, electing to associate with other young people who are committed to winning their lives, who are moving someplace and want to do something special. We talk a lot about that, about their friends and who they associate and what they're like. Sometimes they get frustrated with their friends because their friends are not thinking the right way, and they just have some pretty big aspirations, so they're always looking to meet and be around people who are winners, just like I did, just like Jan did. Who do you currently associate with? Guess what? That's what you're like. Whether you like to admit it or not, you're like them. You act like, think like, and you're very similar to those people you spend the most time with. You may not be objective enough to see it, but I promise you anybody looking from the outside in, they're going to see that. The question is, is it working for you? Is it allowing you to grow and create the life you dream of? Are you really moving in the direction of your dreams? If you're not, what's the point? What's the point? Five, the level of your personal development will determine the level of your success and income. If you constantly grow yourself in all areas, you're going to constantly improve what you attract and who you attract into your life. If you'll take notice, generally the most successful people are the ones who actively sought to grow their competence in their chosen field. The ones that are always getting better do. In Primerica, there are those who are coasting, kind of just trying to get by. They've done okay, and they're coasting, who've leveled out their income, and then those who never stop trying to grow and get better. The other day, I was talking to a good friend of mine, Bill Whittle. I called him to congratulate him on the terrific job he was doing. The month prior, he just had a tremendous month. Bill's a multimillionaire. He might be worth as much as $100 million. He's got to be between 50 and 100. He's been around and been making big money for 20 years, $20 million plus a year for 20 years. I'm sure he's invested well. He's done very well. He could retire if he wants to. He doesn't have to work anymore. He's been in Primerica for over 25 years, and nobody works harder at personal development than Bill does. One of the things I noticed, every meeting I've ever been to, he's taking copious notes, always willing to learn from whoever's speaking, even the young upcoming stars. He doesn't, for a minute, believe he knows it all. As a result, his business is one of the fastest growing in Primerica. Bill's the poster child for what a never-ending commitment to personal development can do in your life. He inspires me by example. I love being in business with people like Bill. That's the kind of people you want to be associated with. When you find somebody like Bill, you want to make sure you are proactive and go out of your way to get to know that person or those people and build a relationship with them. Listen, this is the conclusion of this portion of the CD on mental toughness. I think there's some great ideas. Hopefully, you really got inspired by that. I know just me sharing this and thinking about the things has really inspired me and reminds me of what I need to do, what I need to think about. In the end, you're already good enough to be great at Primerica. Probably the thing that will set you back and prevent you more than anything is a level of mental toughness you have. One of the things I found in working with people is people rarely ever do what they say they're going to do. I've been in business now for 27 years, and in that 27 years, it is unusual, it's very rare to run into anybody that ever does what they say they're going to do. So you're going to be constantly disappointed by people. If you're not mentally tough, it's going to drive you out of business, okay? But every now and then, you find the right kind of people and you associate with the right kind of people and you attract the right kind of people, man, and magic happens when that happens. So make sure you're always focused on growing your mental toughness.
