Dan Waldschmidt's Blog, page 12

Quit. Tomorrow.

When you feel like giving up, do it tomorrow. When you have finally decided that you’ve done all you can do, and make the call to quit — put it off until tomorrow. 

Wanting to quit isn’t something that’s ever going to go away. 

The harder you struggle and the bigger your goals, the more you’re going to feel the overwhelming pressure to quit. 

No matter how tough you are, life is tougher. 

Only the toughest of the Navy soldiers make it into SEAL training. You have to be the best-of-the-best just to apply. You have to be mentally tough and physically rough — a strong body and mind. 

Out of these warriors, only a handful make it past a few days.

More than 80% of them quit. They ring out. Walk away from SEAL training. The toughest fighting men on the planet. And most of them decide to quit. 

So it’s no wonder that you think about the exact, same thing. 

You can’t help it. Life comes at you in painfully unpredictable ways. At the worst possible times, you are tested and tried. 

Your emotions are wrecked. Your will to win is pushed beyond your limits. You look around you and ask yourself if anything you’re doing matters.  

Will anyone notice if you just decide to walk away?

Those feelings are natural and universal. We all get scared and tired. 

You won’t avoid those thoughts. You can’t always avoid the circumstances that drive those feelings. 

You can decide your response. You can talk yourself through the pain and frustration you’re feeling.

Tell yourself you’re going to quit tomorrow. We just need to get through today. A few more hours. A bit more agony. You can make it. 

You can do whatever needs to be done. Especially if you know that there is hope right around the corner. Especially if you know that your suffering is soon to be a thing of the past. 

Quit tomorrow. Make it through today. Whatever it takes.

They Aren’t Idiots Because They See It Differently.

It’s easy to assume that because you see something a certain way, that everyone else around you should see it that way as well.  Your perspective can be deceiving.

Make no mistake, your view on the world is absolutely correct. For you.

How you interpret the world around you is a result of your life experience and your current environment.

But how you perceive reality isn’t how everyone else perceives reality. Even for those who live in the same environment.

That’s the deceiving part.

Your automatic assumption–your subconscious–is that how you see reality is the only way to see reality. That what you see and think and believe is the only correct way to see and think and believe.

That anyone who disagrees with you is self-serving, selfish, or just an idiot.

In truth, they’re just living out their perception. Based on their experience and environment.

It’s a different worldview than yours. A view that automatically guarantees that what they see and feel and interpret is different than yours.

Even though what is happening is universal.

Everyone has a different interpretation. A different perspective. A different meaning.

Here’s what’s even scarier. Both of you are acting in the best possible way given your perspective. You both think your right. Even though you feel like you’re the only one who is right.

You will limit your ability to be successful by making conclusions based on just your perspective of the world.

Just being aware that another person has a reality of their own will help you be more effective.

You’ll be a more powerful champion of your message.

More believable. More impactful. You will achieve better results.

Which is what you want. You just can’t understand why they don’t see it like you do.

It’s because your perspective isn’t obvious. To them. And it won’t be unless you’re willing to take the time to get to know them and understand their view of the world.

And then communicate how your perspective helps them get closer to where they want to be.

Remember that. They aren’t idiots because they don’t see it like you. They’re just like you. Except completely different. Don’t forget that.

You’ll make more money, be happier, and be able to rally more people to your cause — when you understand that each person sees life a little bit differently.

“You Can Do It”…

She was all done. Frustrated. Angry. And more than a little bit annoyed.

She was 45 and fed up.  Determined to make some changes.

Mary Kathlyn sat at her kitchen table making a list of all the things that held her back while working in a “man’s” world for the 25 years. She made another list of the lessons she had learned. She was good at direct sales and had gone toe-to-toe with the best in the industry — but she wasn’t happy.

She wasn’t being treated fairly.

A man with half her experience and a third her skill was making more than twice what she was earning. And only because she was a woman. That’s it. Picked on. Diminished. Teased.

Over the last few decades of rising to the top of every sales job she had ever taken, Mary had learned how tough it was to be a woman in a “man’s world”.

Now, as she sat there thinking, she wanted to turn those lists of lessons into a book about business management.

How could she help other women just like her?

But as she continued writing  and as her lists grew, Mary Kathlyn realized that she had put together a business plan for her “dream company.”

There was just one problem: nobody believed her. Not the banks. Not even the business leaders she had created millions of dollars for.

That made her even more determined to pull it off.

Deep in her subconscious lay an attitude of relentless determination instilled in her by her mom when she was just a kid.

When she was 7, Mary Kathlyn would have to wake herself up, get herself dressed and fed.

And then dress and feed her father. He had been suffering from tuberculosis for years and couldn’t even get out of bed.

When school was over, she’d go straight home. No hanging out with friends. No after school activities. She would clean the house, do her school work, and then cook dinner for her father. All of this while her mother worked sixteen-hour shifts to provide for the family.

A tough mom. With an even tougher will to win.

And some nights, Mary Kathlyn didn’t know how to cook dinner. So she would call her mom at work to get directions.

As a young child, she could cook complex dishes like potato soup and chili. Every time she had to call for help, her mother was loving and patient with young Mary and would explain step by step how to do each task, each time ending with encouragement.

“You can do it!”

Words uttered so often to her as a child, Mary Kathlyn would find herself repeating them to herself when she needed to push on.

“You can do it.”

Unable to afford college after graduation, the next best thing for a woman to do in 1935 was to get married. And so she did.

At 17, Mary found herself walking down the aisle. She gave her husband three children before he joined the military to fight in World War II leaving her the sole provider for her children — financially and emotionally.

Through sheer exhaustion, Mary Kathlyn managed to make it work. And work well.

She had learned from her mom how to make thing work when you needed to. Full-time job. Children. Taking care of the home.

She did it all with apparent ease.

When her husband returned from the war, he told Mary Kathlyn he wanted out. A divorce. He was leaving her. No explanation. No therapy. Nothing. Just gone.

Heartbroken, Mary Kathlyn knew she didn’t have time to sit around and cry. She had children to provide for and now knew she needed a job with flexibility and a decent wage. She needed to make more money. As soon as possible.

She found what she needed in direct sales. She was good at it. Really good at it. She knew how to deliver an in-home presentation that was professional and persuasive.

In fact, she was so good that she was the person they picked to train the other sales people.

“Do what Mary is doing,” management told new recruits.

But being awesome at what she did didn’t mean Mary got more money.

She quickly found herself frustrated having to repeatedly training the men who would eventually take the promotion she had worked so hard for. Men who were less experienced–and bringing the company less money–were making more money than her because they “had families to take care of.”

She wanted to scream at the top of her lungs, “I have a family too!”

Instead, she sat quietly, taking mental notes, and continuing to do what was expected of her–for twenty five years–until she finally retired.

Creating lists and lessons at a kitchen table.

But that didn’t last long for her: “My retirement was less than a week old, and I already knew why so many obituaries include the phrase ‘He retired last year.’”

Mary Kathlyn wanted to work, but not like she had been.

She was nervous. But confident. “You can do it.”

About a decade earlier, Mary Kathlyn met someone who would be pivotal in her future.

As she was pitching her sales presentation, she noticed all the beautiful faces staring back at her. They had amazing skin. Flawless complexions.

It stuck in her mind.

When her presentation was over, all the radiant faces gathered around the hostess, Ova Spoonmore, hoping to get a sample of her beauty cream.

Mary Kathlyn was intrigued. And even more impressed when Ova offered Mary Kathlyn a sample of one of the products.

The son of a tanner, Ova used the same softening chemicals in her facial cream that she saw her father use in his work–softening the harsh chemical smells with fragrances and creams.

After sampling the product, Mary Kathlyn quickly became a believer and a loyal customer.

Years later, sitting at that kitchen table, Mary Kathlyn again thought about Ova and her facial cream.

This was her “dream company”.  The products Ova had spent years perfecting would be the perfect start.

“You can do it,” she told herself.

“Beauty by Mary Kay” was born.

She bought the rights to the cosmetics she had used for years. And began to put the pieces in place.  But just as she was about to launch, tragedy struck. Again.

Her second husband died unexpectedly of a heart attack a few weeks later. Mary Kay, being no stranger to loss, had to make the tough decision of whether to continue or fold.

Her children were already grown.

Could she really do this by herself?

She felt lost without her late husband. Her partner. Her friend. Her buddy. He was the numbers guy. She was just going to handle sales and recruitment.

The day of the funeral, Mary Kay sat down with her children and decided. They would press forward.

Her 20-year old son, Richard, was immediately behind his mother. He agreed to quit his job, take a pay cut, and move to Dallas to help get his mother’s dream off the ground.

Mary Kay’s eldest son Ben had a family of his own that he couldn’t uproot.

He was out. But he still believed.

Giving his mother a check for every penny he had been saving since high school.

As he handed her the check for $4,500, he threw back the words his mother so often used.

“You can do it!”

Her children, encouraging her the same way she had always encouraged them, made it easy for Mary Kay to refuse to dwell on life’s setbacks: dead husbands, dead-end jobs, pay inequality, zero recognition.

Other women had also been dealt similar hands. But it’s what she did with those experiences that made the difference. Mary Kay decided to take the cards she was dealt and reshuffle.

Defeat was not an option. It never had been.

As she would tell her sales reps: “Every problem is an opportunity for massive success.”

Mary Kay knew she could do anything. She dove into making the most successful business she could imagine—for everyone she employed. She wanted every woman to succeed. And took special care to make sure her business plan didn’t encourage stepping on other women to get to the top.

Direct in-home sales. By women. For women. The business model was simple and empowering.

Every consultant’s success was based only on their own effort. There were no set rules about how much a woman could make. No limits. She made sure awesomeness was within reach of every Mary Kay Consultant.

“You can do it.”

The same is true for you.

The problems you’re going through right now are an opportunity for you to achieve greatness.

That frustration you feel inside you is the fuel driving you toward your destiny.

Your experience isn’t an accident. And it shouldn’t be wasted.

You’re going to have problems. Life is going to be unfair. You are going to face obstacles that seem impossible. In your moment of weakness and stress, use the lessons you’ve learned to create the future that you desire.

Do it better. Be the catalyst of change that enables others to realize a better future for themselves alongside you.

What you’re going through right now, isn’t an accident.

You’re being tested for a reason. You’re being trained. You’re learning.  Use your experience to create the future that you desire.

“You can do it.”

And 50 years later, Mary Kay cosmetics is doing it. Empowering more than 3.5 million women on 5 continents in 35 countries.

This year alone, those millions of women will sell more than $4 billion worth of Ova’s face cream.

“The definition of successful people is simply ordinary people with extraordinary determination.” 

For Mary Kay, it started at a kitchen table. Frustrated. Angry. And looking for answers.

Where will your story begin?

Avoiding It Is Killing You.

You can avoid long enough to get away from your problems.

You can’t avoid good enough to stay away from your deepest, darkest fears.

In truth, you’re not avoiding failure. You’re delaying your opportunity to be awesome.

Whatever you’re avoiding — know this —  it is an opportunity for you to make yourself better.

That problem you’re avoiding might just be the one personal flaw that’s been holding you back from achieving the next level of your success.
That person you’re avoiding might be the relationship that makes you the person you’ve been working so hard to become.

No one likes misery. No one needs more chaos or frustration.

You avoid for the right reasons. You want more of the good stuff. And less of the bad stuff.

The problem is that by avoiding your problems and certain people, you delay the bad stuff. You don’t cure it. You don’t solve it. You don’t fix it, mend it, improve it, or make it better.

None of that happens. You just delay your head-on confrontation with what you have been dreading most. You’re just filling your soul up with fear. You’re adding negative expectation to your life.

You’re delaying progress. Stymieing breakthrough. Killing your momentum.

This bad habit of avoiding people and problems will only serve to rob you of your dreams and make it ridiculously slow to achieve even small success.

Confrontation doesn’t have to be ugly or humiliating. You will feel relieved that it is over and excited by the possibility of putting that behind you.

So take the next step. Do that thing you’ve been avoiding doing. Make success a priority.

Convincing Yourself To Finally Get Started.

You want the results of changing, but you don’t want to do the hard work that changing demands.

You’re not alone. That is how everyone is wired.

Avoid pain. At all costs. Find pleasure, if it’s not too painful.

So what do you do when you want to change, but you’re not sure how to get started?

You don’t know what to do to trick yourself into taking those very first few steps.

For example, you know you want to get more things done in a day, but when your alarm goes off in the morning you turn it off and go back to sleep. You wanted to get up, but you feel powerless to get started when it matters most.

It’s not just getting up earlier in the morning, it’s how you’ve abandoned your plans to eat healthier, to surround yourself with better friends, to learn something new, to create more revenue, and be a better version of yourself.

In your head, you want to do it. But when it comes to actually getting started, you always seem to find a way to procrastinate. It’s almost automatic.

The only way to change is by applying leverage.

By using that leverage to subconsciously convince yourself that it’s more dangerous to not get started than it is to procrastinate another moment.

And what is that leverage? It’s what you really want. That thing that automatically overrides the pain of getting started.

That motivation that trumps the frustration and fear of trying something new.

It’s you reminding yourself of the harsh reality of your inactivity.

You’re going to die sooner than you need to if you’re not healthy.

You’re never going to be able to live the life of your dreams if you don’t start saving and investing and managing your money.

You’re going to be miserable and unfulfilled unless you start living a life of passion and purpose.

You might know what that leverage for you is right now. Chances are, you don’t.

You’ve been avoiding thinking about it.

You want to succeed, but you don’t want to think about the negative consequences of not succeeding. By avoiding the subject altogether, you get to feel the hope of being successful and avoid the scary reality that you’re never going to actually get there.

But what if you stopped avoiding that scary reality?

What if you let it chew its way into your soul?

Instead of avoiding the subject, you use it as leverage to get started. To build momentum. And to keep that momentum in spite of the pain and fear and stress you feel on a daily basis.

That how to convince yourself to finally get started.

The Power Of Small Choices.

The path to better outcomes begins with making better choices. Not big choices. Not life-changing decisions. The small stuff.

Choices like when you get out of bed and what fuel you put inside your body. The decision to learn something new or to waste your free time because “you deserve it”.

What you earn is a result of what you do. What you do is decided by the choices you make.

Better results are really just a matter of you making better choices.

Which is fairly obvious to see but difficult to change when your emotions are involved.

Revenge feels better than forgiveness. At least at first.
Entertainment feels better than work. Until you’re tired of being broke.
Doing whatever you want whenever you want feels better than living a disciplined life. Until you reap the negative consequences.

The tiny decisions you make today become the building blocks of your life. And if you’re not careful, you’ll end up with an unsafe foundation for launching towards success.

You’ll leave holes and weak spots where you need strength and leverage most.

You get to control all of this. Every choice is yours to make.

Every new decision is an opportunity for you to move closer to where you want to be.

It doesn’t need to be anything life-changing. In fact, the best decisions aren’t all that noticeable.

It’s you knowing where you want to go and making small tweaks to make sure your dream stays alive.

You won’t get a chance to mess up the big stuff if you aren’t already mastering the small stuff.

That’s the power of small choices.

Your Drug Of Choice.

It doesn’t need to be true. You just need to believe it.

That’s when everything changes. Because belief is a drug.

It changes how you think, how your body behaves, your energy, how you feel, what you see, and every other part of your existence.

Your belief is a pain reliever. And a hallucinogen.

What you believe becomes your future.

It might seem crazy to everyone else around you, but it’s very real to you.

What you believe to be true is possible. So is the opposite. If you don’t think something is possible, no one can convince you otherwise.

That’s the power of belief.

What you believe, happens. It’s not just a matter of coincidence. It’s a matter of will.

Your belief is what forces you to create that reality.

It’s the drug that gives you creativity and strength.

It creates a new perception of reality that motivates and inspires you. 

You are right now what you have believed in the past. You will become what you believe right now.

You can’t help it. You have to believe something. Here are a few beliefs worth being addicted to:

I already have all I need to be successful.
My intentions have an effect on my reality.
The hard times are temporary.
I am constantly getting better because I never stop learning.
Failure can be good some times.
My past does not automatically determine my future.
I can change anytime I want.
Hard work and resilience are rewarded.
I can use any situation to get closer to where I need to be.
My positive thoughts make me powerful.
I don’t anyone else’s approval or permission to be awesome.
Tomorrow will be better than today.
There are plenty of opportunities for me to achieve success.
I don’t have it any worse than everyone else around me.
I shouldn’t take everything personally.
Being bitter won’t improve my current circumstances.
I am in control of my life.
Achieving success is simply a matter of choice.
Anyone can be successful if they work hard enough.
I can do whatever I set my mind to do.
No matter how bad things get, I can always turn them around.
Worry is a decision. A bad one.
I value my time and energy.
Other people respect me because of what I bring to the game.
Feeling bad motivates me to change things.
I decide how I think and act. In every situation.
Success comes to those who pursue their passion relentlessly
Today is that second chance I have been asking for.

What you believe drugs you. Fuels you. Empowers you. It determines your future.

That’s because your belief is a drug.

It’s controlling you right now. Deciding whether your future is full of promise and hope. Or whether you languish in self-pity or misery.

Your beliefs are the most powerful weapon you have.

What do you believe?

Learning Your Way To Awesome.

Chris Gardner, barely older than a toddler, hadn’t grasped the concept that he was living in a foster home. He only knew that his mother and his stepfather had disappeared one day and he was living with strangers.

For three years, he had been in that home. Close to the end of the third year, a familiar face started visiting the foster home and making homemade candy for the children. She visited over and over again. Wrapping himself in the comfort and familiarity of her smell and her loving eyes, young Chris felt like he should know her, but he couldn’t place from her. He exchanged glances with the mysterious lady, thinking she was beautiful. As she handed him a piece of molasses candy one day, the realization clicked.

She was his mother.

Bettye Jean had been sent to prison by her abusive husband, Freddie Triplett, for welfare fraud. She was receiving benefits and also working to provide for her children. One day after a fight, Freddie got mad and turned her in. She was taken from her kids and jailed.

When she was released and got Chris and rest of her children back, she ran straight back to the man who had put her behind bars. Freddie hated Chris and his siblings, telling them, “I ain’t your goddamned daddy.” 

The verbal abuse was unrelenting. Drunk and emboldened, Freddie beat Chris’s mom on a daily basis.  She took it — doing her best to protect the kids. Chris worried that Freddie would kill her.

And then it happened.

One night, his older sister woke him up with a piercing scream. He found his mother lying in a pool of her blood with a 2×4 board stuck into the side of her head. Freddie had finally done it.

The tough mom that she was, Bettye Jean only spent one night in the hospital and kicked Freddie out of the house when she came home. But a few days later, he was back on the couch, beer in hand, screaming at Bettye.  She stood there. Still. Taking the punishment.

But this time she had a plan. Bettye Jean made sure all four kids were out of the house. Freddie was as predictable as he was abusive. When he came staggering home drunk, Bettye Jean waited for him to pass out on the couch.

She lit their house on fire and walked out.

In the middle of the blaze, Freddie woke up and was able to put the fire out. He called the police on Bettye Jean and again had her put in jail. This time she was sentenced to four years more years.

At six years old, Chris Gardner promised himself that when he grew up and had kids, he would never leave them. But right now, he was all alone. Again placed into foster care. Disconnected from that beautiful lady who handed him that molasses candy he loved.

The cycle only continued when his mom got out of prison. Back at Freddie’s house. Shouting. Beatings. Violence. Chaos. Unloved. A teenager without direction or support

And then if his life wasn’t already miserable enough, he experienced a traumatic event that would haunt him for years to come.

It started with a knock on his door.

It was a local man in his apartment complex. Chris had a small job cleaning up and got to know a few of the people he lived with. Chris let him inside the apartment, oddly noticing his limp and the unpleasant odor that followed him. The man he thought was his friend overpowered him and raped him, not once, but twice, before getting up and leaving a shocked and violated Chris Gardner laying face down on the bathroom floor.

For three years, that day haunted Chris.

One day, he saw the familiar limp and smelled that familiar unpleasant odor. Chris followed the man into an ally with a cinderblock in his hand. Turning around, the man realized who Chris was. He wasn’t able to say anything before Chris smashed the cinderblock down on his head. Again and again. And again.

“Got ya,” Chris said.

He walked away not sure if the man was dead or alive.

But he was ready to move on with his life. He was determined to make something of himself. He enlisted in the Navy. And decided that he wanted to be in the medical industry — where he could make good money and finally be happy.

But he found himself struggling financially. He was recruited by world renowned heart surgeon, Robert Ellis, to join the research team at University of California Medical Center. Chris soaked up information like a sponge. He worked determinedly and even made a name for himself in the medical research industry, but his paychecks weren’t enough to cover his bills.

He was broke. Chris wanted more. He had a wife to support. And big dreams to achieve.

One day, while walking to his car, he saw a man in a Ferrari looking for a parking spot. Chris told the man he would give him his own parking space if he could ask him a few questions.

Chris asked two questions that would change his life.

“What do you do?” and “How do you do it?”

The man in the Ferrari was Bob Bridges, a wealthy stockbroker. Chris and Bob quickly became friends and Bridges was able to open some doors for the struggling medical researcher. That was enough for Chris to leave his unfulfilling job in the medical field and try his hand at being a broker.

It was not an easy feat for him. He worked on commission only and had to work long days to meet the quotas he had set in his head. He was tired — but determined. As he thought about his mother working tirelessly to provide for him, he knew he could do it, too.

But he also picked up his mom’s bad relationship habits. He was abusive to his wife and unfaithful. Things began to unravel when he had an affair with a woman named Jackie.

It started as mostly drug binges and sex.

But shortly after they started seeing each other, Jackie found herself pregnant. Remembering that promise he had made to himself when he was six, Chris left his wife to be with his girlfriend and son. He wanted to do better than his father and stepfather had done. Still, he was trapped in the cycle from his childhood.

One day, when his son was almost two, a fight ensued. Chris grabbed Jackie by the wrists to stop her from hitting him. When he let her go she fell into the bushes. Hurt and angry, Jackie called the police for domestic abuse. When the police showed up, they ran Chris’s name through their database and ended up arresting him for outstanding parking tickets.  

When he got out of his short stint in jail, Jackie left him and their son. Chris, now a single father, had to worry about how to continue on that path he had started to get his own Ferrari with a two-year-old in tow. Even when he couldn’t afford a place for the two of them to live. Chris would not give up on being a father.

In a job that only paid commission, Chris was homeless.

But not hopeless. He pushed forward, taking every punch thrown in his direction. Some of them hit him square in the jaw, others he ducked and dodged. He was determined to make it work. He remembered the words of his mother:  “You can only depend on yourself. The cavalry ain’t coming.”  

Using any money he made to keep his baby boy in day care, Chris worked vigorously for success. His days were longer than his successful counterparts. He started earlier. He finished later. He made more calls. And fewer breaks. He wanted it more. And his determination did not go unnoticed.

Chris caught the attention of Gary Shemano, the head of Bear Stearns’ San Francisco office. Gary was so impressed with Chris’s  drive and relentless work ethic, that he was offered him a job with better pay and a clothing allowance. It was an offer that was too good to refuse.

It was the break he had been working for.

Chris used the clothing allowance to move himself and Chris Jr. out of homelessness and into an apartment of their own. He put Chris Jr. into a good day care facility. And he kept pushing. He kept learning. He asked questions. He took the answers and he ran with them.

He was determined to make his million dollars. Growing up, the only millionaires that had brown skin were singers and basketball players. Chris Gardner knew he couldn’t sing or shoot hoops. He remembered what his mother had told him so many times growing up, “Son, if you believe you can do it, you will.”

So Gardner continued to believe. He continued to ask “what do you do?” and “How do you do it?” Whenever he ran across someone who was succeeding, he asked questions. More importantly, he listened to the answers. He studied. He pushed. He worked.

Learn. Improve. Learn. Improve. Learn. Improve.

Chris transformed himself from newbie stockbroker into a heavyweight financial professional.

“The man was like a sponge who always wanted to be around smart people,” Gary Shemano recalls. “He wanted to know how people had succeeded and learned from them — learn how they did it.”

He soon earned the confidence of management all the way up to chairman, Ace Greenberg. Eventually leaving Bear’s San Francisco office for its New York headquarters. Chris moved from picking stocks for wealthy investors to putting together complex investment strategies for institutional portfolio managers.

It was a long tough road. But he had achieved his dream of becoming a millionaire.

And his story didn’t stop there. Chris Gardner could have easily gotten lost in the cycle of violence. He could have easily let someone else raise his son while he sought success. That was not in the cards for him. Neither was continuing to work for someone else.

It was time to step out on his own.

Starting out in an office set up in his tiny apartment, Chris started Gardner Rich & Co. in downtown Chicago. Using all the lessons he had learned from his struggle up to this point, he built it into an investment juggernaut that he sold for million dollars a decade later.

And even that was not enough. Chris opened an even larger firm, called Christopher Gardner Holdings, with offices in Chicago, New York City, and San Francisco. It’s his vehicle for giving back. For helping other troubled and abused young, inner-city men.

His inspiring, life story was played by Will Smith in the movie, The Pursuit of Happyness,  that generated almost $170 million in revenue.

He was successful because he was obsessed with learning.

He beat poverty because he learned how to make money
He beat the cycle of abuse because he learned how to be a good dad.
He beat homelessness because he learned how to be creative.

He beat sexual abuse. He beat complacency. He beat his demons.

And all because he was willing to learn. And not just willing. He craved it. He depended on it. It was the secret to his success in making money and in being the father that his son needed.

Every problem was an opportunity to learn and improve. Every obstacle could be thwarted by learning and improving.

The same is true for you. You’re going to make mistakes. You’re going to find yourself in situations where life chews you up and spits you out.

Your mission is to learn and improve.

You don’t need to get it right the first time. Or even the second or third time. But you do need to learn from your mistakes and figure out a way to make sure you get to where you want to be.

That’s the secret to breakthrough. Continual improvement. An obsession with being a better version of yourself.

Chris Gardner continues to make a difference — helping others to learn and improve their lives. His organization provides homes to the working poor, giving them hope and a decent standard of living. Because of his outreach, he has received numerous awards including the “Father of the Year” award from the National Fatherhood Initiative.

“I find myself saying over and over: ‘Baby steps count. But you’ve always got to be moving forward,’ “ says Gardner, “Hope is all you need”.

That’s a lesson worth learning.

The Movie Your Soul Plays.

It is not an accident if you find yourself constantly nervous and frustrated. And it’s not a coincidence if you wake up tired but inspired. 

Motivation is a pretty simple formula. What you put into your mind fuels the direction of your life. 

If you spend your time listening to frantic, worrisome political news, you will find yourself frantic and worried. 

If you devote a portion of your day to new ideas from your favorite author, you’ll see hope and opportunity — in spite of how your current day is unfolding. 

What goes into your eyeballs is the movie your soul plays.

What goes into your ears is the soundtrack of your conquest. 

Which is why it matters that you surround yourself with people who push you into doing things that make you better. 

It matters that you avoid negative, angry people. You are absorbing their attitudes and adopting their outlook on the world around you. 

Fear breeds more fear. Panic and rage breed panic and rage. You lose your motivation or find it based on the people you let influence you. 

You get to choose what you think about.

You get to choose what you achieve. You get to choose who you love and how much money you make. 

Just don’t think that those results are an accident. 

Don’t make the mistake of believing that it doesn’t matter what you think about along the way. 

You won’t rise higher than what you observe and absorb. 

Every thought matters. Every conversation matters. Every friend matters. 

Protect what you allow inside your mind. 

Success isn’t an accident. Greatness is a choice. Focus is a habit.

You Won’t Win By Judging Other People.

You can’t motivate people when you’re judging them. You can’t help people or get them to change if you’re labeling them and putting them in a box.

One of the key reasons why businesses struggle to grow is a lack of empathy.

Instead of loving prospects and getting to understand them where they are, business leaders automatically assume that the person not buying from them is an idiot.

By the way, that is the same reason why churches fail. And associations that do good work.

Shame and fear and peer pressure are not long-term motivators. To sell something to someone, you need to first appreciate their viewpoint of the world. To deliver marketing that inspires action, you have to speak to that person’s soul.

It’s more than you executing your sales process or running through your business strategy.

No amount of technology or behavior tracking can eliminate your need to understand the world in which your target customer is living.

The best way to do that is by asking questions.

Listening. Instead of talking.

Your mission isn’t to convince, badger, bully, or passionately persuade. To empathize, you have to listen.

Not problem solve. Listen. Not strategize. Listen. Not manipulate. Listen. Not Pitch. Listen.

Ask a question. And then ask another question. Be engaged in the conversation at hand — not in the direction you want to force that person to think.

In truth, you can’t force people to change who don’t want already to change. And why would they want to change for you when they don’t feel like you care about them in the first place?

Think about that.

Whether you’re leading an association, congregation, sales team, marketing division, or just yourself, the greatest weapon you have to get what you want is understanding what the people around you want for themselves.

Stop assuming and judging. Stop labeling people and placing them in boxes.

Empathize and love people for where they are. Your business will grow. Your church will flourish. Your association and group will be the envy of all those who observe.

More importantly, you will change the world.

You’ll help people. And perhaps, that is the greatest reward of all.