Dan Waldschmidt's Blog, page 22

How Winners Think Differently.

The biggest difference between winners and losers is how they each think.

Winners think about winning. What they want. What they need to do. Where they need to do it. And how.

Losers think about not losing. They don’t want to be embarrassed or look like a fool.

At a quick glance, it looks like both sets of people are aiming for the same goal. They are both putting in effort. They each have goals and dreams and aspirations. 

But the winners win. And the losers lose.

It’s a cycle that continues to repeat itself.

It’s not good enough to be afraid of the consequences of failure. That won’t make you a winner.

You might win a few battles by avoiding failure, and you might put yourself in a position where the people think that you’re successful.

But you know the truth. It’s just a ruse. You pretending to be something that you’re not.

You could win. And it would be glorious. Fantastical even.

But to get there, you have to change how you allow yourself to think.

You have to want to win more than you’re afraid of how you look when you fail along the way.

In other words, you have to be willing to look and sound and feel like a complete loser to move closer to where you want to be.

That’s the whatever in whatever it takes.

Your feelings. Public perception. Early results.

What do you want so badly for yourself, that you’re willing to give everything else up in pursuit of that awesomeness?

When you can answer that question, you’re heading in the right direction. You are thinking like a winner.

The post How Winners Think Differently. appeared first on Keynote Speaker, Business Strategist & Ultrarunner | Dan Waldschmidt.

Copyright by Waldschmidt Partners Intl... Not sure that all that legal stuff really matters. If you want to share this material, do so. Just don't charge for it and don't tell people you wrote it. Both of those are uncool.

Other than that, all rights are reserved to you to change your life. If you are ready to be amazing, now is the time to get started. Onward...

The Painful Importance Of Having Hustle.

Hustle doesn’t always mean sprint. Most often it means “grind.”

That’s the tough truth about trying to go places. It’s not usually going to go the way you want it to. At least not right away.

You have to fight for every inch of progress you want to achieve.

On the good days, you’re going to feel like what you’re doing actually matters.

On the bad days, you’re going to feel like a complete loser.

And for most every other day, you are going to feel like you are putting in a lot of hard work with no clear indication that what you’re doing is actually going to pay off.

Which is why we call it hustle.

And why you need to have it.

Despite the obstacles in your way, you have to continue moving your feet.

You have to try new things. You have to seize new opportunities when they emerge unexpectedly.

When you look back, you’ll see the impact of your unrelenting progress. You’ll recognize the fruits of your hustle.

But only when you keep moving. And only if you’re willing to endure the loneliness and confusion of getting your hustle on.

The post The Painful Importance Of Having Hustle. appeared first on Keynote Speaker, Business Strategist & Ultrarunner | Dan Waldschmidt.

Copyright by Waldschmidt Partners Intl... Not sure that all that legal stuff really matters. If you want to share this material, do so. Just don't charge for it and don't tell people you wrote it. Both of those are uncool.

Other than that, all rights are reserved to you to change your life. If you are ready to be amazing, now is the time to get started. Onward...

Your Truth Will Come Out.

There aren’t many secrets you will die with. The truth about life and your pursuit of success is that the truth eventually comes out.

If you’ve been living a lie, you’re guaranteed to be discovered — even if it takes decades.

If you’re feeling undiscovered and discouraged by a lack of recognition, know that your hard work and consistent focus will pay off eventually.

There is a universal philosophy found in every religion that states that “the seeds that a farmer plants are the crops that he will harvest.”

Those seeds are the truth. Your truth.

Good or bad, it will be uncovered eventually.

You might be fooling people now by pretending that you’re dedicated and doing all you can do to be successful. But eventually if you are not living that life passionately, all the world will see you for who you are.

The same is true when you’re giving it your all — laying it all on the line — and still don’t see any progress forward.

You feel like a loser. Everyone around you doubts your ambition and wisdom and strategy.

The secret you know is that eventually there are no secrets.

Your hard work isn’t going to stay hidden for long. It’s about to be on full display for everyone.

Think about that the next time you find yourself devoting too much effort and consideration to how things appear rather than how focused you are on getting to where you want to be.

Your truth will have its day eventually.

The post Your Truth Will Come Out. appeared first on Keynote Speaker, Business Strategist & Ultrarunner | Dan Waldschmidt.

Copyright by Waldschmidt Partners Intl... Not sure that all that legal stuff really matters. If you want to share this material, do so. Just don't charge for it and don't tell people you wrote it. Both of those are uncool.

Other than that, all rights are reserved to you to change your life. If you are ready to be amazing, now is the time to get started. Onward...

Belief Or Convenient Perspective?

Believe strongly. Believe passionately.

Don’t expect everyone else to believe what you do or how you do. But believe something.

Most people go an entire lifetime without really knowing what they believe. Never really believing in the things that they say they believe.

Beliefs about honesty. Beliefs about opportunity. Beliefs about cause and effect.

You might think you believe something right now, but the true test of your belief is what you do when you get tested.

What you do when what you think is normal and expected changes radically.

Then it’s clear to see what is really a belief versus a convenient perspective.

It’s not always convenient to believe.

Isn’t it interesting how your beliefs change when your feelings get hurt?

You thought that person was nice, but then you found out that they didn’t like you and your belief changed.

You thought this new job was going to be the one that made you feel satisfied and valued. But then when you got downsized, your belief in yourself turned into nothing.

That belief you once had that anything was possible seems to have vanished. Along with your courage and commitment.

Own your beliefs. Don’t apologize for what you believe. Don’t back down from what you believe.

Most importantly, don’t assume a convenient perspective is really something you believe.

The post Belief Or Convenient Perspective? appeared first on Keynote Speaker, Business Strategist & Ultrarunner | Dan Waldschmidt.

Copyright by Waldschmidt Partners Intl... Not sure that all that legal stuff really matters. If you want to share this material, do so. Just don't charge for it and don't tell people you wrote it. Both of those are uncool.

Other than that, all rights are reserved to you to change your life. If you are ready to be amazing, now is the time to get started. Onward...

Hire For Heart. Fire For Apathy.

They wouldn’t have been hired by your company. They surely wouldn’t have been promoted.

And had they made their way up the corporate ladder, they would have been “those guys.”

The outcasts, eccentric and impossibly difficult people that everyone else looks at with a sigh and shake of the head.

But genius always starts with heart.

And that’s the sort of complicated, hard-to-work-with leadership that you might not find appealing right away. Or at all.

It’s always been that way:

Author H. G. Wells left school at the age of 14, then went on to become one of the greatest authors of all time. Would you have hired a high school drop out?
Nicolo Paganini, at 17, dazzled audiences with his virtuosity; then pawned his violin in order to pay gambling debts. Would you have promoted an addict?
Jack London went bankrupt at 20 after joining the “gold rush” in Alaska. He went on to become the greatest writer of the 20th century. Would you have trusted someone so inexperienced?
Thomas Edison invented the electronic vote recorder at age 21 . No one bought it. Not one. Would you give a failed promoter another chance?

But they all had heart.

And that made the difference.

And it will make the difference for you as well.

Only hire people who have heart. When things get tough — and they always do — you’ll need that craziness and passion to help you navigate towards success.

In the end, apathy will kill every dream you ever have.

Don’t let people who don’t care near those who do.

Think about that when you’re adding new people to your team. Think about that when you can’t decide who should stay.

Hire for heart. Fire for apathy.

The post Hire For Heart. Fire For Apathy. appeared first on Dan Waldschmidt: Author of EDGY Conversations.

Copyright by Waldschmidt Partners Intl... Not sure that all that legal stuff really matters. If you want to share this material, do so. Just don't charge for it and don't tell people you wrote it. Both of those are uncool.

Other than that, all rights are reserved to you to change your life. If you are ready to be amazing, now is the time to get started. Onward...

Do What You Love.

Do what you love. Follow that path passionately.

Don’t be distracted by what other people tell you should be important.

Money follows passion. It doesn’t proceed it.

Happiness follows passion. You don’t find it by avoiding your passion.

Everything you want for yourself is anchored by doing what you love.

It’s your reason to get up in the morning. Your cause. Your mission. Your noble purpose.

There’s never enough time in life to find happiness and wealth outside of passion and purpose. You’re just spinning in circles.

So do what you love. Do it without apology.

Follow that course wherever it leads you.

It won’t all be easy. It surely will not always be fun.

But it is the thing that drives you and nothing else can replace it.

Do what you love.

The post Do What You Love. appeared first on Dan Waldschmidt: Author of EDGY Conversations.

Copyright by Waldschmidt Partners Intl... Not sure that all that legal stuff really matters. If you want to share this material, do so. Just don't charge for it and don't tell people you wrote it. Both of those are uncool.

Other than that, all rights are reserved to you to change your life. If you are ready to be amazing, now is the time to get started. Onward...

Forever Is Never.

Forever is a long time. It’s practically never.

It’s easy to assume that because something has never happened for you that it never will. It’s easy to assume when you’re discouraged that failure from your past is the only likely future you can expect. 

Time is the great equalizer. 

Never really means “not yet.”

Over time mountains have been moved, man has traveled to the moon and back, warring countries have become allies, and likely losers have emerged triumphant.

So give yourself time to breathe. To grow. To fail and learn and expand and evolve.

Change takes time.  Don’t give up because it hasn’t all happened yet.

The post Forever Is Never. appeared first on Dan Waldschmidt: Author of EDGY Conversations.

Copyright by Waldschmidt Partners Intl... Not sure that all that legal stuff really matters. If you want to share this material, do so. Just don't charge for it and don't tell people you wrote it. Both of those are uncool.

Other than that, all rights are reserved to you to change your life. If you are ready to be amazing, now is the time to get started. Onward...

How To Make Hard Things Easy.

It’s easy to get things done. You just have to get started.

It’s easy to get forgiveness when you hurt people. You just have to ask for it.

It’s easy to learn something new. You just have to go look for it.

It’s easy to improve and grow. You just have to want to.

It’s easy to move beyond your past failures. You just have to try something new.

It’s easy to surround yourself with encouraging people. You just need to be one first.

It’s easy to think for yourself. You just have to ignore those other guys.

It’s easy to save money and grow rich. You just need a reason to get started.

It’s easy to accomplish things that are awesome. You just have to work like a maniac.

It’s easy to avoid people who are negative and condescending. You just have to get away.

It’s easy to get your life back in shape. You just have to make small changes each day.

Life is full of easy things that we make unnecessarily complicated.

It’s easy to get started. It’s easy to try something new. It’s easy to think about what you can do better.

And when you do those easy things day after day, moment after moment, you end up achieving things that you used to think were hard.

You make hard thing easy.

The post How To Make Hard Things Easy. appeared first on Dan Waldschmidt: Author of EDGY Conversations.

Copyright by Waldschmidt Partners Intl... Not sure that all that legal stuff really matters. If you want to share this material, do so. Just don't charge for it and don't tell people you wrote it. Both of those are uncool.

Other than that, all rights are reserved to you to change your life. If you are ready to be amazing, now is the time to get started. Onward...

What Doing Hard Things Really Means.

Success demands that you do things that are hard.

Not just difficult to achieve with incredible amounts of effort, but uncomfortable and frustrating every step of the way.

Doing the hard things isn’t really about choosing goals that are massively difficult and then adopting a radical lifestyle that will propel you mightily toward your goal.

That’s awesome if you choose it for your path. Impressive, indeed. But for most people, you don’t need to veer so far away from what is obvious.

Most of the time you already know what to do.

You don’t just know what to do, you know most of the steps to get you there.

Isn’t that incredible? Chances are, you already know what it is that you want to do and how you could achieve that goal.

The only thing missing in your life is the will to get started and the stubbornness to stay with it when things start to feel icky.

Persistence is the ultimate hardship.

It doesn’t come naturally, and it’s not always humanly possible.

When you are beaten down so far you’re not even sure you can see your way up, it is impossible to imagine that you can continue.

When you give all you can give. When there’s nothing more within you to invest. When you’ve reached the end of your capacity to keep moving towards where you know you deserve to be.

In those moments, you appreciate what hard really is.

It’s the decision to tune out the critic inside you that reminds you of all your past failures. It’s the decision to try one more time.

Even though everything else has ended in failure.

It’s the decision to put your head down and do one more thing on one more day even though you’re exhausted and humiliated and fearful and not sure you’re going to make it.

That’s hard. Physically, financially, and mentally.

Every internal alarm bell is warning you that you’re making the wrong decision.

If it were easy to be successful, you would’ve already been there by now. It’s hard. Unimaginably so.

When we talk about doing hard things, it’s not about choosing bigger goals. It’s about forcing yourself to break past the emotionally crippling barriers that any logical person would assume to be just a perfectly horrible decision.

The post What Doing Hard Things Really Means. appeared first on Dan Waldschmidt: Author of EDGY Conversations.

Copyright by Waldschmidt Partners Intl... Not sure that all that legal stuff really matters. If you want to share this material, do so. Just don't charge for it and don't tell people you wrote it. Both of those are uncool.

Other than that, all rights are reserved to you to change your life. If you are ready to be amazing, now is the time to get started. Onward...

Use Your Superpower.

You have a superpower.

There is that something you have or do or know that is better than everyone else around you.

It’s not even close. You’re better. A lot better.

Maybe it’s how you negotiate a business deal with calm, clear, and compelling ideas.
Maybe it’s how you create a giant vision for a product when there doesn’t seem to be any clear path forward.
Maybe it’s how you are always there for your kids, coaching at sporting events and volunteering for extracurricular school projects.
Maybe it’s how you make people feel understood, respected, and appreciated.

There’s something you do that makes you super.

You’re thinking about it right now. Perhaps, even wondering if it matters to anyone else or if it’s important enough to be labeled “super”.

That is the one thing you need to be focusing on.

Looking to make more money? Attach it to your superpower. Looking to find a new job? Start looking close to the areas of your superpower. Looking to fall in love or fix your relationship? Make it a part of your superpower.

There is already enough mediocrity and mediocre people in the world. Stop focusing on being good enough and instead spend your time and energy on doing more of the things that make you super.

Double down on your greatness. Bet on you. Be super.

The post Use Your Superpower. appeared first on Dan Waldschmidt: Author of EDGY Conversations.

Copyright by Waldschmidt Partners Intl... Not sure that all that legal stuff really matters. If you want to share this material, do so. Just don't charge for it and don't tell people you wrote it. Both of those are uncool.

Other than that, all rights are reserved to you to change your life. If you are ready to be amazing, now is the time to get started. Onward...