Mind Games:
How to Program Yourself for Success
- What that quart of mush perched at the top of our shoulders really IS good for …
- Two core beliefs you must have to succeed in life …
- Four visual images that power-up your sales copy, rocket your response and make you richer, quicker …
- Much more
Dear Business Builder,
Despite what parents, teachers and cable TV have told you …
Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, alien UFOs, Bigfoot, and the Loch Ness Monster are NOT real …
Politicians, televangelists, Oprah and Dr. Phil are NOT more qualified to dictate how you live your life or how you spend your money than you are …
The CIA, FBI, Mafia or the Klan did NOT assassinate John, Bobby or Martin … NASA did NOT fake the moon landing … and the Pentagon did NOT attack itself on 9/11 …
Jesus did NOT paint his own face on that insurance building in Tampa and that is NOT the Virgin Mary gazing up at you from the toasted cheese sandwich that sold on Yahoo for a bazillion bucks.
Now, in the interest of full disclosure, it’s only fair to tell you that these are only my opinions. And as we both know, opinions are like (lessee … how can I clean this up?) they’re like necks: Everybody has one.
So, as long as I’m sticking my neck out, here’s another opinion for you:
All this “when-you-wish-upon-a-star” Tinker Bell twaddle going around today is a fraud.
Gurus who claim they’ve found a shortcut – who promise you can “think” your way to riches instantly and without hard work – are full of beans.
And if someone claims he can teach you to magically create or alter objective reality with nothing more than “happy thoughts,” the smartest thing you could do is keep your hand on your wallet and back away from him v–e–r–y s–l–o–w–l–y.
Call me an old stick in the mud if you like, but to me, the notion that a simple human thought somehow affects events in an infinite number of universes, or galaxies or solar systems seems just a bit of a reach.
It seems just a tad grandiose to suggest that – simply by thinking nice thoughts – I can turn the sky green, or leaves blue, or make Angelina Jolie hot for my chubby pink and white body, or get the Bucs into the Super Bowl again, or cause Congress to balance the budget.
… Not to mention, delusional.
Hell. I’ve thought hard about it – many times – and I can’t even get Priscilla the hound dog to stop pooping in the foyer!
Fact is, I wouldn’t let a single one of the New Age sages and pap peddlers who get rich selling that stuff within arm’s length of my money or my wife.
I mean, jeeze Louise – just look at them: This one’s paunchy. That one’s bald. He’s got a face like a horse. She’s had so many facelifts, that dimple in her chin used to be her belly button.
What’s up with that? Can’t their all-powerful, god-like, universe-altering brains … all their miraculous, reality-altering thoughts … all their “secrets” … correct their own obvious imperfections?
Frankly, I wish they’d all just shut the hell up. Or better yet – put their money where their mouths are. I’d pay big bucks to see a gaggle of those guys stand on a railroad track and attempt to stop a speeding locomotive with nothing more than wishful thinking.
Know what? It’ll never happen.
And why? Because despite all their hype and horsepucky, those sunshine charlatans would end their lives as a grease spot on a cow catcher.
And they know it.
But sadly, as long as it’s still possible to get rich pumping vast quantities of sunshine up good peoples’ patooties, you can bet your last dollar they’ll never go away.
Having said all that, however,
a brain can come in pretty handy
– IF you use it correctly …
Now, don’t get me wrong: The human brain is a wonderful thing. And I highly recommend that you have one if you plan to do much in life – and (please, God!) especially if you plan to vote.
And yes, your beliefs and thoughts actually do help influence how successful you’ll be. But not in the mystical, metaphysical, booga-booga ways the teachers of tripe claim they do.
See the thing is, your brain can be your greatest ally or the #1 obstacle to your success.
The validity of your core beliefs about yourself, others and the world around you will either block you, or free you to create the success you desire.
Here’s some stuff I hope will free you …
You have every right.
The simple, objective fact is, there is absolutely, positively no reason why you shouldn’t have it all.
Billionaires are not a billion times more deserving than you are. Nor are millionaires a million times smarter than you.
If IQ points were dollars, Steven Hawking would be lots richer than Bill Gates. Plenty of dumber people than you are living spectacularly successful lives. Not to mention folks with less talent and who are uglier or fatter.
People who started out poorer than you make it to the top every day. So do folks with lousier health and severe physical limitations – and who suffer far more persecution than you ever will.
Want to light a fire under your career? Examine and then disabuse yourself of the false beliefs that block you and the excuses you use to let yourself off the hook.
Once you fully realize – deep down, at a cellular level, with every fiber of your being – that you deserve this just as much as the next guy or gal, there is no obstacle you can’t surmount, nothing; repeat: NOTHING will be beyond your grasp.
It’s completely up to you.
Nobody cares as much about your success and happiness as you do. Nobody’s willing to work as hard to make you successful as you are.
If you wait for some guru, or some philosophy, some deity or “the universe” to make you successful, you’re probably going to be waiting a long, long time.
It’s only when you invest the time and effort to do the practical things required to succeed that true miracles begin to happen.
Case in point:
In 1968, I was a high school dropout earning $1.40 an hour.
Today, I’m a high school dropout who (in a good year) earns nearly 1,000 times more: That’s a 96,328% raise in pay.
Pretty miraculous, huh?
Want to know the secret? Want to know how I did it?
By working my butt to the bloody bone for nearly four decades – that’s how:
Investing the skull sweat required to learn every blessed thing I could about my craft …
Enduring the humiliation of rejection – repeatedly – by companies I would have done just about anything to work for …
Slaving over a hot typewriter 40, 60, sometimes 80 hours in a week to produce the best sales copy I was capable of …
Quietly enduring pride-shattering criticism of my beloved work product – often by pompous morons who couldn’t write a winning sales letter if you’d held a gun to their heads …
Rubbing my own nose in my failures until I’d painstakingly extracted every last lesson I could learn from them …
Doing it all for peanuts at first and scrimping and saving just to keep my family fed, housed and clothed …
And, of course, by finding the strength and the stones to get up each morning and do it all over again … for years … and even when my own family doubted I’d ever make it to the top.
I guess I could have just stayed in bed and “thought” or “believed” my career into existence.
Lucky for me; I never read the right books.
Visualize Triumph
So how did I – and every other top copywriter and direct marketer on the planet – willingly, even eagerly endure what you must endure to succeed?
By understanding that, while the human brain may not be able to create new universes on demand or alter objective reality, it is capable of doing more than just reasoning, learning, remembering and keeping your hat up.
I’m constantly amazed at how many great copywriters use creative visualization to unlock their creativity and to find the motivation to keep going when it would be easier just to quit.
Fact is, most top writers I’ve interviewed hold four visual images in their minds during the creative process …
1. Visualize your prospect. Live salespeople have a huge advantage over us direct response types. Since they’re eyeball to eyeball with their prospect, they can know precisely how he’s responding to everything that’s happening in the sales conversation.
They can read their prospect’s body language … facial expressions and even the inflection in his voice. And they can use that information to identify unspoken objections … sense skepticism and assuage it with proof elements … judge when the prospect is growing tired of the conversation or becoming distracted … and much, much more.
Perhaps the greatest difference between “A” level copywriters and everyone else is that top writers have developed a sixth sense that tells them what their prospects are most likely to be thinking and feeling as they move through the sales copy.
After I’ve consumed my research and before I begin writing a promotion, I like to take a few minutes just to think about the person with whom I’m about to have this conversation.
Who is he/she? Where is he when your direct mail package appears in his hand? What else is going on in the room as she’s reading your web copy?
What core beliefs does your prospect have about companies like yours, products like yours and/or about the subject at hand? What dominant emotion is your prospect most likely to experience as you raise this subject with him?
If you were attempting to make this sale in person, what would you say? And more importantly, how would your prospect respond to the things you’re saying?
Then, instead of attempting to write red-hot sales copy, have a simple chat with your prospect – all the while, sensing how your prospect is most likely to be responding to each proposition and promise in your copy.
What’s the best way to develop this sixth sense?
Two things:
First, practice on real folks in the real world. Next time and every time you have a conversation with someone, have your “feelers” out. Look for cues that tell you what they’re thinking and how they’re feeling about the conversation. Make this a habit – and before you know it, you’ll become a pro.
Second, make a habit of reading direct response promotions through the prospect’s eyes. Instead of looking for techniques the copywriter used, visualize how you think a typical prospect is most likely to respond both intellectually and emotionally to every headline, subhead and block of body copy.
I think you’ll be amazed at what you learn … how much stronger your copy becomes … and how much higher your response climbs as you develop this skill.
2. Visualize your client. This technique has more to do with energizing you, motivating you and unleashing your creativity …
As I’m writing, I hold a mental image of my client being absolutely blown away by the brilliance of my first-draft copy.
I see myself delivering my copy … the phone rings … and my client raves about how off-the-hook powerful this promotion is.
See, I only tell folks I do this for the money. The truth is, the ego boost I get from impressing my clients is every bit as rewarding for me.
And visualizing that emotional reward gives me more than enough motivation to do what’s necessary in each draft to produce the highest-quality work product I’m capable of.
3. Visualize your payday. Gary Bencivenga does this. I do this. And so does every other top writer I know.
The mental image goes something like this: The phone rings. It’s the client. My promotion is blowing the doors off of everything else they’ve ever mailed. His phone’s ringing off the hook; each call is a new customer placing an order.
Plus, every day, the Post Office pulls a huge tractor trailer up to his offices and unloads bags stuffed with more orders. They had to add two more shifts just to count the money that’s pouring in.
And best of all, they’re just rolled out – three million pieces – and my $150,000 royalty check is in the mail!
I see myself walking out to my mailbox and finding the check. Proudly showing it to my wife. And I lose myself in all the cool things I’m going to do with that money – and all the other royalty checks that promotion is going to earn me in the year ahead.
Hey – if that isn’t enough to make you pull out all the stops, nothing will!
4. Visualize how your success will change your life. When I first began freelancing, the money wasn’t so good. I barely made enough to provide for my family.
So I went on a shopping spree.
Not a real one, mind you; it was just a fantasy. A friend and I sat down and made lists of all the things we wanted and all the things we wanted to do in our lives.
We designed our dream lives in painstaking detail – and put it all down on paper.
And when I say “painstaking detail,” I mean I wrote down where I wanted to live (Prescott, Arizona), then researched how much my dream house would cost me there.
I picked out my dream car, went down to the dealer and worked out what the color, options, price and payments would be.
I wanted to become a private pilot, so I visited the local flight training school to see what that would cost, how long it would take. And I wanted my own airplane; so I shopped around for just the right one.
Then, I added up what all the things I wanted would cost me. And figured out that when I got my income to just $75,000 per year ($223,917 in today’s dollars), my dream life would be mine.
Because if you don’t have a clear vision of where you’re going, you’ll never get there.
Until I went through this exercise, I had only half the picture. I knew what the vision was costing me. But the rewards I was working for were fuzzy; unfocused. Now, I could see my dream house; smell the leather in my dream car. They were real.
From that moment on, I had a crisp, crystal clear mental image of why I was going to work every day. Why I was putting in the long hours. Why I was enduring the humiliation of rejection and failure.
And then, I did something else: I began bringing my rewards forward.
Rather than waiting years to realize my full vision, I gave myself small rewards along the way. I took my first flying lesson. Moved the family to Prescott (although not to my dream house). And every time a piece of my dream life fell into place, I was reborn.
Give it a try – you’ll be amazed at the energy and enthusiasm it brings to your work!
Hope this helps …
Yours for Bigger Winners, More Often,
Clayton Makepeace
Publisher & Editor
THE TOTAL PACKAGE
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20 Comments »
Join the Discussion!
Let us know what you think. Or ask us anything. Or offer your own sage advice.
The only rule: RESPECT THIS HOUSE! Postings that contain abusive language and/or personal attacks will be cheerfully VAPORIZED. One cross word and – POOF! – your well-thought-out post will be gone in a puff of smoke.
– Clayton
Comment by Alex — May 14, 2007 @ 12:31 pm
Sorry, but I couldn\’t help it. It sure sounds as if the second half of the article seems to vindicate what those good folks from \”The Secret\” are saying, albeit from a more psychological point of view. And that after all of the \”tempest\” in the first half…
Now I would agree with Clayton that quite often the \”spiritual\” perspective they like to hold forth isn\’t that well … eh… developed, and can sound a little \”snake-oily\”. However the techniques he himself is describing could have come straight out of the mouth of most any one of them (and as has been pointed out in comments on Daniel Levis\’ recent article, are as old as Wattles and Napoleon Hill, etc. Nothing new to see here).
And since he has obviously had quite a bit of success, one just might conclude that they do indeed work. It\’s just a matter of which explanation you prefer, the more spiritual or the more psychological one. Or could you hold both of them in mind without cognitive strain?
Best
- Alex Schleber
Comment by William Flentje — May 14, 2007 @ 2:12 pm
At first I thought this would be different, but in the end it appears to be just the same ol\’ \’visualize it, see it, and get it\’ stuff.
Am i missing something?javascript:ac_smilie(\’:sigh\’)
javascript:ac_smilie(\’:sigh\’)
Comment by Clayton Makepeace — May 14, 2007 @ 2:54 pm
For your honest input.
You\’re both right, of course. Wasn\’t it Solomon who first wrote \”There\’s nothing new under the sun?\”
I guess it\’s just that when common sense is dressed up and presented as new and couched in spiritual terms, my BS detectors start screaming.
Especially when the emphasis is on metaphysics rather than good old fashioned hard work and the application of genius.
Again — thanks for your honest crit of the article!
Comment by Max Percy — May 14, 2007 @ 3:25 pm
Hi Clayton,
as usual your articles are so thought provoking, interesting and factual.
It is so refreshing to know that there are people out there like yourself that has both feet on the ground and so eloquently put into words what many of us think in regards to some of the out landish statements made on thinking your way to what ever you want.
I love your articles and really appreciate the effort you go to to help us grow our business through good copywriting. Thankyou ever so much.
Kind wishes
Max Percy
Comment by Steven Cundiff — May 14, 2007 @ 4:16 pm
Clayton-
I have to say I took something quite different from the movie you so cleverly avoided mentioning.
To me, the movie says something very close to what you said just now in this article. I never thought that they advocated \\\”lying in bed and thinking myself rich.\\\”
In fact, I noted that one of the speakers is a well known author/editor and another is a direct-response copywriter!
I guess what I took from the movie, is believe that you are important enough to deserve everything you want, and focus on achieving your goals so that you\\\’ll be ready to take advantage of oppurtunities when they come to you.
And the steps they talk about are
1- getting clear on what you want (down to the smell of the leather in your dream car)
2- take inspired action toward your dreams
3-Take time to enjoy your journey
\\\”Chance favors the prepared\\\” and all that…
Just my 2 cents.
Well thanks for your time, and the use of this forum-
Steven Cundiff
Comment by Clayton Makepeace — May 14, 2007 @ 4:51 pm
Please understand — I did\’t mean to call out any one guru, or book or movie.
I\’m just concerned with what I see as a general trend in the self-help niche today: So many seem to be cashing in by \”spiritualizing\” simple common-sense principals, carrying them to illogical extremes, convincing folks that a thought or a word are enough to somehow magically guarantee success.
I\’m concerned that folks who buy into this line of thought are likely to give up at the first sign of adversity and by doing so, fall short of their dreams.
Thanks for writing!
Comment by John C. A. Manley — May 14, 2007 @ 5:06 pm
I agree, The Secret focused mainly on the metaphysical approach while Pyscho-Cybernetics, for example, focuses on the psychological.
I think you\’d be weakening yourself by not clinging to both.
It\’s important to remember most of us use 10% or less of our brain. Who\’s to say what would happen if we applied all 100%? Maybe one thought would be enough?
But until you reach that state, I\’m wholeheartedly behind with Clayton said here: work hard and focus.
But no reason why you can\’t do both, and I\’d think one would one encourage the other.
The man who thinks he has the whole Essence of the universe working through him, even if were \”delusion\” is probably better off than the man who doesn\’t, all other factors being equal.
John
Comment by Alex Schleber — May 14, 2007 @ 5:27 pm
Just a little technical feedback on your overall very nice new blog/article site:
If I were you I\’d have the tech guys make *the number* of comments show up at the end of the blog post (maybe even at the beginning?). There is just something about that number showing a lot of interest that will draw more people in and get even more activity.
P.P.S. I feel honored to get a reply from you Clayton, \”the master himself\”, it\’s nice to know that there are real people behind operating this thing…
As to the substance of your reply, it is indeed often a bit grating that the people from the \”spirituality camp\” cannot seem to get themselves to speak clearly most of the time. And ultimately I believe it undercuts their messages.
One of the greatest esoterics writers of all time, Dion Fortune, rightly said (rough quote): \”All inquiries of spiritual issues should be preceded by a good study of the human mind…\”.
And many if not most of today\’s \”gurus\” run afoul of this maxim. Case in point, even someone like Neal Donald Walsh, who I certainly believe is a very spiritual guy, comes across to me as almost \”unlistenable\” in a few little teleconference calls I have heard him on. It just all tends to go towards \”feel good\” and \”anything goes\”, rather than asking the hard questions and digging for the answers.
One thing in particular that has had me a bit on edge about the whole LOA thing is that they mostly fail to point out the caveats that should apply even from a very spiritual perspective: In a word, if attracting things into your life is so easy, then where is the \”beware of what you wish for\” disclaimer? How do they know that people\’s knee-jerk-reaction wish for the money/car/mansion/etc. will not create more misery for them down the line if they fail to address the deeper underlying issues they carry around in their unconscious? (And many of our celebrities are sad examples of this.)
Much food for thought.
Best
- Alex
Comment by Mike — May 14, 2007 @ 6:48 pm
Good points…
What I like about the spiritual angles of life is that they remind us that we have an inner self, a soul, that needs to be \”seen\”, felt, and listened to. Using our conscious mind along with our deeper self literally brings together the best of both worlds.
Comment by Jonathan Gunson — May 14, 2007 @ 7:26 pm
Clayton,
I don\’t entirely agree with you.
How fashionable it is to join the lynch mob and attack the Law Of Attraction and The Secret.
What happened? I had you down as my #1 original thinker.
The LOA and The Secret never claimed you should Think happy thoughts and the world is yours. That is a concoction of the media and its observers, and moreover is an uneducated analysis of \’The Secret\’ by the \’editors\’ and comumnists who are deliberately generating \’news\’ to sell newspapers and TV reports.
Even more ghastly is that the unversed press, TV, and the rest of the media have failed to mention that Joe Vitale (one of the main protagonists in The Secret) went to considerable lengths to point out the following:
(1.) There can be no foggy dreams.
You have to be very CLEAR as to what it is that you want. You cannot simply want to Get rich. Instead you must discover, paint and hold an extremely precise picture of what is your core desire.
Sort out what you want. Get crystal clear before you begin the journey.
(2) You must get rid of all the self-limiting crap that is trained into your mind since bith by teachers, friends, parents and co-workers.
It is this extremely damaging subconscious set of beliefs, long hard-wired into your mind that holds you back, not your circumstances.
What\’s more, blaming circumstances beyond your control is a wonderful excuse for not taking action and succeeding.
Yes, it is true, ripping out all that negative old hard-wiring is not easy. That requires an all-out firefight with yourself to straighten up and get confident.
But you CAN do it with hard sustained work.
(3.) You have to take HUGE action.
Sorry, you cannot sit on your butt and dream. This means hard grafting slog with some unpleasant bits and failures all the way to the dream.
Voila!
The Secret and the LOA is about all three of the above, and is what exactly what Joe Vitale and Rhonda Byrne teach.
They never said … Sit on your butt think happy thoughts and the heavens will shower you with all the goodies you want.
Quite to the contrary.
Further to that, I also believe that most people have not actually read the LOA material, or utilised it properly.
Such folks take a glance at The Secret or similar LOA content, then without any further work go to bed at night wishing the happy thought that tomorrow morning there will be Ferarri in the garage.
But when they wake up in the sunshine of the morning and it is not there, they bitterly complain that the LOA does not work!
Good grief. Let me tell you now that the LOA does work if followed and if hard work is put in. This is real Secret as presented by Rhonda Byrne and Joe Vitale.
Still with me?
It is not all bad Clayton! There is one point you make with which I agree completely: Spending a lot of money on LOA material is a bad idea.
Yes, close the door fast if some sales guy comes at you claiming thta all you have to do is dream it and it will appear.
Once more for old time\’s sake
Get the real, passionate core desire sorted out, get clear make a plan and start the hard work. Then and only then will the Universe begin to help you to fill in the details at an accelerating rate.
That is the LOA that Joe & Rhonda teach … the formula for success.
Jonathan
Comment by Bob Clarke — May 14, 2007 @ 8:16 pm
Great display of grabbing the emotions. Especially when ever you go against a persons beliefs, and it\’s all about beliefs.
Oh, and \”be careful what you wish for\” is a command not a warning. It\’s telling you to be specific as Clayton made clear. Because you will get what you ask for, therefore words like can and will are very emportant.
A wife that can bake is different than a wife that will bake;^)
Another great demonstration Clayton, thank you.
Comment by John — May 14, 2007 @ 10:54 pm
Outstanding \’rant\’ Clayton!
I couldn\’t agree more, and when you turned it around and actually described how the visualisation techniques used by (the more effective) gurus worked for you, I was completely smitten!!
Thank you for sharing your success. I\’m working on sharing my own with you … as it grows …
John
Comment by Clayton Makepeace — May 15, 2007 @ 5:11 am
The way I see it …
… There are three factors that govern what we believe to be true: Science, theory and faith.
Science is based on the observation of measurable, repeatable results. Because the results of a scientific test are measurable and repeatable, they are dependable. If you combine two hydrogen atoms with one oxygen atom, you will get a molecule of water every time. If you drop an apple, it will never fall up.
Theory is a possibility suggested by scientific fact. The theory of Evolution … Quantum Theory … the Big Bang Theory … Chaos Theory … String Theory … M Theory … the existence of dark matter … each has its roots in established scientific fact. But they are “if-that, then-this” extrapolations – not demonstrable facts in and of themselves.
However, when a theory is continually supported by newly discovered facts over a period of decades—and never directly contradicted–it begins to assume the cache’ of an objective fact among scientists and eventually, among the general public.
Finally, there is faith; what we choose to believe — often without objective proof, and often in direct contradiction of the evidence. Or as Paul put it in Hebrews, “Faith is the substance of things hoped for; the evidence of things not seen.”
By and large, we choose to believe these tenets of faith because they were drilled into us in childhood and/or because it makes us feel good to do so.
We yearn for an answer to the unanswerable questions, “Why am I here?” and “What’s the purpose of life?” … for the acceptance and support of a community of fellow believers … for validation, love, forgiveness and help from a loving deity … and for the comfort that comes from believing that we are eternal spirits destined for a heavenly afterlife.
Faith can be a wonderful thing. It can also be the cause of tremendous human suffering.
And because so many of the things we believe are subjective – unsupported or even contradicted by objective reality – it can easily be subverted, appropriated and used to seduce, manipulate and exploit others for profit.
This is not a new phenomenon. Two thousand years ago, Jesus himself warned us to beware of \\\”… false prophets, who come to you in sheep\\\’s clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves.”
In my opinion, the “ravenous wolves” of the entrepreneurial world include teachers who maintain that when it comes to producing a successful life, your words and thoughts have supernatural powers that can equal or even surpass the effects of commitment, perserverance, wisdom, responsibility and a lifetime of diligent work.
They appeal to our baser instincts by preying on our yearning for a shortcut … a magic bullet that will bring us success without sacrifice … and for illusions of god-like grandeur.
My personal philosophy: In circumstances where no physical evidence exists, faith is fine. But history is littered with the corpses of pretty theories and of their unhappy victims.
Where objective facts exist, I’m going with them. I can hope my new headline will beat the control. If I was unashamedly selfish, I could even pray that some deity or “the universe” will take a little time away from folks who are starving or dying of cancer to make me rich.
But unless I’m willing to learn what must be learned and do what must be done to produce a positive result … well, Paul said it best: “Faith without works is dead.”
Then again, who knows? I could be wrong …
Hope this helps clarify my view for you.
And thanks for all your feedback!
Comment by George Mathew — May 17, 2007 @ 8:35 am
Hi Clayton,
What is required for a clear understanding of the world can be got only with the faculties of our brain, but these are very much on the `endangered\’ category list. There is much that is happening to rob us of our rational minds and put us in a very loose and sloppy condition without the use of our brain power, which is equated with a dream-like state by some wily tacticians like politicians and certain successful `marketeers.\’ No wonder any sort of deeper mental approach or curiosity is condemned as totally inappropriate for success in life. A belief that carries on in a vapid and `unproven manner\’ seems to be popular and acceptable to many. No wonder there are so many scams on the net.
Comment by Dan Curriden — June 4, 2007 @ 11:53 am
Wow Clayton,
Your last couple of paragraphs, in your 5/15 comment are a radical departure from any I\’ve seen on the subject of prayer. What a cool way of looking at it.
How incredibly selfish we are when asking our deity of choice to make this promotion a winner, or to keep it from raining for our kid\’s soccer tournament or whatever.
I never looked at it that way.
Thanks and keep up the great work!
Dan
Comment by Tommy — June 13, 2008 @ 10:33 am
Wow you really touched a nerve didn’t you
I’m all for using the lump 3 feet above your ass… it’s a very powerful tool.
What most people are overlooking is the years of study
The years of being in the mix and learning the lessons only a butt kicking can deliver
the years of putting your money on the line day in and day out and surviving on your sales and marketing skill
I truly learned to write copy when I started placing 15k per week in newspaper ads 20 years ago so I could make my phones ring for my sales staff
I learned to sell getting off a plane with only 5 appointments for the day and needing 2 signed contracts to keep the doors open
Far be it for me to speak for anyone…use whatever floats your boat but the sad truth nobody wants to talk about about is the toil needed to get better
That is rarely talked about
When wood was chosen to build ships in the 1800’s they picked trees that stood unobstructed from any other tree
why?
because the tree that faced the elements from all directions and survived had the necessary strength to be relied upon when facing an unforgiving sea
I look at every sales experience for my service as a lesson that must be learned or we will repeat it over and over again.
It was a loss if we do not get a sale…we have the advantage of having that conversation10,000 times before and the prospect is having it for the first time
Every minute of every day we get better if we apply the lessons from our experiences
No disrespect Clayton but as good as you are you could talk to be 10 hours a day and you could never come close to teaching me as well as my experiences can
Nothing teaches as well as being in the mix with money on the line
I’ll throw a word at you…obsess
my desire to win, to learn, to perfect my craft is an obsession
my desire to beat my competitors is an obsession
that obsession is reflected in my bottom line
Here’s what I get from your post…you can visualize all you want but without doing the work, the study and getting in the mix with skin in the game… it’s all fantasy
Lots of pretenders who never have to show their bank statements to back up their ideas
My philosophy is to learn all you can from all that you can and then get in the game and test yourself…
then learn from the greatest teacher in the world…your experiences
Comment by Mark — June 13, 2008 @ 12:30 pm
Clayton,
You brought me down to earth again! You are a true copywriter - you just hit people’s hot spot. Great live lesson in action.
Good work!
Comment by Roy Everitt — June 13, 2008 @ 1:28 pm
Thanks for the provocation, Clayton. You certainly stirred a few people up.
Just one ingredient I’d add to the psychological recipe you’ve outlined, and that’s the importance of getting out of your own way sometimes and allowing the success to happen. Partly, it’s believing you deserve it all, but the way it works is more than just believing you’re entitled; it’s also about not fearing the very thing you’re aiming for.
We do get, to a great extent, what we really, deep down, want. Some people, convinced they want, deserve and are entitled to all the things you aimed for and got, still manage to stop themselves getting anywhere near any of it. It might manifest as idleness, or a series of mishaps and accidents, but self-sabotage is at the root of a lot of ‘failures’. In truth, many failures succeed in getting what they want, too, until they really change their minds about what that is.
Comment by Mark Sierra at MeAndMyDrum.com — September 21, 2008 @ 11:07 am
Very powerful words, Clayton. I’ve read that we are the product of our decisions, which is quite true. And that includes the times we chose not to act on something — which is a decision in itself.
By visualizing our goals, we are committing ourselves to make a decision to get there on a daily basis. The trouble most people have, myself included, is that this visualization is only temporary, something we only think about when we are inspired by something or someone. We think, "Cool, I want to be that kind of person." We might write an awesome post after that, or make the call we’ve been avoiding, but eventually we let that inspiration slide away until next time.
Committing ourselves to anything means sacrifice and that’s something we don’t like to do necessarily. We want it all now and with little to no effort. That only works for lottery winners, so how many of those do we know?
Thanks for the inspiration here, Clayton. This time, I’m not going to let it get away.
Comment by Guy — September 30, 2008 @ 8:26 am
Clayton,
Do you have personal knowledge of what you stated in paragraph 4 above? I am your age and I do. Before you make such sweeping statements, please, make sure of your facts.