Posted by Brian Tracy on Mar 26, 2007
“A journey of a thousand leagues begins with a single step.”
Having just returned from China, I can quote Confucius, who said, "A journey of a thousand leagues begins with a single step."
Mark Twain once said, "Even if you are on the right path, you’ll get run over if you just sit there."
What I have found over the years is that the primary difference between top people and average people is that top people are action-oriented. They decide what they want, set a goal, and then they take the first step. Everything else follows from that.
Why is it that so many people think and dream and plan, and even hope that if they think positive thoughts and visualize happy pictures their dreams will come true, and nothing ever happens to them?
The primary reason that people don’t take the first step is that they fear failure of some kind. They fear loss of time or loss of money. They fear loss of respect, or embarrassment. They fear rejection and criticism if they don’t achieve their goals. Most people have so many fears that they are paralyzed into accepting vastly less than they are truly capable of.
My friend, Denis Waitley says, "You could not use your full potential if you lived 100 lifetimes."
Let me tell you a true story. When I flew out of Los Angeles International Airport for Narita Airport in Tokyo, a 10-hour flight, I knew that the plane was going to be off course 99% of the time.
The fact is that all flights, short or long distance, are off course 99% of the time. Nonetheless, when the wheels came up as we took off from Los Angeles, the pilot came onto the Intercom and said, "Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to this flight. We will be touching down in Narita Airport at 5:08 in the afternoon. Have a nice flight."
And surprise! Surprise! The flight touched down at exactly 5:08 pm, even though the plane was off course 99% of the time.
Why was this? Simple. Because of updrafts, downdrafts and other weather patterns, the plane is continually making course corrections. Most of this is automated today, with the pilots in place to make sure that there are no mistakes. But nonetheless, the plane is off course most of the time.
What is my point? My point is that, once you set a goal and take the first step, you will be off course most of the time, as well. Everybody is.
No matter how smart you are, or how experienced, or how knowledgeable, or how thoroughly you plan in advance, you will be off course most of the time throughout your life.
All of life is a series of course corrections. You try something, and then you try something else. You work your way forward by trial and error. You fall down and you pick yourself back up again. You make the wrong turns and you end up either off the main road toward your goal, or in a cul-de-sac.
There is a Turkish saying, "No matter how long you have been traveling on the wrong road, turn back."
Never be afraid to take the first step because of the possibility of failure. Know in advance that you are going to fail many times before you achieve your goal. The good news is that every failure teaches you something that will be helpful to you to not only achieve your goal but to hold onto the goal once you reach it.
In fact, there is no such thing as failure; there is only feedback. Temporary failure, setbacks, difficulties or disappointment should simply be treated as forms of information, containing nuggets of wisdom and advice that you can use to be smarter and more effective when you take the next step.
The good news is that, no matter what your goal is, you can always see far enough to take the next step. And if you take a single step, you will then see far enough to take the next step. If you keep taking steps, one at a time, twisting and turning throughout your journey, you will eventually arrive at your destination, sometimes in the most remarkable ways.
Be clear about who you are and what you want. Write down your goals and plans. Set priorities on your activities. Then, take the first step.
Orison Swett Marden, the original founder of Success Magazine in 1905, once wrote, "There are only two keys to success, and they have always been the same. The first is ‘get-to-it-iveness’ and the second is ’stick-to-it-iveness.’"
But the key is always for you to take the first step.
Just do it!
Tags: Brian's Words of Wisdom
Posted by Brian Tracy on Mar 19, 2007
Tour of Japan, China, and Korea
On March 2, I embarked on a 10-day tour of Japan, China and Korea, speaking two, three and four times in each of those countries respectively.
My first trip to Asia was in 1968. At that time, Japan was rapidly recovering from World War II and throwing off its reputation for poor products by focusing on quality.
China was a repressive, totalitarian, communist state, largely impoverished with starvation and even famine caused by Mao’s "Great Leap Forward."
Korea in 1963 had a GNP per person of $100, and was a poor, cold, largely treeless backwater of Asia controlled by a military dictatorship with little economic activity or hope for the future.
How things have changed! By the 1970’s, Japan had emerged as the third largest economy in the world, producing and shipping billions of dollars of high quality products, cars, electronics, cameras, appliances - to America and the world. Today, China is an ultra-modern, beautiful country with sweeping freeways, beautiful buildings, fabulous hotels and restaurants and all the benefits that go with sustained prosperity.
The Japanese people are warm, polite, efficient, hard-working, and a pleasure to conduct seminars for.
Korea has increased its GNP per person from $100 to $16,000, an increase in wealth of 160 times in the last 43 years. This rate of wealth creation has never been matched in all of human history. Korea is today another ultra-modern state with huge industries, large, booming cities, wonderful hotels, restaurants and shopping centers, and a hard-working, intelligent and friendly people. I conducted four seminars while I was there, wrapping up with a two and a half hour program on Success and Achievement for 3,000 positive, happy Korean participants.
But the real miracle is China! This was my third visit to China, even though I lived in Hong Kong for some time in the late 1960’s. With the opening of China, I took my family there for several days in 1990. I then returned to China for three days of speaking in Beijing and Shanghai in 1992 for my friend Richard Tan of Singapore. The Chinese growth rate for the last decade has been 9% - 10% per year. At this rate, the entire economy doubles every seven years. In the last five years since I was in China, what was extraordinary and impressive at that time is today even more so.
My first visit was to Guangzhou, which was set up as a model industrial city by the government about 15 years ago. Today, it is a thriving ultra-modern, high-tech metropolis with 10 million highly energetic, hard-working, determined entrepreneurs starting and building businesses at an unbelievable rate. We had 3,000 people filled a major stadium to hear me speak on Leadership for the 21st Century. They are open and eager to learn the best ideas in the world to help them become even more successful in the future.
From there, we flew to Beijing, the capital of China, and easily the most impressive capital city in the world. The city has been laid out with great precision. The boulevards leading into the town and crisscrossing the center of the city are 12 lanes wide. Tens of thousands of condominiums and offices are under construction as far as the eye can see, and according to our hosts, they are all sold out already.
The hotels, restaurants, office buildings and factories are built with Swiss-like, German-style precision and quality in every element. The streets are so clean you could eat off of them 24-hours a day. The stores and shopping centers are jammed with affluent shoppers.
The Chinese middle class has now passed the 250,000,000 mark.
We stayed at the beautiful Raffles Hotel, not far from the capital’s Forbidden City in the center of Beijing. My seminar, for 1,000 entrepreneurs, was in a special Arts Theater of the Forbidden City, something very few foreigners ever get a chance to enjoy.
We spent several hours touring the Forbidden City with a bilingual guide. At one time, 60,000 bureaucrats worked in the city to serve the Emperor and the Empire. It was the center of power for the entire nation of China for hundreds of years. Its palaces, castles, living quarters, vast plazas, rivers, bridges and artwork make anything in Europe or America look small by comparison.
Finally, we flew off to Shanghai to address 1,000 people all day Saturday, March 10. Since my last visit there, five years ago, the city seems to have exploded in skyscrapers that stretch to the horizon. Shanghai now has a population of 20,000,000 people, and its current growth rate will be at 40,000,000 by 2010. My hotel, The Grand Hyatt, was 85 stories high. My room was on the 59th floor, from which I could see skyscrapers disappearing over the horizon in all directions. It was awe inspiring!
Just think! 20 years ago, China was a poor country where the major form of transportation was bicycles, rickshaws and horse-drawn carts. Today it is an economic juggernaut, 30% the size of the US economy, and slated to pass the US within 20 years.
I will talk more about the impact of Asia on our lives and the future of the world in future Blogs. For now, it is safe to say that the epicenter of world attention has shifted to China, and will be focused on China for the next 100 years.
Talk to you again soon.
Tags: Brian's Words of Wisdom
Posted by Brian Tracy on Mar 13, 2007
There are many obstacles on the road to success, but your job is to use them as stepping-stones and to persist until you succeed.
Twelve feet of snow fell in upstate New York in February. Throughout the winter, there were freak storms that dumped huge amounts of snow throughout the Midwest and down into Arkansas. Even the Florida orange crop was hit by freezing temperatures, causing massive financial losses.
Two years ago, my wife and I attended a conference in Colorado Springs. We flew into Denver and rented a car for the 90-minute drive. The woman at the car rental office encouraged us to upgrade to a four-wheel drive because there was “snow in the mountain passes.”
Somewhat reluctantly, we rented a four-wheel drive and headed for Colorado Springs. As it happened, the roads were clear, the sky was blue, the sun was shining and we felt that we had been ripped off by paying extra for features that we didn’t need.
That was Wednesday. On Saturday night, at the close of the conference, they announced that they were expecting some snowfall overnight. Many people were actually leaving earlier so as to avoid any problems that might occur from difficult snow conditions.
Having heard this story once before, we stayed the night, only to arise the next morning to four foot snow drifts and a blinding blizzard that shut down most of that part of Colorado.
We got into our four-wheel drive and headed for the highway. There were cars off the highway in the ditches, abandoned, on both sides of the road. Visibility was 50 to 100 feet in most places. Nonetheless, we pressed on.
We finally came to a police roadblock. We asked them what was happening and they told us that the highway over the mountains to Denver was closed because of snowdrifts and blizzard conditions.
When we asked them what that meant, they said that, “If you proceed past this point, you are on your own. We will not send anyone out to look for you.”
This was like waving a red cape in front of a bull. I thought, “This is great! There will be no one on the road ahead of me. With four-wheel drive, I can drive straight through and get to Denver in time for my afternoon flight back to San Diego.”
What was interesting was that this turned out to be true, for the most part. When everyone else saw the blizzard, they quit, went home and decided to sit it out until the weather improved. But Barbara and I drove on through the blizzard, speeding up and slowing down, finally passing through the mountains and into Denver, arriving at the airport in time for our flight.
The problem was that there was 4-5 feet of snow covering the Denver International Airport, and all flights had been canceled for at least 24 hours. The airport was full of people preparing to sleep wherever they could.
Fortunately, I hadn’t returned the Explorer yet, so I turned around and drove into the city to spend the night. The next morning, in spite of there being 10,000 people jamming the airport trying to get flights out, by generously tipping one of the porters, we got moved to the front of the line and caught our flight to San Diego with only a few minutes to spare.
The moral of this story is to remember that, despite the snowdrifts and blizzards of life, and despite the fact that everyone around you is quitting and giving up, there is almost always a way through. The key is to take action. And then take further action. And then take even more action, and keep persisting until you achieve your goal.
There are many obstacles on the road to success, but your job is to use them as stepping-stones and to persist until you succeed.
Until next time.
Tags: Brian's Words of Wisdom
Posted by Brian Tracy on Mar 6, 2007
“I have just been to Hell and returned. It is a city in the Nevada desert called Las Vegas.�?
Not long ago, a New York journalist wrote, “I have just been to Hell and returned. It is a city in the Nevada desert called Las Vegas.”
Well, last week I was speaking to 300 people at one of the massive hotel/casinos on the Las Vegas Strip. The taxi pulls up a long sweeping driveway, after you have passed dozens of huge neon signs advertising shows, entertainment and gambling delights, and deposits you in front of huge glass doors.
The registration is neatly situated about 150 feet away from the door so that you have a chance to stroll past a few slot machines and get a good look at the gaming floor on your way to check-in.
Once you are registered, to get to your room, you have to walk across the entire casino, past hundreds of people, tables, slot machines, poker rooms and tote boards before you get to the elevator.
When you get into your room and click on the television, you get 24-hour per day, non-stop advertisements and inducements to play, play, play!
In my book, Something For Nothing, I explained that the gambling craze is a desperate and ultimately futile attempt to get “something for nothing.”
All the advertisements show pictures of happy faces and people laughing with delight at all the money they are winning. But the reality is quite different. As you walk around the casinos, there is not very much joy or happiness. People have a glum, resigned look on their faces, like cattle moving inexorably down the chute toward the slaughter, unable to stop their forward momentum.
The tragedy is that the people losing money at these tables cannot afford it. By the way they dress, groom, wear their clothes, hats and hair, they are obviously “working people” who are spending their grocery money in a vain attempt to capture the will ‘o the wisp of “something for nothing.”
The fact is that nobody ever wins, at least not for long. The executives and supervisors of the casinos will tell you that “gaming is a form of entertainment; people must accept the fact that they are here to lose money, not to win it.”
When I flew into Las Vegas three weeks ago from Austin, it was a Thursday night and the plane was full of loud, boisterous, laughing, happy people, looking forward to a weekend in Las Vegas.
But on the flights out of Las Vegas on Sunday and Monday, there is no more joy. No more laughing. The money is gone and reality has begun to set in. Now, the hopeful gambler has to return home and work, maybe for weeks and months, to make back what he lost in a few brief minutes at the gaming tables.
The moral of this story is that there are no short cuts, no get-rich-quick schemes, and no easy ways to make money. It is only by working hard, becoming good at what you do, and then carefully saving and investing your money over the years that you will achieve financial independence.
This has always been true, and it is still true today.
Talk to you again soon!
Tags: Brian's Words of Wisdom
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