What do Napoleon Hill, Norman Vincent Peale, and Earl Nightingale, have in common other than being dead? They all believed in the power of positive thinking, which is something in short supply these days.

The phrases; “You become what you think about,” “Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, the mind can achieve,” “Think and grow rich,” all tell us that success starts with a thought and the act will follow. Not the other way around. In my own personal quest for the secret to success, I would ask people how they became successful and I could only find one common denominator. Winners see an opportunity and think, “What if this works?” and the masses see an opportunity and think, “What if this fails?”

Do you see this economic downturn as an opportunity or as a disaster? Winners see this as an opportunity to increase market share and eliminate weak competitors. Bargains abound everywhere but consumers are saving more and spending less. Do you see a self-fulfilling prophecy here? The more we worry about the economy slowing down the more we help it slow down.

I know it is easy for me to say as my business is booming. But this was not always the case. Forty years ago I went through what many of you are experiencing now. I lost my job. My wife and I divorced and she took my kids. My car broke down on the side of the
road and was towed away as an abandoned vehicle. It doesn’t get much worse than that. Luckily I met Linda, my wife of thirty seven years. She did for me what I could not do for myself. She believed in me. Every day she would say to me “Remember how far you
have come. You can do anything.” Slowly, I began to believe it and success followed. But it started with the belief that it would turn around. The turn around did not precede the belief.

Start each day with a winner’s mindset. Expect to make that sale. Expect good things to happen and refuse to participate in the recession.

Posted in Ray's Rules by Ray Leone on February 4, 2009.