The Resilient Mind - The Power of Attitude - Zig Ziglar

Episode Date: November 9, 2023

Zig Ziglar was a best-selling American author and speaker who uplifted millions with his motivational message. One of his infamous lecture "See You At The Top" talks about why a positive mental attitude is critical for your success.Take action and strengthen your mind with The Resilient Mind Journal. Get your free digital copy today: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Download Now⁠⁠  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the Resilient Mind podcast. In this episode, you will be listening to The Power of Attitude with Zig Zigler. Get access to the Mental Mastery Program and other exclusive episodes by becoming a subscriber. Enjoy. Number of years ago, Larry Majors, my executive assistant, got a phone call from a lady in Birmingham, Alabama. At the end of the conversation, she said, Zig, she said, I believe this woman thinks she's got an impossible problem. But I believe you can solve that problem with her in just a few minutes if you will spend that time with her. I said, well, Laurie, tell her to meet me backstage.

I'll get there about 10 minutes early. My schedule was such. That was about all I had. Well, I got there, and I was on backstage behind the curtain on one side. She spotted me from the other side. And as she walked across the stage, I have never seen as much anger in a human being in my life as I saw in her. She almost started crying when she saw me. She said, oh, I'm just so glad to see you.

I got this horrible job. I hate it. I hate everything about it. I hate everybody down there. I mean, you're talking about negative nils. She was it. She said, can you help me? Now, understand, I've only got about 10 minutes.

So I looked at her, and one thing I have learned, I don't do counseling, but I talk with a lot of people who do in psychologists, psychiatry, and the ministry. And they tell me that everybody who comes to you with a problem are not necessarily looking at. for a solution. I couldn't understand that for a long time. Why do they bring you a problem if they don't want to solve it?

Well, I can tell you why. They want to tell you about it, you about it, you about it, you about it, you about it. And if you foul up the deal and solved the problem, they can't tell you again, you again. They want the attention that goes with the problem, and every company just about it has that kind of an individual. They want the attention that goes with griping and complaining. Well, I looked at the lady, and it wasn't unkindly, but firmly I said to her, yes, and you know, ma'am, I'm afraid your problem is about to get worse.

She said, what do you mean? I said, I believe they're going to fire you. She was stunned. I couldn't have stunned anymore if I'd hit her in the face with a bucket of ice water. She said, fire me? Why on earth would they fire me? In flexing in her voice clearly said, they're the bad guys. I'm the good guy. Why don't they fire them and keep me? Have you ever noticed that people who are the problem never recognize that they are? They're in complete denial. They think denial is just a river in Egypt. Why would they fire me?

I said, ma'am, I don't believe there's a company in America big enough to contain this much poison in one small spot. Have you ever noticed that when somebody is about to lose something they've been complaining about, whether it's a car, a home, a mate, a job, or whatever, when all of a sudden it appears they're going to lose them, it takes on brand new value. She looked at me and said, well, what can I do? I said, do you really want to know? She said, yes, I do.

That's the reason I came to see you. I came looking for help, but you sure hadn't been any help so far. I said, well, ma'am, I've got an idea, and I will absolutely guarantee you it positively, definitely, absolutely will work. if you will just do it. She said, I'll try anything within reason. I said, okay, when you get home tonight, all of your household tasks are complete, it's bedtime, get off in a room right by yourself, get a sheet of paper out, and at the top of it, right, I like my job because she interrupted me. She said,

that'll be easy. I don't like nothing about that job. Don't like nothing about those people down there. And I said, well, just as a matter of curiosity, do you work there for benevolent reasons, or do they pay you for working there? She said, well, I got to confess they pay me. And I said, and you don't like to be paid. Oh, she said, yes, I do. I said, okay, tell you what you do. Open your notebook right now.

We'll start our list of the things you like about your job. They pay you for working there, and you do like it, don't you? She said, absolutely. But she just stood there. I said, no, open your notebook now, and we'll get busy on the list. She just stood there. I said, ma'am, let me tell you what my experience in life. life has been, I've discovered that in 100% of the case, there's no exceptions. People who won't

take step number one, never take step number two. You see, she had come to me with an impossible dream. Her dream was that nice Mr. Ziegler was going to solve all of her problems, and she would live happily ever after. But folks, I got news for you. I can't solve her problems. I can't solve your problems. But I will give you some steps that I'll absolutely, definitely, and positively will work for you, as it worked eventually for her. I said, well, ma'am, let me tell you something, unless you're willing to take step number one right now, it's been nice talking with you. She angrily opened her notebook. Before we got through there were 22 things she liked about her job. Now not only did they pay her for working there, they paid her above average.

She had three weeks vacation with pay. She had a retirement program. She was in on profit insurance. She had health insurance, life insurance, and accident insurance. She lived less than 10 minutes from home. She was in on management decisions. The company sent her to three seminars a year to be paid for. She had her own private office and party place.

22 things that she liked about her job. Now I said, man, when you get home tonight, everything is finished. Get off in a room right by yourself, close the doors, change one word from I like my job to I love my job. Get in front of that mirror, and folks, I cannot say this strongly enough, but I'm going to try. The eyes are the windows of the soul. Look yourself in the eye, and with excitement and enthusiasm,

say, I love my job because they pay me for working there. I love my job because they pay me above average for working there. I love my job because I have a wonderful insurance program. I love my job before every one of the statements. You will sleep better that night. You see, there's something hidden in what I'm saying to you now when she says, I like my job, she's really saying I'm grateful for my job.

And of all of the emotions we can have, according to Hans Sellier, the number one stress specialists in America, the healthest of all human emotions is gratitude. I said, you go down that? list. I like my job. I love my job, rather. That is a way of gratitude. You'll sleep better the first night. Tomorrow morning when you get up, get back in front of the mirror just before you go to work, get back in front of the mirror and repeat the process again with excitement and enthusiasm. I love my job because and take the list with you. Because the reality is, you see, you will have

started to change from a fault finder to a good finder. Some people do really find fault like there's a reward for it. They really do. Take the list with you and you will be able to add to that list absolutely guaranteed. Do this every morning and every night and you will have an astonishing recovery from this advanced case of stinking thinking. Now, I didn't say that to her, but I'm saying it to you. That's what it was. It was an advanced case of stinking thinking.

Well, six weeks later, I was back in Birmingham. Alabama, I was doing a follow-up sales seminar. Now the lady was not in sales, but she had been listening to my tape, she had been listening to Automobile University, and she had discovered that everybody sells, everybody who will ever hear this is in selling. Whether you're a schoolteacher, a civil service worker, a military personnel, an executive secretary, it doesn't make any difference. What you do, you sell every day of your life. There she was. on there at the sale seminar seated on the front row grinning so wide she could have eaten a banana sideways i'm telling you you're talking about somebody that was excited she was turned on i said

well how you done she grinned even more broadly and said mr ziegler i'm doing wonderfully well and thank you for asking she said you cannot believe how much those people down there have changed i got a lid on the line folks you're not going to change anybody else Did you change you? Everything really does begin with you. In early 1965, I was in Kansas City where I was addressing my first really major seminar. When the seminar was over, I headed back to my room expecting to have a lonely dinner that evening. But as I stepped off the elevator, the booming voice of a man I've come to know in love as a brother sounded out.

Where are you going? And I said, well, I'm going to dinner. He said, wait a minute. He said, I'll go with you. It was Bernie Lofjik from Winnipeg, Canada. When we sat down, you have seen it happen where men just become instant, instant friends. And I don't mean just buddies, I mean really close friends. We had about the same-sized families.

His daddy died when he was very young. My daddy died when I was very young. He'd gone to work very early. I'd gone to work very early. He had gotten in the cookware business. I'd gotten in the cookware business. I mean, it was just an amazing thing. We sat down for dinner, and I said,

Bernie, you've certainly come a long way to a sales meeting. He said, yeah, you know, it really was magnificent. I got some wonderful ideas. Said it really was a great experience. Well, I kind of persisted, you know. I was going to find something negative to say there. So I said, yeah, but it sure cost you a lot of money to come from Winnipeg, Canada down to Kansas City.

for a couple of days. Well, he said, you know, Zig, thanks to my son David, I don't really have to worry about money. I said, Bernie, that sounds like a story. Would you share it with me? He said, yes, I will. He said, when our son David was born, our joy literally knew no bounds.

We were related. We already had our two girls. Now we had the boy, that's the family we wanted when we got married. But he said, it wasn't but a few days before we realized something was wrong. David's head hung too limply to the right side of his body. He drooled it too much to be a normally healthy baby.

But the doctor said, don't worry about it. He'll outgrow it. But you know, Zig, Bernie said, when it's your baby, you worry about it. We took him to a specialist, and the specialist, this was after about six months, the specialist, incredibly enough, diagnosed him with a condition he identified as the reverse of club's feet. And treated him for that for several weeks. But Bernie said, you know, Zing, we knew it was more serious than that. So we went to another specialist.

And this specialist, after a very exhaustive examination, told us, said, this little boy is a spastic. He has cerebral palsy. He's never going to be able to walk or talk or count to ten. I'm going to suggest that you put him in an institution for his own good and for the good of the, quote, normal members of the family. But Bernie looked at me in with those dark eyes of his flash, and he said, Zig, but he said, you know, I'm not a buyer. I'm a seller.

I could not conceive of my son living the life of a vegetable and growing up to be absolutely a nothing. I saw him in a different light altogether, so I asked the doctor if he knew of any other doctors, and all this specialist got highly indignant. He stood up. He said, I've given you the best advice you'll ever get. I suggest that you take it. And the interview was over. Bernie Loftick didn't take it.

He went to another specialist who told him the same thing, and then another and another and another and yet another. 30 different specialists said, there is no hope for this little boy. Then they heard of a Dr. Pearlstein from Chicago, Illinois. Dr. Pearlstein was reputedly the number one authority in the world on cerebral palsy. But he was so busy that he was booked for two full years in advance. Bernie finally got his home phone, called him there, made an arrangement so that if there was a cancellation that David would have the first alternate.

Just 11 days later, a little boy from Australia, canceled, and they bundled David up, flew him to Chicago for the examination. It was probably the most comprehensive physical that any child has been given up until that point. I mean, they really spent hour after hour, after hour, going over the baby. They threw out all of the other findings, all of the other x-rays. They just started from ground zero and went on with examination. They called in the best expert in the world to read the x-rays, just to tell them what was there. To make no diagnosis, to make no recommendations, just tell me what you see in the x-ray.

When it was all over, Dr. Pearlstein and his nurses, sat down with the Lopsichs, and they said, this little boy is a spastic. He has cerebral palsy. He's never going to be able to walk or talk or count a 10 if you listen to the prophets of doom. But he said, I happen to be solution conscious, not problem conscious. I believe there's something which you can do for this little boy if you are willing to do your part. The Lofsticks rather obviously said, well, doctor, you tell us we will do anything. that is humanly possible. Now at that time they could not easily afford a very heavy financial burden but they said spell it out doctor and we'll do what is necessary.

And in minute detail he said you're going to have to work this little boy beyond all human endurance then you're going to have to work him some more. You will have to push him until he literally falls and then you're going to have to pick him up and you'll have to push him some more. You're going to have to be patience personified and because there will be many, many months where you will be unable to detect any progress at all. But if you ever stop, he will go all the way back and then you will have to start all over. You're going to have to understand this is a lifetime commitment you're making, not something you do this year, next year, five years, or whatever, this is from now on.

Well, the lovistics took David and they went home. They hired a physical fitness expert and a bodybuilder. They built a little gymnasium in the basement of their home, and they went to work. It took a number of months before David could even move the length of his own body. One day, many months, probably about two to three years later, Bernie received a call from the therapist. He said, I believe David is ready. Come on home. Bernie Lifshick rushed home.

David was down in the gymnasium on a mat, getting ready to do. a push-up. And as that little body started to rise into the air, the physical and emotional exertion was so great. There was not a dry inch of skin on that little body. The mat looked as if you had sprinkled water on it when that one perfect push-up was complete. Mom and dad, the two sisters, David, the therapist, and several of the neighbors who were over there, broke down and said the tears, which clearly say that happiness is not pleasure. Happiness is victory. The story is even more remarkable when we learned that one of America's leading universities

had also examined David very carefully and discovered that there were no motor connections to the right side of his body. Ben said to him, he has no sense of balance. he will never be able to swim or to skate or to ride a bicycle. On October the 23rd, 1971, my wife and I were in Winnipeg, Canada, to see little David Lafjik at his bar mitzvah. I wish you could have been there. I wish the television cameras of the world could have been there to see what we saw.

That young boy, 13 years old, whom the doctors had said, would never be able to walk or talk or count to 10. At that point in his life, had already done as many as 1,100 push-ups in a single day. Had run six miles non-stop. Was doing extremely well as a seventh grader in ninth grade math at St. John's Ravens Court School for boys. He was running the wheels off his third bicycle, was skating on the neighborhood hockey team, was one of the best table tennis players in the city of Winnipeg, Canada. The next year, to the best of my knowledge, he became the first and so far as we know,

the only victim of cerebral palsy, to qualify for an unrated, ordinary, $100,000 life insurance policies. The reason I share with you so many of the details of David's story is because it involves the principles that we've been talking about all the way through. First of all, there was the foundation which is solid. They were absolutely honest with the loftics, and the lobstics, in turn, were honest with David. Character is, as Calvert Roberts says, the ability to carry out a good resolution

long after the excitement of the moment has passed. It's one thing to agree with the doctor you're going to do this for the next 15 years. It's another thing to do it for the next 15. years. Integrity, no question, all the way from day one. Loggily, you've never seen a family that were so one as the Lofjik family is. Trust? Don't you know that the trust had to be incredible? Three hours every single day from then on end, David had to be in there working. Don't you know that when the doctor said there'll be years and years when you won't be able to see any change,

That involved an incredible amount of trust. How many of us, for example, would have been willing to have hung in there all of that length of time? Love? One of the most beautiful love stories I think I've ever heard is this one. When David was about two years old, they had to start putting heavy leg braces on his legs every evening. And they had to make them progressively tighter. And every evening when Bernie and or Elaine would put those leg braces on, David would be there literally with tears in his eyes. And he had beautiful green eyes.

He's a beautiful child, cold black hair, olive complexion with tears in his eyes saying, mommy, do we have to put him on tonight? Or daddy, do you have to make them so tight? Now don't you know that any mother or father in existence would really have had trouble with that one? But Bernie and Elaine Lafjik loved David so much, they said no to the tears of the moment, so they could say yes to the laughter of the lifetime. See, when you really love someone, you do for that person what is best for that person. attitude every night when they were putting David to bed. First Elaine and then later, Bernie, when he would come in every night,

he would awaken David and he'd hold him in his arms. He'd say, son, you're a champ. You can do anything you want to do, son. And dad really loves you and mom really loves you. He was one of the first people to get a cassette recorder. In those days, they were just coming out. And every day while he was taking his therapy, be listening to the motivation while he was taking the therapy.

Self-image, obviously, as a child, he could not have a good one as an infant, but today, of course, he does. Relationships? Probably nobody has ever worked as closely with and in better cooperation with others than David Loftich has been working all of his life. Goals? We talk about daily goals and long-range goals and big goals. David Loftich had literally hourly goals. on many occasions. Nobody has ever worked them any harder than David Loftick. Desire? When you start talking about desire, you're talking about a youngster who surpasses just about anybody and anything I've ever seen. The physical effort that went in all of this is absolutely astronomical. David Loftchik, for one solid year, said his opportunity clock one hour earlier

than any other member of the family. And when that clock would sound off, he'd get up and put his skates on, go out to that frozen swimming pool, and it took him one solid winter just to learn how to stand up on the ice. Later, he skated on the neighborhood hockey team. You've heard it said many times throughout the series

that you can have everything in life you want, if you'll just help enough other people get what they want. One of the interesting phenomena of this is that Bernie and Elaine Lofchik, in the process of providing David his opportunity in life, Bernie not only had to work smarter, but he also had to work harder. For seven years, Bernie Lofchik worked seven days and seven nights every week. He took off one Friday night in seven years in order to provide the financial necessities for giving his son everything he needed. Today, Bernie Loftich is an extraordinarily wealthy man.

What's the end of the story? Well, the story is not ended. That's the reason we can't really end it, but I can bring you up to date. David Loftich today is a handsome young man of 29 years of AIDS. 195 pounds, a barrel for a chest. Happily married, a proud papa. And for the last two years, he's been the number one condominium salesman, in the number one real estate firm in Winnipeg, Canada, having a marvelous time and a marvelous career.

The principles he learned as a child are standing him in good stead now and will for the rest of his life. You just listen to The Power of Attitude with Zig Ziglar. Continue strengthening your mind by checking out our other episodes.