In 1971 I attended my first ever sales training workshop. Towards the end of the workshop I was quietly taken aside by my well-meaning instructor for some sound fatherly advice, “Get out of selling kid you haven’t got what it takes”.

So, what’s new, I thought.

I’ve been bottom of every class since Grade One. In Standard Nine, after discovering I had achieved the all-time distinction of 3% for Maths and Science, 21% for Afrikaans and 24% for English, I made a profound discovery: “I was not cut out for school,” so I quit.

After leaving school, I led the first expeditions to canoe the Tugela River and the Fish River Canyon in Namibia and completed several Duzi Marathons and the Comrades, partly because I loved adventure, but mostly to prove I was not the wimp other people thought I was.

After a very varied and exciting five-year stint in the South African Police, I found out that I was not very good at conforming, had absolutely no respect for rank and very little regard for authority. I reached another profound turning point in my life: I had discovered that I was not really employable.

Because along the way I had also worked out that the world did not owe me a living and that I had no “rights”, I made the logical discovery that it was about time that I learned to work for myself. After all, I had to eat. Hence my decision to participate in the sales workshop.

As I sat amongst my twenty-two newfound acquaintances listening to the farewell speeches at the end of that sales workshop, I was completely blank. I had no idea what to say, besides public speaking was not exactly my forte. Suddenly it was my turn. My consciousness seemed to leave my body and I found myself looking down on my body as it was dragging itself reluctantly to its feet.

As I looked down, I remember thinking, “I wonder if anyone will listen to me just this once?” Then, to my amazement, I heard these words coming out of my mouth: “One day I will be the greatest teacher the world has ever had!”

I collapsed into a heap and while re-entering my body I thought, “If one man in the world can achieve something truly exceptional, then surely I can learn too. All I have to do is give up being who I think I am and become someone who is equal to my aspirations!”

Well, twenty-five years later, I have travelled the world. The Chinese have named me the Bearer of Great Profit and Wealth, the Zulus call me the Man who Laughs in the Bush, and I dare not tell you what the Irish call me!

Captains of industry ascribe their success to my teaching. My books are being treasured by thinking people all over the world. Some people claim that I have changed their lives forever and I didn’t really believe in myself that fateful day in 1971. After all, my track record proved it could never happen.

What Was the Profound Thinking That Was Responsible for the Change?

 

FIRST

Everything in nature is in a permanent state of change. The vast majority of the planet’s inhabitants resist change and consume most of their energy trying to hang on to their past. Generally, they find it easier not to think, so they give away all responsibility to some authoritative figure. Now, if life does not work, they have someone other than themselves to blame. The tiny minority of exceptional performers know that they are part of nature and are continuously changing. They accept personal responsibility for choosing their own change while using a minimum amount of energy doing the logical and natural thing.

SECOND

While resisting change, the majority is forced to use their incredible intelligence to justify their past. The tiny minority of superstars use this same intelligence to change themselves into the person who is equal to their aspirations. They simply work the law of cause and effect.

THIRD

Because the underachievers refuse to accept responsibility for their thinking and, as a result, their lives, they always see themselves as victims of the system and are always blaming someone or some circumstance for their miserable lack of performance. The super achievers, on the other hand, know that they, through their thoughts and actions, are in control of every aspect of their lives and are willing to accept that responsibility. As a result, they become the creators.

FOURTH

Because the victims are not in control, they live in fear, using their intelligence to justify why their perceptions are based on their real-life experience. They quickly adopt a philosophy of greed, always on the lookout for a quick windfall, usually blamed on good luck but almost never earned. They believe they have rights that must be supplied by society, irrespective of their apparent inability to trade fair and honest value.

The creators are always selfish. They know that all they must trade with the world is what they have made of themselves. Because of their dignity and self-respect, they will never let themselves down or settle for less than their best. The result is that they always trade exceptional value and are always willing to pay in full for the value they expect for themselves. They know everything has a price and that there is no such reality as something for nothing. They are in control of their fears because they keep using their intelligence to gain the knowledge to change their perceptions, and thus change themselves.

FIFTH

The non-starters spend their lives saying, “What if?” and then use their brains to think of all the things they don’t want to happen. They consume energy being “positive thinkers”, working out how to protect themselves from the perceptions of their own victim mentality.

The starters, however, know that they control their world with their thoughts and never waste energy thinking about what they don’t want. They simply stay focused on the perfect end result of their vision of the future and the achievement of all the other goals along the road to the fulfilment of their dreams.

SIXTH

The failures dream and then use their victim intelligence to compromise or settle for second best. The successful dream and convert their dreams into thought energy. Armed with the knowledge that, like all forms of energy, this energy cannot be destroyed but has to go into the universe and fulfil itself, they plan and mentally put their plan into action, knowing with absolute self-knowledge that they are not capable of dreaming a dream that they do not have the latent ability to achieve.

By acting immediately, they force themselves to uncover this latent unconscious ability and convert it into conscious tools that enable them to grow into the person who is equal to their desires.

SEVENTH

The failures say they were created in the image of God. Do they believe that God does not have the ability to accept responsibility for the fulfilment of His own life? Those who have succeeded know that they are created in the image of God and understand that they would not have a desire for something without having the latent potential for its fulfilment. They honour their Creator by working their GODLINESS.

By David Pickard Wyllie