The Cycle of Winning
An Excerpt from Serial Winner by Larry Weidel
We all know people in life who seem to move from success to success, with barely a pause or dip in between. They’re always talking about their next big project or goal. They’re always excited about something. They have limitless energy, which they use to accomplish more and more. They are role models and opinion-makers. They always seem ahead of the game.They stay on their feet.They lead rewarding lives.
They are serial winners. In a world full of people who almost win, they are the few who do it again and again.
To most of us, serial winners are confounding. They seem to have the ability to shed the negatives in life and attract the positives. How do they find the energy or time? we ask. How did they get there so fast? How do they fit it all in? We just don’t understand how these people achieve what they do. Because for the most part, they don’t seem all that special. Many of them started where we did. Sure, some had elite training, but most didn’t have any extra advantages (and some had even fewer) — they worked their way up from the streets. (Did you know that most millionaires in the United States are first-generation or self-made?)
So we try to follow their moves. We study what they say. We may stick some of their better quotes on the wall. We even copy their style — how they dress, their mannerisms, their haircuts. They become our models. Why? Because we want similar things. We want opportunities. We want to contribute to our communities. We want to lead fulfilling lives. We want to have fun! We want to do big things. Yet we still seem to be missing some important piece.
That piece is action — consistent action that leads to consistent progress.
Serial winners leverage a cycle of winning action to make progress. They do something every day that puts them or keeps them on course for the things they want in life. Along the way, they steadily overcome friction and other forces that could slow them down or knock them off course. By focusing on what they can and should do, they manage themselves out of tough, demoralizing situations. The result? They are always moving forward, following their passions, having fun, and contributing to the world.
What about you? Are you achieving everything you want to achieve? Are you making the progress you would like, or do you feel stuck? Do you have an itch to break out, try something new, or go for more? Is there something great you want to make happen in your career, your life, or even the world?
If you’re okay with your life remaining exactly as it is now, this book probably isn’t for you. But if you can picture yourself doing more and doing bigger, this book can help. Because the only difference between you and a serial winner is five basic actions.
And there is nothing keeping you from applying those five actions in your own life.
THERE’S NO PATENT ON ACTION
Even though it may not seem to be true, everybody has won and lost. No one has a perfect batting average, and no one has struck out every single time. Anybody who tells you different is trying to sell you something, so be sure to read the disclaimers. Serial winners bounce back, move on, and win anyway. And they do it through action.
I’ve had big successes, but I also had to accept food stamps for a time just to keep my wife and two young boys from going hungry. Today I’m a multimillionaire, but I once had a boss label me Turkey of the Month in a company-wide newsletter (no kidding). I know what it is to have nothing go right, to be passed over for promotions, to be the one applauding others who were getting ahead. But I’ve learned a lot about success and winning along the way. And I have spent the past forty years building a national financial services organization and helping the many, many people on my team achieve the success they want. Hundreds have been able to earn six-figure annual incomes, and even more have earned the label “millionaire.” I had to dig harder and longer than some people, but when it takes you longer, you value the results and what you learned along the way more.
When I started my career, everything was hard. But my weaknesses gave me an edge. I knew I didn’t have a chance of making something great out of my life unless I paid attention. I studied the winners I knew closely. I asked a lot of questions. (I’m surprised people didn’t start walking the other way when they saw me coming.) And I figured out what I had to do — step by step, detail by detail — to improve. I caught on to the fact that the people who were winning weren’t better than me. They simply did things that I wasn’t doing.
I learned something important: nothing can keep us from doing what winners do. There’s no copyright on wisdom, and there’s no patent on action.
My biggest advantage has been the incredible circle of advisors and mentors in my life. I learned about coaching from “Bullet Bob” Turley, professional pitcher and winner of the Cy Young Award. My cousin, Edward Roberts, who was known as “the father of the personal computer,” taught me how to follow my curiosity and apply my drive. Art Williams, founder of the A.L. Williams & Associates life insurance company (now Primerica), taught me a lot about how to be a winning leader.
Everything I’ve achieved, I’ve achieved by watching the best. How do the best do it? How did they get to the top and how do they stay on top? I wasn’t interested in modeling just anyone. I wanted to watch what the top people did, because obviously they knew and did things that most people didn’t. Life is too short to figure everything out on your own.
Unfortunately, not enough people have access to great mentors and coaches. They aren’t close enough to serial winners to spot the simple pattern they all apply. And that is why I wrote this book — to help people discover the patterns that could catapult them to a new level of success and happiness.
THE CYCLE OF WINNING
Over the years, I figured out the go-to moves — the cycle of action that winners use to achieve what they want. The winners who return to this cycle again and again, day after day, have serial success. These five actions get them on track and help them stay on track. What are they?
It’s true, these concepts aren’t complicated. But the greats from every walk of life talk about using them to win. So why don’t more people win? Because most people don’t really understand them, don’t apply them, or don’t apply them consistently. “Yeah, yeah, I know,” they say. But what they believe is that these actions seem too simple to be important. There must be something more to it, right? So they keep looking for a more complicated answer that doesn’t exist, ignoring the valuable answer they’ve already been given.
Here’s the bottom line: Anyone who wants more out of life and is frustrated enough to do something about it can learn and apply what winners do. Winners keep things simple. And where winners always start is with these fundamentals. So if you ever find yourself asking, “Who says I have to sit on the sidelines? Who says I have to live on the leftovers of people who are doing the things I would like to do?” this is where you should start, too.
WINNING ISN’T A ONE-TIME THING
Will Rogers once said, “Even if you are on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.” You may be a hard worker. You may have a great attitude. (In fact, I’m pretty sure these sentences describe you because lazy, negative people don’t buy books like this.) But to win in life, you have to keep making progress. Winning isn’t a one-time thing.
Unfortunately, when some force has come along and knocked us off our path, we can become confused. We don’t have a clue as to what to do next, so many of us stop doing anything. We sit there.
What I will help you discover is practical answers to the most basic of all questions: “So now what do I do?” The answer is, “Turn to the fundamentals. Go back to the basics.” The cycle of winning can always guide us to appropriate action. It shapes how winners respond to whatever life throws at them.
If you are struggling to choose a path and start down it, I’ll explain how to decide on a goal or destination and commit to it. If you’ve started down a new path but don’t seem to be making much progress, I’ll show you how to build momentum. If you have hit a hurdle that is stopping you in your tracks, I’ll share the methods that all winners use to adjust and keep going. Most important, I’ll help you keep yourself from quitting when you are moments away from winning. And then I’ll describe how to keep going — on to the next and bigger thing. What I will come back to again and again is the importance of doing.
If things aren’t happening for you right now, there’s something you can do about it. And it’s probably one of the five fundamentals I’ll cover in this book. As you read, you’ll realize that you’re already doing some of these things. But one or more of them will jump out at you — the things you’re missing. It’s like a Ferrari with a bad spark plug. Switch it out and you’ll be covering ground fast. Stop talking about what you want; stop thinking about what is holding you back. Instead, turn your frustrations and desires into actions. The discipline of consistent action is what self-management is all about. It’s the only way to win and keep winning.
I want to get you excited about what’s possible and to show you how easy it can be to achieve what you want faster by digging deep on the fundamentals. My mission is to launch a revolution of doing, to unleash an army of people who are ready to race forward toward the great big things they really want to do — that they are destined to do.
If you’re ready to join that army, read on.
Excerpted from Serial Winner published by Greenleaf Book Group on October 20, 2015. Copyright @2015 Larry Weidel and WOW World Media, LLC
Available for Purchase at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and your local independent bookstore.
