How does a person commit?
What I do is eliminate any and all other options and devote myself to learning everything I can about the topic. I become a fanatic, 100 percent absorbed, all in, a Super Freak! I stop questioning and get in all the way. Furthermore, I discontinue looking at other options.
Committing is as simple as picking a place to park your car. Find a spot, pull in, and get out of the car. You don’t keep looking for another space in which to park. COMMIT AND BE DONE WITH IT. Committing is when you make a firm decision, you quit wondering, and then you follow through on your commitment with actions.
Once you’ve fully committed to a partner in life, it’s good advice to quit looking for new partners. You take what you have and make everything you can out of it. Can you find someone prettier, smarter, and happier? Probably, but that’s not committing. Committing means you are in all the way, you are done looking, and you make the person you have committed to the prettiest, the smartest, and the happiest. I would rather commit to the wrong thing all the way than commit to the right thing only halfway.
Commit and be done with it!
GREENER PASTURES
The guy who thinks the grass is greener “over there” is the same guy who never commits to taking care of the pasture he already has. He winds up mediocre and miserable. What was he even doing looking at another pasture in the first place? He already has one that needs to be mowed. Remember, while there may be greener pastures, they’re green because someone committed. Weeds grow in every field, and if you don’t commit to it all the way, you’ll neglect it. When you neglect it, you’ll start to dislike it, and then you’ll start peering over the neighbor’s fence and thinking that what he has is better. It’s only better because he committed. So commit to your career, commit to learning about selling, commit to your product, service, and employees. Commit to learning everything you can and watch how much green your career will produce for you.
Whenever I commit myself to any line of action, I get immediate results. When I’m not committed all the way, I find that results are delayed or nonexistent. If I’m committed 100 percent to the customer before me, I get results. But when I’m with one customer and thinking about another customer or wishing I had a better customer, I’m unable to make the best of what I have. Commit and commit all the way.
When I give seminars I often wear a small gold pin on the lapel of my jacket that says “100%.” A salesperson asked me if I wore it for my customers to see. I explained that while customers do see it and are intrigued by it, I don’t wear it for them. I wear it for myself. I wear it to remind myself to commit all the way. I don’t get dressed for my customers; I get dressed for myself so that I feel good, so that I’m dressed professionally. I wear that pin to remind myself that I’m 100 percent committed.
Commitment is a personal thing, and it’s the indisputable requirement for getting results in life and separating yourself from the herds. At the age of twenty-five, I had been in and out of sales for five years or so and I realized that I was still looking for another career. No commitment equals no results. I had not made a commitment to sales yet, and I was not proud of my position or the work I was doing. How could I be? I was only average at best. I was average because I was not committed. Because I was not committed, I was not getting results. Because I was not getting results, I did not like my job—it was all a vicious cycle.
To the degree that you aren’t proud of the job you’re doing, you won’t be successful; and the degree to which you are successful will determine how proud you are of your career. The career you are in is not the problem—your commitment is the problem!
I decided one day (after years of being mediocre) that sales was not the problem—I was. At that moment I devoted myself to learning everything there was to know about sales. My goal was to stand head and shoulders above others in my field and to no longer be compared with them. I decided to become a professional and be different than the “typical” average, mediocre salesperson. That was the moment when everything changed for me, and it changed immediately and magically. Right away my energy changed, my dress changed, my actions and habits started changing, my language changed, and my results changed. Immediately, my pastures became green and my potential exploded. It was almost spiritual! No, it was spiritual. It was so dramatic—and that is the magic of commitment.
If you want to be successful at anything you have to commit. You’ve got to be in it 100 percent with no other fish to fry. A “burn the ship” kind of mentality is what it takes to get you to a place where you’ll do things that will ensure results. Get into the game as though your life depended on it, because your life does depend on it. The life that you’ve been dreaming of depends on you getting in all the way now. This is how I approach anything when I really want results. This is how I approached the career of selling, and the moment I did that, my life changed.