WHAT MAKES A WINNER?

Have you ever wondered why some people always seem to success, no matter the odds against them, while other never seem to get anywhere no matter matter how hard they try?. Are people born either winners or losers, or is it as Shakespeare has said : “ Men at some time are masters of their fates: “the fault, dear Brutus, is not in our star, but in ourselves, that we are underlings?”

Denis Waitley (author of “Seed of Greatness” and “The winner’s Edge”).
There is a fine line between them and the rest of the pack. He calls this line the winner’s edge. This edge isn’t the result of priviledge environment, of having a high I.Q, a superior education, or unusual talent. Nor is it a matter of luck. The key to the winner’s edge, he has found, is ATTITUDE.


There are many ingredients in a winning attitude, but the most important is being honest with yourself. To do this, you must follow three major precepts.

First: Assume responsibility for your actions.
There is a saying that goes: as we sow, we reap. Scientists talk of cause and effect. The meaning is the same; Our reward depend on the contributions we make. You yourself must take the credit or the blame for your place in life.
Responsible people look at the sackles they’ve placed upon themselves, and in a moment of truth, they declare their independence.
(Joe sorrentino grew up in an inner-city neighborhood, became a teenage gang leader and served time in a reform school. Remembering a seventh-grade teacher’s confidence in his academic aptitude, he relized that, despite his high school record, his only hope for success was through education. He returned to night school at age 20, went on to University of California, where he graduated magna cum laude, and then finished at Havard Law school. He became an outstanding junevile-court judge in Los Angeles. None of this would have happened if Joe Sorrentino had not had the courage to alter his destiny.

Second: Find your own gifts; follow your own goals
In Shakespeare’s HAMLET, Polonius tells his son:
“This above all: to thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the nigh day, Thou canst not then be false to any man”
Polonius was advising his son to live according to his own deepest convictions and abilities-daring to be different while respecting the rights of other. Most of us however, find ourselves in a quandary. How do we really want to send our lives? How do we know we have selected the right career or the proper goals?

Third: Don’t escape-Adapt
The key of success, to mental and physical health, is adaptability. Under pressure, many of us become depressed, lose our incentive and excitement about life. We tend to drink more, smoke more, or rely on traquilizers to help us cope. While alcohol and other anti-anxiety drugs temporarily reduce emotional reactions to threats of pain or failure, they also interfere with our ability to tolerate these stresses.
One of the best way to adapt to many stresses of life is to simply accept them as normal. The adversity and failures in our lives, if we view them as corrective feedback, serve to develop in us immunity, the adverse responses to stress.
John Gardner in his book Self reneval, states that the winners in life do not leave their growth to chance. They pursue it by carrying on an endless dialog between their potentialities and the claims on their lives. In developing our society attitudes for success, we must recognize that there is more freedom in society than ever before and more opportunity to express our talents and opinions.
Those who feel they are forced to do things or to escape are not in control of their lives.
In short, LOSERS LET LIFE HAPPEN TO THEM, WINNERS MAKE IT HAPPEN.

(condensed from “Seed of Greatness” and “ The Winner’s Edge” by Denis Waitley)