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IN HIS BOOK Grinding it Out, Ray Kroc, the man who
made McDonald’s what it is today, wrote about his father.
Kroc senior was a hard-working man who was doing well in real
estate before the Depression, expanding his holdings and using
credit to extend himself even further. “When the market
collapsed, he was crushed beneath a pile of deeds he could not
sell,” wrote Kroc. “The land they described was worth
less than he owed. This was an unbearable situation for a man
of my father’s principled conservatism. He died of a cerebral
hemorrhage in 1930. He had worried himself to death. On his desk
the day he died were two pieces of paper — his last paycheck
from the telegraph company and a garnishment notice for the entire
amount of his wages.”
Bad stuff happens, and sometimes it’s
big. You don’t want it to crush you. You want to be strong.
So start now taking every small bad thing that happens as an
opportunity to repeat this idea to yourself:
There will be an advantage in this.
I will find it or I will make it.
Repeat it until you see or can make an
advantage out of it. If you will do this, you will stand as a
fortress of strength for your family in situations that would
make lesser men and women collapse in hopelessness. This idea
is not some namby-pamby, rah-rah, positive-thinking nonsense.
It is a source of tremendous strength. It may save your life
some day. For sure it will be good for your health. Ingrain that
thought — make that pathway through your brain well-worn
— and you’ll be able to face up to difficulties that
would make a mere mortal crawl and whimper.
Arnold Schwarzenegger is more successful
than most people know. He’s made a lot of money with his
films and married a Kennedy, but he’s also a smart and successful
businessman outside of the movie business, with real estate,
books, restaurants, and fitness clubs. He is hugely successful.
In his autobiography, he wrote,
I didn’t get certain things I needed
as a child, and that, I think, finally made me hungry for achievement...If
I’d gotten everything and been well-balanced, I wouldn’t
have had my drive. [Because of] this negative element in my upbringing,
I had a positive drive toward success...
He held up under the strain and turned
it to his advantage. He didn’t let it crush him because
of the way he thinks. This strength is within your grasp:
Find or make an advantage in everything that happens.
Find a way to turn your problems
into an advantage. |
