Copyright (c) 2008 Larry Smith

Back in 2000 when I was a career educator making the transition into the business world, someone told me that success in starting and building a marketing business was 90% mindset. If the battle of the mind is not won, forget business success. I did not buy that hypothesis fully back then, but eight years of working in customer services with a very successful and rapidly growing marketing firm, I can unequivocally say amen! This series of articles on why people do not meet with success in any venture, business or otherwise, will focus on having the correct mindset for success.

Jack Dolittle (real name no pun intended) was a fresh-water fishing guide in the Tampa Bay area a few years ago. I learned a very important lesson about mindset from him. He was a very successful fishing guide and people paid him good money for catching fish. His mindset was authoritative. He believed that the creator of the universe gave him authority over all the animals and creatures of land and sea. He would declare how many fish he was going to catch and would go out and reel them in like clockwork. If he said seventeen bass he would catch seventeen bass. When he caught his number he was through for the day, regardless of how others were doing. In ten years of being near him, I never saw Jack experience failure in catching fish. He went “catchin” not “fishin”. Mindset was a spiritual matter. He had a made-up mind and nothing could break his resolve.

I shared Jack’s approach with an octogenarian mid-western cattle farmer on the brink of losing his huge cattle ranch. He set his mind to success and went to his banker and told him how much money he needed and on what terms he would take the note. The banker who previously had rejected giving him a note, had a change of mind (heart) and gave him what he asked. Two years later at age 85, Charles had not only saved his ranch, he now had five million dollars surplus in his business account.

The business mindset is not wishful thinking of I hope, or maybe so. It is tied to what Lisa Diane, my marvelous boss, calls the “Five Magic Words”. She declares, “Your Thoughts Create Your Life”. I have watched her create numerous six and seven figure business ventures in short periods of time. Her success is tied to not allowing negative, or even, whimsical thinking into play. Positive, authoritative thinking wins every time! If you have been doing the same thing over and over again and you are not meeting with success. Something has to change and the mindset is where it all starts.