Sales Training: Your Sales Belief 

By Mark Bowser - Motivational Business Speaker

The belief we hold inside is a reflection of the life we’ll live outside. 

I remember a practice tennis match I played one time.   The score was three all in the first set and then the next thing my practice partner knew was that I had won the first set six games to three.  My practice partner said, “What happened?”

I said, “I told myself to raise my game.” 

“What do you mean, you told yourself to raise your game?” asked my tennis partner. 

What I was verbalizing very poorly was a positive self-expectation.  This guy had never beaten me and I didn’t expect him to now.  I knew I was going to win so I just raised the level of my game to meet that expectation. 

This particular tennis partner tends to have a negative attitude.  He thought the worst.  He expected to lose and he did.  I expected to win and I did.  The belief we hold inside is everything.  You see, a negative self-expectation is just as powerful as a positive self-expectation just in the wrong direction.  A wrong direction down the path of failure and destruction.

A man who chose that negative path was Elvis Presley.  “Come on, Mark!  The king of rock and roll?”  Yes, the king of rock and roll.  Let me explain. 

Elvis Presley’s mother died of a heart condition at the age of 43.  Elvis was so terrified that he would die of the same heart condition that he actually helped bring that condition upon himself.  Through worry and anxiety, Elvis’ health started to deteriorate.  His heart got weaker.  His attitude got weaker.  His negative self-expectation got stronger.

Elvis Presley was confident he would die by the time he reached the same age as his mother’s death.  He believed it with every ounce of his being.  You know what happened?  Elvis received what he believed.  Elvis Presley died at age 43 and very near to the some month that his mother died.  Coincidence?  I don’t think so! Our attitude is important.  Our belief system is powerful.  What we believe has a way of coming true. 

Success coach Anthony Robbins tells a great story in his fabulous book, Awaken the Giant Within, of a man who believed  in a positive self-expectation.  A champion with a strong belief system who reached extraordinary success.  That champion’s name was Honda.

Even though he was still in school, Mr. Honda in the year 1938 took all the money he had and invested it in a small machine shop.  It was his dream to develop his piston ring concept which he wanted to sell to Toyota Corporation. After many hard hours of pain and sweat Honda finally presented his work to Toyota and they rejected it.  They said his quality didn’t meet their standards.  Toyota then sent Honda back to school where he was cruelly teased by both his professors and his fellow students.  They thought Honda’s designs as well as Honda himself were crazy.

Many people would quit right there.  Would you?  How about Honda?  NO WAY!  Remember, champions expect to win!  Honda continued to believe in himself and his work.  Two more years went by before Toyota gave him the contract he desired. 

At this time, the Japanese government was preparing for World War II and they refused to give Honda the concrete he needed to build his factory.  But this challenge did not stop Honda.  He was a champion.  He rallied his team and they developed their own procedure for making concrete.  They built their factory. 

During the war, Honda’s factory was bombed twice by American fighters.  Did he quit now?  It would certainly be understandable if he had.  But that was not Honda.  He pushed forward persistently.  Honda turned this into a positive by gathering up the empty fuel tanks the fighters had dropped during their raids.  Honda called the tanks “gifts from President Truman” because they provided him and his team with valuable raw materials which were not available in Japan.

Now, after all this an earthquake destroyed his factory and he was forced to sell his materials to Toyota.  Most people would have given up by now.  How about you?  What else could Honda do but quit?  Honda would not accept defeat.  He knew that somehow, somewhere, there was a victory. 

After the war, Japan went through a tremendous gasoline crunch.  People were not allowed to use very much gasoline so out of desperation Honda strapped a small motor to his bicycle and made a motorized bike.  Honda’s neighbors loved this idea and asked if he would build some for them.  Honda decided to so and eventually he ran out of motors. 

Honda then got an idea.  He thought, “Hmmm, what if I built a factory and manufactured these bikes?”  But he didn’t have any extra money.  So what could he do?  Forget about it?  Not Honda.  He wrote a personal letter to each of the eighteen thousand bicycle shop owners in Japan and he convinced five thousand of them to supply him with the capital he needed to fund his venture.

Honda built a factory and started manufacturing his motorized bikes.  But the problem was these bikes were huge.  They were big and bulky and only the most dedicated bicycle owners bought these bikes.  So, Honda made a smaller, lighter version of his bike and it was an overnight success.  He was even awarded the Emperor’s Award for his achievements. 

This success led to the automobiles we are so familiar with today.  Because of one man’s unstoppable positive self-expectation is why Honda Corporation is one of the finest companies in the world. So, my friend, what do you believe?  Can you succeed like Honda?  You can if you believe you can.  Hold on to your dreams and, like Honda, work them until they come true.  YOU CAN DO IT! 

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