Dan Pena: Most of you are not more successful... not just most of you,
but most people in the world, is because they don't hold themselves accountable.
You come up with an excuse. Why I didn't get this done?
For those of you that have children the kid did this, the wife did this.
And you wind up, you’re 25, 30, 35 then you're 60 and 70 and then your life's over.
To self-esteem has to be earned with scar tissue.
Are you working hard enough?
Are you doing absolutely everything you can to reach your goals?
Or are you using excuses so you can get out of the responsibility of achieving the life you want
Wanting is easy
Pursuing is hard
That is the test.
Everybody wants something. But few are willing to make the sacrifices necessary to succeed.
Endure pain, doubts, loneliness on the way to victory.
Giving up comfort and certainty.
Give yourself to the unknown. Give yourself to your work. Go the extra mile.
Are you just one more between many? Or are you one of the few?
Dan Pena: There's a hip-hop motivational guy, a black guy.
And he says if you don't want to be successful as much as you want lungs, breath in your lungs,
none of you qualify in this room. Hardly anybody that comes to the seminar qualifies.
When I was doing this and when I invented QLA, and I didn't know it was QLA at
the time I only knew it was QLA when I looked back and I put it together, the
model if you will or the formula, I wanted it more than air. I sacrificed, my God,
my country, my family, my children, my parents, my friends. And guess what?
It happened. It's no different than the guys that have, go to the Olympics. And I’ve had
the pleasure and the privilege of training some of them, they have one thing on their mind. They're
not going to the Olympics, but getting a medal. And not getting a medal, getting a gold medal.
Dan Pena: Life expands and contracts with courage through pain. Being successful at
anything for those of you that played sports in high school or college or whatever,
you know, the better-trained teams normally won. Best prepared teams normally won. How do you
get prepared to practice sweat etc, right? Life, business, being an entrepreneur is no different.
You've got to practice being successful. I went over this. I could give this seminar in a coma.
I went over, for every minute that I'm up here I practiced 10 minutes and I'm a world-class
speaker. Can you say the same? When was the last time you practiced being successful if ever?
When you want something you can get it. But there are two things you must do - BELIEVE AND PRACTICE.
You have to believe you can win. If you don’t how will you find motivation?
How will you carry yourself with enough confidence to stand out in the room?
How will you be worth it?
And then practice. Practice all the time.
Practice to perfection. Practice not only how to be good at your craft but how to be successful.
When you do that, everything changes.
People see you differently.
And the practice starts becoming reality.
Dan Pena: The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler's to look at
the man who surrounds himself with. Now, If I were going to judge you or you or you
by the guys you hang with the guys you chill with I’d think you're a retard.
Bill Gates does not chill. He does not go to Super Bowl. Steve Jobs didn't hang. Why do you?
You hang out with monkeys, a lot of resemblance here,
you know, you become a circus. Show me your friends and I'll show your future.
Most of you would be embarrassed to tell me who your five closest buddies are.
Dan Pena: You only have one time to make a first impression. The first impression is how you look.
Now I already know how I look and you know how I look as well. Second impression is when you open
your mouth. Most of you, with the greatest respect, can't speak properly. You stutter,
you mumble, you sweat and I can go on and on and I’m describing most of the people in this room.
He's an anomaly to that. He was born for the stage more or less, see he basks, he likes these hot
lights on him. Most of us don't. I’ve learned to like the hot lights because I want to convey my
message. So you go where there are people that you want to be like. You find somebody that is,
in my whole basis is mentorship, find somebody that is where you want to
be 20 or 30 years from now and go to him or her now.
And I had the presence of mine to be attracted to some very very famous,
very well wealthy people in my 50-year career and I went after them to not for money,
not for anything like at but I just wanted them to talk to me and to share their wisdom.
People around you make all the difference.
If you want to grow, you must surround yourself with people who want to grow as well.
People who will be working on their goals instead of going to parties.
People who won’t let you give up when you want to.
People who will you inspire to become better.
Have good people alongside you on your journey, but also look ahead.
Who are your inspirations?
Who represents how you want to be like in 20 years?
Learn from these people’s mistakes and victories.
And move forward.
Dan Pena: The first day I went to work was august the 10th 1961.
The day I turned 16. That's when you could get a social security card.
And I was a member of a union. I was a box boy at a market where they used to put the
groceries in bags for you. Okay, I got paid a dollar or six or a dollar eight an hour.
And so for between august 10th my first day at work I worked 21 days. I worked every
day. My first check was 240 dollars. If you go through the numbers, I worked every day,
about 10 hours a day. If you had, if you went got sick, I took your shift. If you wanted to go home
and get laid I took your shift. If you wanted to go to your son's ball game I took your shift.
I just took everybody in and so they, you know, I was extra shift Pena I mean. And then,
when school started I used to work on the weekends and I would go there after practice.
Nobody's got a job after practice. Because I saw my dad's work ethic and i.e the average
guy that comes to the seminar works less than 40 hours a week. Some of you are internet scum,
you know, four hours you want to work, not a day, a week. And there's more you than 80-hour
week guys. But even at the average and 80, that's only 42 hours a week. Some of you, not necessarily
this group, brag you work four hours a month, one hour a week and you're going to culture shock.
One third of you in the next two months is going to get either pneumonia, can't get up out of bed,
and it's called stress. Especially the six packers and the pill poppers are the first to drop.
The five percent body fat or the big tubs of shit. Like we got a couple in here yeah but well I mean,
you know, they just seem to roll with it. They just eat more I guess, I don't know.
But I mean, the fit guys are the guys that fall like pretzels because you're not used to working.
And then what you're really not, you think the hours you work are work and they're not.
And the weekly reports you're going to have to from the time you get up in the morning,
and of course you lie to me, to the time you go to sleep at night, every hour on the hour,
what did you do. When you see that you are gonna shit your pants
and you wonder how you accumulated anything in your life.
Work when others sleep.
Work when others party.
Work when they take time off.
Work when they’ve had enough work.
Work even when you think you can’t anymore.
It is hard. You will need focus and persistence, but you will get used to it.
The more you work, the better you will become at it.
Step by step, you will get closer to your goals,
until the rewards you get are greater than any hardship you endured.
It is all in your hands.
Make the choice of what you want to do with your life and do it.
Don’t waste any more time.
You can do it.