“The 6 Success Strategies for Winning at Life, Love & Business” by Wolf J. Rinke, PhD

Part two of a two-part interview with Wolf J. Rinke, PhD, author of The 6 Success Strategies for Winning at Life, Love & Business

Before embarking on a successful journey, says management consultant and professional speaker Dr. Wolf Rinke, one needs to follow a roadmap; the same is true for our journey through life. In this conclusion of our interview, Dr. Rinke points to the steps along the road that can lead to a winning life.

When is fear helpful and when is it destructive?
Fear is wonderfully helpful if you’re sitting in a movie theater and someone screams “Fire!” You don’t exactly want to be calm and think about what to do; you want to get yourself out of there. And in that respect, fear is helpful. In just about every other aspect in our lives, though, fear stands in the way of doing what you really want to do. We all fear failure but we also fear success. One is as powerful as and as much of a hindrance as the other. We may fear success because even though we think we desire success, we don’t like change. There’s a saying: “The only things that like change are diapered babies and cashiers.”

The fear of failure is something that will keep holding you back simply because no one likes to fail. But in my personal lexicon, the word failure doesn’t exist. What I mean by that is, when I do something I get results – either I get the results I want, or I get the results I don’t want, but there is no failure. And it’s simple: If you get the results you want, keep doing it. If you get a different result from the one you want, quit doing it. People keep making the same mistake over and over again. So do something different and you’ll get different results. There’s a wonderful saying: “If you always do what you’ve always done, you’re always going to get what you always got.”

What are some suggestions for stamping out the fear?
We all paint terrible pictures in our imaginations and those pictures get in the way of our doing what we need to do. Some people have a fear of flying, for example, but the way to overcome that is to get yourself on a plane. Get yourself to do what you’re fearful of doing. Do the thing you fear, and what you fear will be gone.

How can we turn failure into opportunity?
Just about every time I’ve had a setback in my life, it’s caused me to succeed faster. For example, one of my early books was a niche market book and the publisher told us it would be a best-seller. But nine months later he called to say they were discontinuing it. I had retained the copyright on that book so I reworked it – it became one of the forerunners of a continuing education business. That book was a “failure” but we turned it around and made it a successful business. And it all started because the publisher said “I don’t want to print your book anymore.” It’s true that every cloud has a silver lining, but you have to look for that lining – look for the opportunity. And the reality is, if you look for an opportunity you’re going to find it.

What are the three types of optimists?
The first type is the unrealistic optimist. This is a person who is a dreamer but never wants to pay the price to transform the dreams into reality. The second type is the eternal optimist. This type is best illustrated by the phrase “Don’t worry; be happy.” His thought is, “Just don’t worry about anything and everything will work out.” But my experience is no, it won’t. You have to do something if you want things to work out. Bad stuff happens to good people, so you have to do something when bad stuff happens.

You want to become the third type of optimist – the pragmatic optimist, This is what I recommend you work toward. The pragmatic optimist accepts setbacks and tragedy and disaster as the normal order of life. Somehow, we have an illusion that everything is supposed to work out. But if you look at the world and at nature, that’s not how it goes. Tragedies are built into the system. So you and I need to accept it as being the way it is and recognize that life is tough – and then establish systems for finding the good in the bad. That’s a selective process. We all have the ability to find that good.

For example, I had a friend who invested all his savings in real estate deal, which eventually went belly up. But he said, “It’s not all that bad. My life was boring, and I needed the challenge.” It’s not what happens to you; it’s what you do about it.

What’s the most important strategy for success?
It’s really two things. One is perseverance. I use the “rule of seven”; – that is, don’t accept the word “no” until you hear it from the horse’s mouth at least seven times. Pursue your dream; keep going after it, and don’t accept no as an answer. “No” is just a negotiating position. It’s something to talk about. Focus your mental energy.

The second one is right on par with perseverance: Take action. I’m always amazed by how many people know how to do something right, but cease to take action. The reality is, if you know what to do and you don’t do it, it won’t do you any good. To win at life, love and business you need perseverance and a willingness to take action.