THE COMMON DENOMINATOR OF SUCCESS is as timely and inspirational, as it was when it was first delivered in 1940. Though it was written for life insurance professionals, its message is equally well suited to anyone in the sales profession, or anyone in any field of endeavor who seeks success in their professional, personal or spiritual lives. --- This inspiring message by Mr. Gray is one of the most timeless pieces of life insurance literature. It first appeared as a major address at the 1940 NALU (National Association of Life Underwriters) annual convention in Philadelphia and has been available to association members in pamphlet form ever since. Mr. Gray was an official of the Prudential Insurance Company of America and had 30 years of continuous experience both as an agent in the field and as a promoter and instructor in sales development. He was known throughout the country as a writer and speaker on life insurance subjects.
Speech Transcript
Several years ago, I was brought face to face with the very disturbing realization that I was trying to supervise and direct the efforts of a large number of people who were trying to achieve success, without knowing myself what the secret of success really was.
And that, naturally, brought me face to face with the further realization that regardless of what other knowledge I might have brought to my job, I was definitely lacking in the most important knowledge of all.
Of course, like most of us, I had been brought up on the popular belief that the secret of success is hard work, but I had seen so many people work hard without succeeding and so many people succeed without working hard that I had become convinced that hard work was not the real secret even though in most cases it might be one of the requirements.
And so, I set out on a voyage of discovery which carried me through biographies and autobiographies and all sorts of dissertations on success and the lives of successful people until I finally reached a point at which I realized that the secret I was trying to discover lay not only in what people did, but also in what made them do it.
I realized further that the secret for which I was searching must not only apply to every definition of success, but since it must apply to everyone to whom it was offered, it must also apply to everyone who had ever been successful.
In short, I was looking for the common denominator of success. And because that is exactly what I was looking for, that is exactly what I found.
The common denominator of success --- the secret of success of every person who has ever been successful --- lies in the fact that they formed the habit of doing things that failures don't like to do.
It's just as true as it sounds and it's just as simple as it seems. You can hold it up to the light, you can put it to the acid test, and you can kick it around until it's worn out, but when you are all through with it, it will still be the common denominator of success, whether you like it or not.
It will still explain why people have come into this business of ours with every apparent qualification for success and given us our most disappointing failures, while others have come in and achieved outstanding success in spite of many obvious and discouraging handicaps.
If the secret of success lies in forming the habit of doing things that failures don't like to do, let's start the boiling-down process by determining what are the things that failures don't like to do.
The things that failures don't like to do are the very things that you and I and other human beings, including successful people, naturally don't like to do.
In other words, we've got to realize right from the start that success is something which is achieved by the minority of people and is therefore unnatural and not to be achieved by following our natural likes and dislikes nor by being guided by our natural preferences and prejudices.
…Successful people are influenced by the desire for pleasing results. Failures are influenced by the desire for pleasing methods and are inclined to be satisfied with such results as can be obtained by doing things they like to do.
Why are successful people able to do things they don't like to do while failures are not? Because successful people have a purpose strong enough to make them form the habit of doing the things they don't like to do in order to accomplish the purpose they want to accomplish. Sometimes even our best producers get into a slump.
When a person goes into a slump, it simply means that they have reached a point at which, for the time being, the things they don't like to do have become more important than their reasons for doing them.
Many people with whom I have discussed this common denominator of success have said at this point, "But I have a family to support, and I have to have a living for my family and myself. Isn't that enough of a purpose?" No, it isn't. It isn't a sufficiently strong purpose to make you form the habit of doing the things you don't like to do for the very simple reasons that it is easier to adjust ourselves to the hardships of a poor living than it is to adjust ourselves to the hardships of making a better one.
If you doubt me, just think of all the things you are willing to go without in order to avoid doing the things you don't like to do. All of which seems to prove that the strength which holds you to your purpose is not your own strength but the strength of the purpose itself.
Now let's see why habit belongs so importantly in this common denominator of success.
People are creatures of habit just as machines are creatures of momentum, for habit is nothing more or less than momentum translated from the concrete into the abstract. Can you picture the problem that would face our mechanical engineers if there were no such thing as momentum? Speed would be impossible because the highest speed at which any vehicle could be moved would be the first speed at which it could be broken away from a standstill.
Every single qualification for success is acquired through habit. People form habits and habits form futures. If you do not deliberately form good habits, then unconsciously you will form bad ones.
You are the kind of person you are because you have formed the habit of being that kind of person, and the only way you can change is through habit.
But before you decide to adopt these success habits, let me warn you of the importance of habit to your decision.
Perhaps you have attended sales meetings in the past and have left determined to do the things that would make you successful or more successful only to find your decision or determination waning at just the time when it should be put into effect or practice. Here's the answer.
Any resolution or decision you make is simply a promise to yourself, which isn't worth a tinker's dam unless you have formed the habit of making it and keeping it. And you won't form the habit of making it and keeping it unless right at the start you link it with a definite purpose that can be accomplished by keeping it.
In other words, any resolution or decision you make today has to be made again tomorrow, and the next day, and the next, and the next, and so on. And it not only has to be made each day, but it has to be kept each day, for if you miss one day in the making or keeping of it, you've got to go back and begin all over again.
But if you continue the process of making it each morning and keeping it each day, you will finally wake up some morning a different person in a different world, and you will wonder what has happened to you and the world you used to live in.
Here's what has happened. Your resolution or decision has become a habit and you don't have to make it on this particular morning. And the reason for your seeming like a different person living in a different world lies in the fact that for the first time in your life, you have become master of yourself and master of your likes and dislikes by surrendering to your purpose in life.
That is why behind every success there must be a purpose and that is what makes purpose so important to your future. For in the last analysis, your future is not going to depend on economic conditions or outside influences of circumstances over which you have no control. Your future is going to depend on your purpose in life.
So, let's talk about purpose.
First of all, your purpose must be practical and not visionary.
But in making your purpose practical, be careful not to make it logical. Make it a purpose of the sentimental or emotional type.
Remember needs are logical while wants and desires are sentimental and emotional.
Your needs will push you just so far, but when your needs are satisfied, they will stop pushing you. If, however, your purpose is in terms of wants and desires, then your wants and desires will keep pushing you long after your needs are satisfied and until your wants and desires are fulfilled.
