Who molded YOUR melon?

Great success comes from great thinking.

Which means you must surround yourself with great thinkers.

In person.
On the phone.
Through books
Via the Internet.

Your challenge is to expose yourself TO and constantly learn FROM as many great thinkers as possible.

The following list takes you through many of my favorite thinkers and the various paradigm-changing ideas and thinking patterns I gleaned from them.

Some are mentors. Some are friends. Some are old dead guys.

NOTE: these aren’t just quotes. Not just lessons learned.

These are thoughts and ideas that molded the way I think.
These are thoughts and ideas that changed my life and my business.

(Big thanks to all the great thinkers on this list!)
Jeffrey Gitomer
*Make ideas into a list first.
*Don’t think of yourself as an author. Or a speaker. Or a trainer. You are a THINKER. An entrepreneur. A resource.
*Writing is the basis of all wealth
*Writing becomes persuasive when others are willing to act on, or comment on, what you’ve written. Elicit more response.
*Don’t say “sorry,” say “thanks”
*It’s not who you know, it’s who knows you
*Don’t cheap out on design
*Give value first
*Platform is the most important word in your vocabulary
*In writing, architecture is everything

Nido Qubein
*Think modular
*Don’t prepare a speech, prepare yourself to speak

Dr. Phil
*Don’t lose weight; get a healthier lifestyle.
*Focus on the umbrella

Fred Gleek
*Content is king
*Imagine your ideal day
*Always get their email
*Your target market needs to see that it’s for THEM

James Redfield
*Why was this meant to happen?
*What synchronistic pattern does this represent?

Dr. David Rosenthal
*Media is nothing without leverage. Make a sticker, put the video on YouTube, anything to make it last longer than the interview itself
*What’s your PDA? Personal Differential Advantage

Marc Leblanc
*Complete three highly valuable activities, every day
Joseph Pollack
*Validate your existence on a daily basis

Dave Avrin
*Anonymity is the greatest barrier to business success
*The media doesn’t care about you
*But, the media is your customer, too
*When you do interviews, you’re not there to answer their questions

Dr. Richard Wiseman
*You create your own luck
*Chance encounters change lives
*Trust your gut
*Turn bad luck into good fortune with your response
*Opportunity is knocking all day
*My good fortune will continue
*All of my interactions today will successful

Larry Winget
*If your life sucks it’s because you suck
*Keep it simple
*Be the world’s expert on yourself
*Just be really, really good

Harry Beckwith
*Get remembered and get business
*Everyone is in marketing
*Everyone is in sales
*Narrow your focus, pick a lane
*Sell value before price

Tom Peters
*Cool encounters = cool you
*Stand up, stick you neck way out, or else be counted out
*People who get noticed get ahead
*Market yourself daily
*Make people stop, listen and say, “WOW!”
Roger von Oech
*Order comes later: puke everything out in movable bits of content so that way when it self-organizes, I can easily categorize it.
*Hang on. Let me write that down.
*What’s the exact opposite of what this person is expecting me to do?
*You know what would be cool is…
*I just got a great idea. Better go for a swim or a run to think about it.
*Regularly study, practice and enhance your creativity
*You can never be too creative

Leonardo da Vinci
*Ask myself the same question over and over again for about hours. My favorites are, “So, what have I REALLY learned from wearing a nametag every day?” and “As a result of wearing a nametag, I have become more _______.”
*Also, I like asking dumb questions
*Always be curious about things and people and life

Alan Weiss
*Don’t be afraid of being a contrarian
*Your brand is an umbrella
*Get them to come to you
*Don’t sell, enable people to buy
*If you aren’t being criticized, you aren’t doing much
*State your fee confidently and shut up

John Maxwell
*The water does not flow until the faucet turns on
*Today’s lessons become tomorrow’s books
*Separate yourself from the wrong type of people. Don’t be friends with them.
*Put yourself in a growth environment
*You will never change your life until you change something you do daily

Norman Vincent Peale
*Make daily appointments with yourself

Donald Trump
*It usually works to your advantage to be underestimated
*Be a sleeper
*Figure out exactly who you are, then go be that person every day
*What’s next?

T. Harv Ecker
*It’s OK to make lots of money
*Your ability to earn wealth has a lot to do with the impressions you have about money, especially when you were a kid

Seth Godin
*I don’t have time NOT to blog today!
*Market to people and get out of the way
*Ideas that spread win
*Make the mundane memorable
*Don’t worry about opening BIG
*Be the one
*Be the only
*Figure out what the “always” is and do the opposite
*Interaction, not interruption
*Look! There’s something cool and remarkable. Man, I need to blog that.
*Wow! Something powerful, funny, cool or interesting just happened to me. I can’t wait to use that in my next speech/book!
*Register the domain before you do anything else!
*Now Google it. See what’s already been written about it.

Al Reis
*What word do I “own” in the minds of everyone I meet?
*I wonder what I could learn from the definition and/or etymology of that word…
*Don’t market, position.

Marcel Legrand
*The Internet is forever
*You can participate in your online image, but you can’t control it

William Jenkins
*Did I validate my existence, do something cool and be myself today?
*Is there an article or a speech in what just happened to me?
*If everybody did exactly what you said, what would the world look like?
*You need your own philosophy. Your own school of thought.
*Do not despise the day of small beginnings

Og Mandino
*Don’t say “no”; say “not yet.”
*What’s next?
*“Until now” instead of “I’ve never been able to…”
*Instead of dwelling on failures, say, “Next time…”
*Don’t expect good things to happen to you, expect YOU to happen to good things.

Mark Ginsberg (my dad)
*If (x) happened last year, I can expect (y) to happen this year
*A chicken ain’t nothing but a bird. Abilities trump age, every time.
*Be unique, not different

Bob Baker
*How can I get them to come to me?
*Fans, not customers

Arthur Scharff
*Who lives in the city I’m traveling to that I can hang out with?
*When it comes to networking and relationships, concetrate on keeping it alive

Brian Tracy
*Is what I’m doing RIGHT NOW leading to a sale?
*Did you write your goals down?
*Be brilliant at the basics

Napoleon Hill
*What good could come of this?
*Is this consistent with my #1 goal?

Kurt Vonnegut
*If you want to be a great writer, be a great date for your reader

Jack Canfield
*Nobody sees the 90
*Be a class act
*Success leaves clues
*If everybody says you’re out of your mind, you just might be onto something

LET ME ASK YA THIS…
What great thinkers molded YOUR melon?

LET ME SUGGEST THIS…
Share your favorite paradigm-shifting quotations here!

* * * *
Scott Ginsberg
Author/Speaker/That Guy with the Nametag
www.hellomynameisscott.com

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