Of all the books to improve performance using sports psychology, one of the best ones is How I Raised Myself from Failure to Success in Selling by Frank Bettger.

Here's an idea: read Chapter 1—“How One Idea Multiplied My Income and Happiness”—every day for 28 days until it becomes part of your "DNA."

The broad strokes follow:

In 1907, Frank Bettger was playing in the minor leagues for the Johnstown, Pennsylvania club in the Tri-State League.

He was young and all he wanted to do was to make it to the majors, but one day the manager called him in the office.

“Frank. I hate to do this to you, but I’m cutting you from the team.”

“What do you mean, you’re cutting me from the team?” said Bettger.

“Frank, how old are you?”

“I’m 19 years old.”

“You drag yourself around the field like a veteran who has been playing ball for 20 years,” the skipper told him. “Why do you act that way if you're not lazy?”

It was a shot across the bow, but Frank got it. “I'm so nervous, so scared, that I want to hide my fear from the crowd, and especially from the other players on the team. Besides, I hope that by taking it easy, I'll get rid of my nervousness.”

“Frank, it will never work,” the manager told him. “That's the thing that's holding you back.” 

Frank decided from that day on nobody will ever accuse him of being lazy.

He caught on in an even lower minor league with the Chester, Pennsylvania club in the Atlantic League.

He'd been making $175 per month in Johnstown. With Chester, he'd make just $25 a month.

“I can’t hit better. I can’t throw better. I can’t run faster,” Frank figured, “but I am going to act like a man electrified. Nobody is ever going to accuse me of being lazy again.”

Did it work?

“It worked like magic,” Frank recalled. “I couldn't feel very enthusiastic on that kind of money, but I began to act enthusiastic.”

Thanks to his new attitude, and only a week later, Bettger received a better opportunity in a better league. He went down to play for New Haven in the New England League. “No one knew me in that league,” said Frank, “so I made a resolution that nobody would ever accuse me of being lazy.”

He was totally into the new approach. He said he almost entirely overcame his fears.

The newspapers started call him “Pep” Bettger because he was “the life of the team.”

Within 10 days, his pay increased from $25 per month to $185. A 700% increase!

Two years later, he was in St. Louis, playing third base for the Cardinals, this time with a thirty-fold increase from that salary in Chester.

In Chicago, two years after that, Bettger and the Cards were playing the rival Cubs. He charged in hard from the hot corner on a swinging bunt, fielded the slow moving grounder, and “attempted to throw in the opposite direction.” This wrenched his arm.

Something snapped inside Bettger's arm. His career was over.

Yet, years later Bettger reflected. “I now look back on it as one of the most fortunate events of my life.”

Here was an uneducated guy whose career in baseball was now over. For the next two years, his job consisted of riding around the streets of Philadelphia, his hometown, on a bicycle collecting installments for a furniture company.

Very little pay. Lots of headaches.

He figured he needed to do something better and make more money. After all he was still young, so he decided to go to work selling insurance.

He was horrible at insurance sales. “The next ten months were the longest and most disheartening months of my life,” said Bettger.

An opportunity to attend a Dale Carnegie public speaking course came up. Frank took it.

In the middle of one of the classes, Carnegie asked Bettger, “why don't you talk with a little enthusiasm?”

It was a revelation for Frank. “I’m making the same mistake I made when I was in the minor leagues.”

He said it was the turning point in his life. “Starting tomorrow, I’m going to act as if I’m the world’s most enthusiastic salesperson. I’m not going to know any more. I’m not going to be more trained. I’m just going to act as if.”

Frank Bettger gave it his all. He made it to the top of his company. He became a trainer and a professional speaker.

Dale Carnegie said Frank's book is the best sales book ever written.

Bettger attributes all this success to acting as if.

Your actions change your attitudes. Your attitude makes your work.

As always,

Brian

P.S. — If you need an extra kick in the fanny to get things going, we can help you with that.

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