by If you haven’t already watched the Netflix documentary called Arnold, I highly recommend you do so. Each episode of the three-part series explores a different facet of Schwarzenegger’s life and career. Part One “Athlete” focuses on Schwarzenegger’s upbringing in post-war Austria, including his family life and first foray into fitness and competitive bodybuilding., Part Two “Actor” the bodybuilder-turned-actor reflects on what it took to make such a major career transition — especially since plenty of Hollywood managers and agents dismissed him due to his size and Part Three “American” is probably the most complex of the series, and explores how Schwarzenegger’s can’t-quit life philosophy and box office viability as an actor led to his run for governor of California. According to him, the same level of naysaying he’d experienced earlier in his career was what drove him to run in the first place. To read more click here.
Personally, I found this three-part series really inspiring. Arnold has certainly made mistakes and is very straight up about everything, but what he has achieved in his life is truly amazing.
To go from wanting to be the best bodybuilder in the world, which he was by far, to wanting to be the highest paid actor in the world, which he also achieved, then to become the Governor of California with no political experience and being accountable for the 7th largest economy in the world is truly amazing.
My wife creates art yet after watching Arnold, she has declared herself an artist and is not just talking about it she is in action, taking actions that are aligned with being an artist, like entering her work into more exhibitions, today she is being interviewed by a local newspaper. She is becoming known within our community.
With my clients I often talk about Arnold’s 6 Rules for Success
Trust Yourself
Break Some Rules
Don’t Be Afraid to Fail
Avoid the Naysayers
Work Like Hell
Give Something Back
He says, these may not be your rules, but these are my rules. I love his rules. So, in this article I am dedicating my blog to those rules.
His first rule is trust yourself. I think for all of us we can have this self-doubt like, I can’t do that instead of just giving things a go and just trusting yourself. If you have a passion, follow it, give it a go.
His second rule is break some rules, not the law, but the rules. He references that if you wanted to be a governor for example, you’d have to normally follow a particular pathway and you might take a lower position, then you work your way up, to ensure you’ve had political experience. As Arnold says, if you want to be somebody, you have got to break the rules and not follow the norm, find your own path, and follow it. I know for myself, the things that I’ve achieved, I went from being a teacher to owning my first business which ended up being really successful and I understand the path I chose is not the norm.
His third rule is don’t be afraid to fail. I love this rule because they all relate to each other straight away. If you don’t trust yourself, you get too scared to fail. And I think this relates a lot to the work of Dr. Carol Dweck and the Growth Mindset.
This Netflix documentary is probably one of the greatest examples of Growth Mindset I have ever seen in my life? I want to acknowledge James Anderson and the work he has done with Dr. Carol Dweck’s work.
James allows me to share his Growth Mindset model with my clients which breaks down all the differences of a growth and fixed mindset and that they are not one or the other rather we tend to be a mixture of mindsets.
People with a fixed mindset tend to avoid any failure, they want to look successful. They won’t do anything that could have them fail. Unfortunately for these people, they do not get to have experiences like Arnold, everything he has done was a chance to have a new experience.
I remember when I left teaching, and went into the business world, I left a very secure job as a deputy principal to working as a trainer for the NZ lotteries, I ended up as their National Training Manager and I loved working there. I remember when I was considering leaving that great job and setting up my own business everyone told me don’t do it; you’re married, you’ve got a good job, you’ve got three children, and you’ve just bought a house and a car. You’ve got to be crazy to put it all at risk.
But I had self-belief, I trusted myself and the business I started called the Productivity Increase Group (PIG) ended up being run in five different countries and was hugely successful.
Which leads to his fourth rule, don’t listen to the naysayers. All those people who can’t see what’s possible and are full of negative feedback; you know the people who’ve never done anything for themselves, due to having a fixed mindset and in some cases just cannot be with other people’s success or don’t want others to be successful. I often wonder, how many people wouldn’t have done anything if they listened to the naysayers?
I think this rule also relates to the other rules. If you listen to the naysayers, you may be scared to fail. Right?
I’ve taken a lot of calculated risks in my life, and I have been fortunate to have had my partners backing me, for me it is also about surrounding yourself with the type of people that you want to surround yourself with? Not negative people. You know, those people who cannot see any other point of view.
His fifth rule is work like hell. Arnold talks about when he was bodybuilding he worked five hours a day, every single day. He even trained with his competitors, he created teams around him and trained with the people that he was competing against, because they all lived together. He talks about how much sleep you should get, he said, it’s five or six hours. I’m in my 60’s now and I know there is no luck. Lucky people seem to work very hard.
His sixth rule is give something back. What can you give back to others? I think this is a wonderful rule for people to think about. I’m not running a big business anymore; I run a smaller practice and I do the work I love with people I like. Sometimes I charge less than I used to because I really want to help people, especially when I know they can’t afford my normal rates. Like many people I also support many different charities.
Again, if you haven’t seen the documentary, watch it, and let me know your views. I would love to hear what those six rules mean to you.
In closing, if you don’t trust yourself. Break some rules, not the law, the rules. Don’t be afraid to fail. Through failure ventures we learn so much. I often ask companies what happens when things go wrong. They often say, we have a meeting about it, we look in to how it happened and what do we need to do?
I also ask companies what happens when things go really well? Generally, nobody really says a lot. They might say something like, we might do a high five but there is never a response like, we have a meeting about it, we look in to why it was so successful and how we can replicate it. It seems to me people just don’t realise successful outcomes provide us with so much information and most importantly deserve to be given an equal amount of time to workshop the results.
In next week’s article I will discuss success. One of the things we do in our research is always analyse why the people who are very loyal are loyal, so we can understand what our best practice is, learn from it and replicate it.
Warm Regards,
Craig