Dr Denis Waitley shares his wisdom

A young woman interrupts us and thrusts her hand at Dr Denis Waitley as we sit in the lobby of the Intercontinental Hotel in Festival City.

He has just given his talk at the two-day conference 'Empowering People – Building the Nation', focusing on transformational programmes geared towards self-development, the science of getting rich, effective leadership and other lofty ideals.

"You were just wonderful, Doctor! Brilliant!" she enthuses. "Are you coming back soon? I hope you are!"
"Thank you, I hope so too!" he replies with a genuine smile, though he must have heard this hundreds of times, and pumped equal numbers of hands in the two days he has been here.

Not surprising, considering that he is one of America's most respected authors, keynote lecturers and productivity consultants on high performance human achievement. With over 10 million audio programmes sold in 14 languages, Denis is one of the most listened-to voices on personal and career success.

He is the author of 15 non-fiction books, including several international bestsellers, Seeds of Greatness, Being the Best, The Winner's Edge, The Joy of Working, and Empires of the Mind. His audio album, The Psychology of Winning, is said to be the all-time best-selling programme on self-mastery.

Denis has studied and counselled winners in every field from Apollo astronauts to Superbowl champions, from sales achievers to government leaders and youth groups. During the '80s, he served as chairman of psychology on the US Olympic Committee's Sports Medicine Council, responsible for performance enhancement of all US athletes.

As president of the International Society for Advanced Education, inspired by Dr Jonas Salk, he counselled returning POWs from Vietnam and conducted simulation and stress management seminars for Apollo astronauts. A graduate of the US Naval Academy, and a former US Navy pilot, he holds a doctorate in human behaviour.

I

I have been doing this for 40 years. When somebody says I'm one of the most well-known motivational speakers in the world, I usually respond, "Certainly one of the oldest!" It's been a really wonderful journey, and I am not ready to stop.
I think that my children, my grandchildren and my great-grandchildren keep me going, and keep me re-inventing myself. That's how I keep it fresh for myself.

I have been associated with the popular film, The Secret. Rhonda Byrne met me in Sydney, Australia and said she was going to do a TV show based on the law of attraction and the book, The Science of Getting Rich by Wallace D. Wattles.

It was to be a one-off show; she asked me to appear in it. I agreed. She prepared a little trailer that was available on the internet and it became so popular that instead of becoming a TV show it was released on DVD. Around 20,000 were sold in a day. None of us who appeared in it received any payment. But all of us benefited.

I have two daughters by birth, two by adoption and one by immigration! I have two sons, but my daughters are doing better than my sons.

My daughters told me they thought they had to work a little harder to be successful, and interestingly both of them have become doctors in psychology. They have taken over my profession, which I always thought my sons would.

My sons probably thought I work too hard. One of them is a radio announcer and telephone communicator and the other one is a fitness trainer.

I don't think that being one of the oldest speakers necessarily makes me one of the best. I hope I am learning and becoming a part of the future rather than rehashing information.

Of course, there are some basic truths that have to be rehashed again and again. I shouldn't say 'rehashing'; we are explaining them in a language that is relevant to today's situation.

I travel a great deal to China (and hopefully, from now on, to India), so I can see what the newest developing nations are going through to become successful. I think the challenge for me is to continue to plant shade trees under which I won't sit. So people ask, why don't you retire? And I say, from what? To what? They say playing golf. But I like to learn and teach. The more I teach, the more I need to learn. The more I learn, the more I want to teach. It really is what keeps me going.

I've always wondered why some people are angry and sad all the time and why some people are happy. At first I thought that maybe they were born that way.

Certainly, personality plays a part in it. I was raised during the Depression, at the beginning of the Second World War, and my grandmother was the dominant influence in my life. She and I planted a 'Victory Garden' and grew our own food. She told me that what was on the seed package, those pictures, would come up if we planted those seeds and then she told me the same thing would happen in my life if I cultivated it. She told me to model my life on worthy people.

Me

Me and my models

When I was very young I read biographies of people who had overcome enormous obstacles to become successful. It began to dawn on me that we were a very humble family and didn't have any money as my father wasn't successful.

My mother and father argued and divorced, but it didn't have to continue – I didn't have to become what my environment was.

I could learn from my father, and I could be somebody different, but still love him. And that hunger in me to be better and be something led me to understand that the best way to do that would be to help other people.

Me and Grade 8

What influenced me most as a boy was when my Grade 8 teacher gave me As A Man Thinketh by James Allen. The book talked about gardening, and tending to your garden, and I resonated with that. I remembered that my grandmother had taught me the same thing. These two were then my milestones, at age nine and 14.

Later, when I became a navy pilot, I learnt that I had to train and be disciplined in order to stay alive. And often on the aircraft carrier, even though I couldn't see where we were going, I had to know where we were going and how to get back. That taught me a little about simulation and targeting and goal-setting.

Me and the Nobel Laureate

I went to work for Dr Salk, the Nobel Prize laureate who discovered the polio vaccine. He did not like public speaking.

He said, "I want to be in the laboratory. You go and speak; you're supposed to be raising money for us. I told him, "But they are so disappointed when they see me instead of you! They want you and they get me!" And he said, "Then it's your job to make science interesting. Don't tell people they can walk on water. I know you're very enthusiastic, but stick to the truth. Just tell them in an interesting way."

That was in the early '60s, and that began my effort to ensure that audiences were not disappointed when he wasn't there. Finally, I was able to explain concepts that were difficult in an easy way.

Much later, someone paid me $100 to speak. Instead of having a best-selling book and becoming an 'expert', I worked my way up the ranks for nearly 20 years to finally command
a fee that a person on the circuit now would earn overnight.

Dr Salk was definitely an influence. Dr Han Seyle, who invented the word 'stress' as applied to the body, and postulated that stress is the response to any demand made on the body – good or bad – is an influence too.

Me and my thoughts

Earl Nightingale was one of our early 20th century motivational speakers and philosophers. He coined the term 'The Strangest Secret'. It postulates that we become what we think about most of the time. He became, if you will, a mentor, and he guided me to record my own thoughts because that's what he did.

Me and Billy Graham

American evangelist Billy Graham was also a big influence. He asked me how many lives I had changed. I said, "Only one: my own. But not you! You've changed so many!"

He replied that many who came to see him would go back home and go back to being what they were. We can provide an emotional charge, but they have to be ready to be committed and take the option.

He told me, "As you do your work, don't believe that you are a world changer. Know that you are just a
seed planter and that you are not changing lives."
That impacted me very much. You are not going to change other people. You may have set them on a very important path of their lives, but they still have to do the real work for themselves.

Myself

How did your career help you as a father and a husband?

My children knew that people enjoyed and paid to hear me talk. My kids didn't pay to hear me talk!
I would lecture them and they would say, "How long is this going to take? Is this your half-hour or 45-minute speech?"

That hurt a little bit, but I realised they were beginning to grow up when they told me, "We knew you could talk, but it was much easier to watch you. We watched the way you treated our mother, the paperboy, the janitor and the taxi driver. We wanted to see if what you did was the same as what you said."

That made me a better father. I realised that I needed to walk my talk. It made me accountable to my own words. It wasn't easy! Like when we went skiing and I said, "It's pretty steep, I might break my leg."

They said, "That's exactly what you shouldn't be saying to yourself. You're supposed to have the mindset of a champion! Why don't you use your Olympic training?" I said, "I'm afraid." And they replied, "You're just dad after all, aren't you?" I said, "I am after all." They taught me humility.

My wife set a better example. She had to listen and go with me and sit in the audience. I thought that would be fun. But now I realise that it wasn't. There were many things she wanted to and could have done better.

I really admire her, and her ability to juggle priorities, and to be the glue that bound the family together. I am hoping that our daughters will grow up to be more like her.

What would you be thinking if you were in your audience?

Here's what I think they are thinking: he seems to be humble. I expected someone more dynamic. But he's dynamic in a quieter way. He's honest, and I believe he's very passionate
in that he has something to say.

It isn't much different to what I already know, but he says it in a way that applies to me.

My audiences think I am interested in them, not the money that I am receiving or the books that I am trying to sell at the back of the room. I am one of the few speakers in my country who doesn't hold up his book, DVDs or CDs or package them as a seminar special. I've never done that, and never will.

That's not my primary motivation. I am a teacher. Three of my 16 books have been on the New York Times bestseller list. Many more could have made the list if I had been 'clever' and promoted myself more than I do. People may be looking for a success pill, but I don't have that. My conscience won't allow me to say that.

How did you get into writing books?

Out of my speaking seminars, I recorded an album in 1978, and it happened to be a very big success. It also thrust me into the publishing world. The Dragon and the Eagle is my latest book, my 16th, and it will be published in August.

I don't regret not having started writing earlier. The kind of writing I do is better left for later! I am a great reader and I believe it enables one to write better. I have a passion for writing. I wrote a lot in school, but I didn't think there was a career there.

I've found that if you're writing non-fiction, writing from experience is better. So, naturally I started writing much later. I didn't start writing till I was 40. It takes a lot of discipline.

What was the inspiration behind The Dragon and the Eagle?

The Dragon and the Eagle is about China versus America. It's about two different cultures that are clashing – superpowers that are facing off. India is on that stage too. So, you have the dragon and the elephant and the eagle!

It's about misunderstanding, mostly on the part of Americans, and what they are facing in the future with people who are highly motivated to have a piece of the pie.

It's a narrative fable and by writing a fable I've been
able to avoid controversy. I use it as the magic mirror for the nations to view themselves. The dragon says that we worry that we are taking your culture as ours. The eagle says you've been doing things like that for 5,000 years, haven't you learnt? The dragon says, no and it's apparent that you haven't either.

They are able to talk about what happens to a society that rests on its laurels. But the book is gentle enough that the Chinese government has allowed it to be published. But the Americans are saying it's a little critical. It's just a fable: rather like Who Moved My Cheese? Only it's more like who moved my chopsticks!