Persist Until They Can't Resist

“Quit mak­ing excus­es. What we’re real­ly talk­ing about here is com­mit­ment. Until you make a com­mit­ment to your dream, it’s not a com­mit­ment at all. It’s just anoth­er fan­ta­sy.” — Rudy Ruet­tiger

I had the great plea­sure of get­ting to meet and spend time with Rudy Ruet­tiger who was made famous by the 1993 movie Rudy. If you haven’t seen the movie, it’s amazing.

This is a true sto­ry about per­sis­tence in the face of incred­i­ble odds.

The third of four­teen chil­dren, Rudy strug­gled in school because of dyslex­ia. He dreamt of play­ing foot­ball for the Uni­ver­si­ty of Notre Dame — even though he didn’t have the skill or size of a typ­i­cal player.

After his fourth try — and putting in the work for two years to improve mar­gin­al grades — Rudy was accept­ed to Notre Dame. He even talked his way onto the stu­dent coun­cil before he was admitted.

Once there, he worked hard to earn a place on the prac­tice squad – just show­ing up until they let him on — but nev­er got past warm­ing the bench, until the last game of his final sea­son when his coach called him onto the field. Mag­ic hap­pened – every­thing he’d dreamed about and worked so hard for: He made three plays and, in the final sec­onds of the game, in a sin­gle, astound­ing tack­le, he sacked Geor­gia Tech’s quar­ter­back. Jubi­lant, his team­mates car­ried him off the field.

Rudy used the same per­sis­tence, years lat­er, to get a movie made about his expe­ri­ence at Notre Dame. At one point, his per­sis­tence got him banned from cam­pus. It only took 10 years. At one point, he was on one of many trips to Los Ange­les to get the film made, to meet with some­one in the film busi­ness. When he was stood up, Rudy tracked him down at his house to make sure he got to make his pitch.

“Don’t let peo­ple steal your dreams.”

His dream, by any stan­dard, was insane: a 5’7” guy who want­ed to play foot­ball on a col­lege team, and then make a movie about it. That movie, by the way, is con­sid­ered one of the top foot­ball movies ever made.

In spite of the odds, Rudy always act­ed as if his dream was going to hap­pen, no mat­ter what. When every­one said he was dumb and stu­pid – that he couldn’t do it – he focused on what he could do. That work eth­ic and atti­tude helped him to find a way out­side the nor­mal path.

All too often, it isn’t oth­er peo­ple who stop us from achiev­ing our dreams – it’s us.

The Chal­lenge

• Look at your team: where do your log­i­cal, prac­ti­cal think­ing and beliefs get in the way?
• What dream do you real­ly want to achieve — for your work, your­self and your life?
• If you were to put togeth­er a plan — with incred­i­ble com­mit­ment and ener­gy — to per­sist until they can’t resist, what would it be?