Sales Training Success: You Were Created To Be a Champion

By Mark Bowser

Well my sales friend, have you begun to see that special person that is you? You do have greatness in you and you were created by God to be a champion. All it takes is a little faith and a little gumption to make it happen. This is how ordinary sales people accomplish extraordinary sales achievements.

For centuries, the dreaded disease smallpox decimated mankind. It was estimated by Voltaire that about one third of the people who contracted smallpox died from the disease. It was a disease that had no respecter of people. About 6o% of the population caught this monster.

One day in 1763, a fourteen year old boy in England named Edward Jenner made an observation that would change history and save untold thousands, maybe millions of lives. Edward was learning about medicine as an apprentice with a doctor. The doctor was examining a milkmaid and had the sad duty of telling her she had smallpox. As the doctor delivered his devastating message, the milkmaid shockingly looked up into the sad eyes of the doctor and exclaimed, “That can’t be. I already have a cowpox sore on my hand and everybody knows that once you have a cowpox you never get smallpox.”

The doctor dismissed the remark but young Edward logged it back in his mind. What did the milkmaid mean? How can a cowpox protect someone from smallpox? What is cowpox? Cowpox was a common ailment for the cattle in the area. It was such a mild version of smallpox that it didn’t even seem to bother the cows. The people who were infected with cowpox simply developed a few sores that quickly disappeared.

Years later, Dr. Edward Jenner was waging his own war with smallpox to save his patients. He often thought about the milkmaid and her startling remark. Every moment he could spare, Edward would study the life of the milkmaids. Were they really safe from catching smallpox if they had had cowpox?

Edward had had enough. He had to do something to stop this monster disease. On May 14, 1796, Edward would do something that would forever change the lives of you, me, and millions of other people. On that day, Edward took a great risk. Sarah Nelmes, a milkmaid, had come to Edward suffering from cowpox. He took a tissue sample and injected it into the arm of a healthy eight-year-old boy by the name of James Phipps. As expected, James came down with cowpox. After James had recovered from his case of cowpox, Dr. Edward Jenner took his greatest risk. He infected James with straight smallpox. That is when the miracle of vaccination was discovered. The smallpox disease had no effect on James. The dreaded monster of smallpox was finally put into its cage.

My sales friend, we, like Dr. Jenner and the milkmaids have greatness inside of us and we were created to be champions. Hold fast to that truth and with perseverance we will reach the victory line of life.