Psychology Today: A Personal Interview with Mark Penn about Getting Through Tough Times in Life and Politics
Why don’t you start by telling me some of the toughest moments you’ve been through when advising people in tough situations.
The truth is that in today’s world, there’s no success without failure. If you can’t tolerate a failure, it’s virtually impossible to have a successful life. The road to success is paved with roadblocks. Difficult moments, things that have gone wrong, attacks you didn’t expect. To be successful you have to be able to overcome and learn from failure. The moment you lose that perspective, you don’t climb back from that.
Maybe it’s easier said than done. How do you remind yourself at the toughest moment that it’s an inevitable part of success and that you just need to get through it? How do you keep a long-term view?
You’re right to say that it’s not easy—to really understand what you’re about, where you’re going. If you look at movies, almost all movies and popular culture are based on the idea of someone who’s different standing up. But in reality, being different and standing up and having a counter view is one of the hardest things to do in our society.
I try to remember that it’s not necessarily about what everybody else thinks at that moment. It’s really about, “Are you going to have the kind of strength and fortitude to carry through with what you believe in, even against the odds?” That’s what’s made me a tough competitor and a fighter that people relied upon through their difficult situations. When you find yourself in difficult situations, are you the shoemaker without shoes? You have to be able to find some of that personal fortitude.
Are you thinking of any movies in particular?
I grew up on movies like Mr. Smith Goes to Washington and Inherit the Wind that were always about standing up for what you believe regardless of the pressure. Today you can go to even kids’ movies and they are always about the bee, the penguin, or the cub who grows up by standing up.
My most successful strategies—like “soccer moms” in ’96 for President Clinton or the Upstate Strategy for Hillary in 2000—were always opposed by just about everyone, and I can tell you that fighting for things outside the zone of conventional wisdom will always take a lot of flak, and a lot of energy to sustain.
