You Can CHANGE Your Life | Danica Patrick's Top SUCCESS Secrets

If you could do anything in the world, what would you do? Well, why can't you do that then? At least start. At least try to make an effort at doing it. I think everybody's afraid to take chances and do something new in their life because they're identified a certain way or they'll be judged if they don't do it or judged if they do something different. Life is hard. It's what you do with it.

Need motivation? Watch a top 10 with Believe Nation. What's up? It's Evan. My one word is believe and I believe in you. I believe you have an amazing gift inside you that I want want to see explode out onto the world. So let's get your motivation to a 10 and get you believing in you. Grab a snack and chew on today's lessons from a woman who went from being a high school cheerleader and part-time babysitter to becoming the most successful woman in the history of open-wheel racing. She's Danica Patrick, and here's my take on her top 10 rules of success. Enjoy. Alright, let's kick things off with rule number 1: Find your passion.

I mean, I think the difference between someone who ultimately is successful and someone who isn't is just getting up and trying again. And I feel like I've seen that in my life again to other people is that things get hard and people try again and things get hard and people might try again, might not, and then things get hard and they just don't try again. Giving up is, is, is, can't be an option. And I think that that goes back to the core of making sure that whatever it is you're doing is something that you love to do, something that you enjoy, something that maybe if you didn't even get paid, would you still do it? And I think that's what pulls you through those times ultimately, but, and that's what keeps you coming back for more, and that's what that passion and that love for what it is that you do is what keeps you going. So would you say your resilience and that persistence is because you love what you do so much, or is there something about your parents or anything in your upbringing? Do you think it's— I mean, I think that genetically I have a deter— I'm determined because my dad was very much like that, for sure. Very persistent and determined. But I think it's also because I found something that I love to do. And there's plenty of other stuff that I've done that I didn't keep doing. I mean, I didn't keep playing basketball, let's face it. But I kept racing. And so it was about finding that, I feel. And finding it really young. I'm very fortunate that I found it really young. And I tell everyone, young or old, is just, if you could do anything in the world, what would you do? Well, why can't you do that then? At least start. At least try to make an effort at doing it. You're not gonna get there within one shot, but you just gotta take baby steps and opportunities along the way. And I feel like, especially like people get out of college and they have this idea of what they wanna do and they're holding out until they get it. Just get going. Just get going. You know, just get working and get the experience and start working your way there.

Rule number 2 is ignore the little man. The first woman driver to lead a lap under green in NASCAR Sprint Cup Series.

How do you handle it when someone talks bad about you for the whole world to hear? Psh, I say whatever. I'm confident. I know what I— no. You don't ever like when somebody says something negative about you, but I believe in myself. You have to just remember all the things that it took to get there. And that they weren't easy. And then it allows me to say things like, I really don't care what people say about me.

Rule number 3, my personal favorite: start small.

I mean, doing the same thing, I mean, just being known for like one thing your whole life, that's sad, you know. We all have so many interests, I'm sure, and so, you know, to get to make jobs of them all, or jobs if you could call it that, but to make businesses out of them all and see them on a daily basis in your light and how you visualize them is really cool and fun, and we can all do it. We all can do it. So many people are so afraid to try something because they're like, oh, like, I can't leave my job because I'm, you know, I have to pay bills, or, you know, it's like, well, start small then, but don't say you can't because as many times you say you can't, you're not going to. If you don't think you can, you won't. Thoughts become things.

Rule number 4 is embrace your uniqueness.

So you've said what makes you different makes you great. Where does that advice come from that you've when you talk to people? Well, I mean, I think that the most obvious one really, obviously, is being a girl. So when I was younger and like living in England and kind of early teen years, I don't think I, I didn't care that I was a girl. I just didn't want to make it real obvious. I mean, I didn't want it to stand out, you know. I didn't wear nail polish because when I talk about the race car, I didn't want them looking at my hands and seeing pink fingernails. I didn't wear pink and purple and make it really flashy and obvious. No hearts and bows. Just kind of wanted to blend in. You're describing my 7-year-old daughter. Am I really? Hearts and bows or didn't want to wear hearts and bows? She's now rejecting them, but she was all in them. Well, you go through these phases where you feel comfortable and sometimes you don't. And I didn't really feel comfortable making it obvious. I came back from England when I was 19 and I let myself kind of go there to be a girl a little bit. And it really came from a kind of racy photo shoot that I did that it was more girly of me. And it just all of a sudden, stuff started happening. And people were contacting me and sponsors and teams. But nobody questioned what I could do. It wasn't like people didn't— didn't think I could race or their opinion really changed on that. Maybe they had an opinion on what I did, but it didn't change the opportunity to be able to do what I wanted to do. It just really was opening doors and it was allowing it, you know, it was me being able to tap into something that was part of my personality. I mean, I think we're not one-dimensional people. We have all kinds of different sides to us. We're not, you know, I don't just race and I don't just work on cars. I, you know, I race and I like to cook and I like to travel and I like to look pretty and I like to get dressed up and I like hair and makeup and I like all those other things. So it was kind of a way for me to, it was an extension of me, but it was celebrated. So it was— Success came to you as you embraced who you were. Exactly, so, you know, sometimes, I really feel that whatever it is that's the most different about you is probably the most important and the most special and the most useful.

Rule number 5, just do stuff that makes you happy. Now, do you think that you're stepping away from race car driving when you deciding that just like enough is enough? Do you think that in some ways that this is you appreciating other aspects of life too?

I don't know, there's a lot of negativity to some degree, um, a lot of grind. It just kind of feels like the grind a little bit. Um, and, um, so I just kind of felt like it wasn't a space that I wanted to be in as much anymore. Like, I want to be in a happy space where I'm just doing things that bring me joy. And, yeah, it just wasn't doing that as much, or I was noticing it. I was noticing I was missing that or wanting it more. I think that's really what it comes from is growing as a person and realizing— I think everybody's afraid to take chances and do something new in their life because they're identified a certain way or they'll be judged if they don't do it or judged if they do something different. And who are they now? And are they crazy? What are they thinking? And, you know, it's just life. Just do things that make you happy.

Rule number 6 is push through hardships.

I think that what I took from the film to me that was interesting, because again, it's my life and it's been 35 years of just living, is it's kind of really sucked at times and how hard it's been. I know it's been hard, of course, but to be good at anything is hard. I mean, I'm sure everybody in this room and anybody watching thinks like, my life's been hard too. It's true. And if somebody were to put a documentary together about your life, it would probably be similar in that life is hard. It's what you do with it.

Rule number 7, be a good team player.

I mean, the team is critical, obviously. I mean, like, you need a bus driver. You got to get a truck driver to get the car there. You've got to get guys to put the tires on, of course. So there's a whole bunch of steps in the process and it can't happen without the other. But I think more importantly with team for me is about morale. It's about attitude. It's about your mood and keeping everyone in a good mood. Like all those guys that you see right there, we see each other every weekend of the year pretty much. And so, you know, that can wear on you and it can get exhausting. That's the family vacation. There's your family, but you had that whole Yeah, so that's my crew chief on the left. He's kind of the other co-team leader with me, but you know, the two of us dictate the mood of the entire team. And you really have to, you know, you know, being a leader is also being a cheerleader, and it's very important. So I think that, you know, team is, team is a lot of attitude.

Rule number 8 is take risks. Doing so well in IndyCar, was there any hesitation at all about moving to NASCAR? Because it's very hard to see from outside how big NASCAR is in the USA.

The slight hesitation that I had was just that when everything was evolving with doing NASCAR, I was coming off of my best IndyCar season. I finished lots of top 5s, I finished 5th in the championship, and it was like, hmm, do I really want to like leave this where Start again. It's like, yeah, start again. And trust me, it's like way start again, more than I thought it would be. But it's, you know, it's, you know, where the race season was maybe 17 or 18 races going to 38. So like triple the workload. But man, when I first got in a stock car, I loved it. Like I had so much fun the first time I ever drove it. I remember hearing the polar opposite of that be that I remember Dario Franchitti describing his first time in a stock car and He's like, "What am I doing?" And the first time I got in a stock car, I'm like, "I'm home!" Rule number 9 is create positivity. I also have a book coming out at the beginning of the year. January, right? January. Pretty intense. And one of the chapters in the book is about building your woman cave. And it's WOMAN. And it was always written W-O capital M-A-N. And when I went to final edits, I'm like, "Why is the man capitalized in this?" So it was W-O capital, lowercase, I'm not trying to not, but it's about a woman, okay? Anyway, but it's just something that organically grew as a space. I wanted some space to do yoga, and so it was this pool table room basically off of the pool, and I moved some stuff to the side, and then I kinda moved it even more to the side, and then I set my sewing machine on the ping pong table that got moved to the side, and then all of a sudden I put some, like, can I paint it? Well, let's just pick a paint color. And I ended up being the one that picked the paint color. Wasn't intending for it to be my room, or my woman cave. And then I was like, can I just put some stuff on the walls? And I just started hammering away. I didn't measure, I just threw it up very loosey-goosey. And anyway, there came the woman cave. And I'm like, man, everything in this room is something I love. It makes me feel positive. It gives me a space. Restorative. Absolutely. It's, uh, it's just a— it's a positive environment. And so, um, you know, yeah, it's all about being positive. Yeah.

So you're gonna be like, great energy to be around. Let's just have Danica around all the time. But I mean, now I get why you guys have had man caves forever.

Y'all Smart. You've had your little zones where you can do what you love and see what you get, your stuff on the wall, memorabilia, whatever you're—

everyone gets a key.

I know somebody doesn't always have a room that they can dedicate, especially let's say you live in New York City, you might not have an extra room. You might be putting 4 different things in one room in New York City, but you can at least dedicate a corner or a spot or something like that to something. So it's just a way to create positivity.

Rule number 10, the last one before 2 very special bonus clips, is tell great stories.

Whoa, what happened? Oh, just a little fender bender.

A little fender bender?

With the wall. The tire's gone. Yeah, that tire got a little bit closer to my feet than intended.

Oh, this is the front of the car.

That's the front of the car. Yeah, I hit the wall at about, I'm thinking somewhere around about 180. You hit the wall. 160, 180, I'm sure I hit the wall at. After I'd hit the wall, there was fire coming up from inside of, from the middle of the car, and so my hand was on fire, and all I was concerned about was my hair. It's an excellent prop. I can't, it takes forever to grow this back, so I just had to get out as fast as I could. Absolutely. But at that point in time, I was jumping out, and another car had been in the wreck as well. I hit the car next to me, Matt Kenseth. And so he actually flipped, and he was still sitting in his car, and I was out of the car kind of headed towards him. He was like telling me to hurry up, and I thought, oh my God, my car is going to blow up, something— what's, what's going on? I turned around, looked, and kept going. And he said that he just wanted to make sure that I was coming towards him away from the racetrack so I didn't get another $20,000 fine for approaching the racing surface, because I did I got a fine for $20,000 for taking 10 steps towards the track and giving the universal WTF sign to a driver. Really? Yeah. I thought it was good TV, but— and it was, probably, but I still got fined $20,000 for that.

Now I've got 2 very special bonus clips from Dinah Ka on how to create your own destiny and get the courage to try something new. But before that, my question of the day relates to rule number 3, which is start small. I want to know what is one small step that you're going to take today after watching this video to make a little bit of progress on that big goal, that big vision you have. Leave it down in the comments below. I'm really curious to find out. Thank you guys so much for watching. I believe in you. I hope you continue to believe in yourself and whatever your one word is. Much love. I'll see you soon and enjoy the bonus clips.

Part of my message and something of me moving forward is how powerful we all are as individuals and how, you know, looking into more reasons as to how I got to where I am today. And even something simple, like I was doing an interview earlier and they asked about visualization. I'm like, I've actually done visualization since I was in go-karting, like picture the perfect lap. And so, you know, trying to figure out what it is that's got me to this point and then how to go deeper. But, you know, we are powerful individuals in and of ourselves and create our own destiny, and so that's an important message. What I've learned over the years with me is that trying new things ends up usually going pretty well, and, you know, that's where you start to get more confidence in yourself. And if anything, you just learn something and you have an experience. And life is about experiences. And if something exciting comes your way, just say yes. Just try something new and not be afraid. And the worst thing you do is fail and you just don't do it anymore. You just, or you try again. So new experiences are how you grow. And I think that that goes back to the core of like even just living in a new country when I was 16. I grew up so fast because I did that. It's about doing things that are outside your comfort zone and something you would not do.

Raise your standard. Apple, at the core, its core value is that we believe that people with passion can change the world for the better.

Not one drop of my self-worth depends on your acceptance of me. I don't ever give up. I'd have to be Dead or completely incapacitated.

Hey, Believe Nation! If you want to see my all-time favorite top 10 rules of success, I have a very special secret video for you. These are the individual clips that I have personally learned the most from and applied to my life and my business. Check the link in the description for details.