Fortunately,
what Steve Jobs said every successful person has inside is something you
absolutely can develop.
When asked what makes people successful, Steve Jobs would describe how belief can motivate and
inspire. Jobs would talk about the power of asking for help. He would talk
about how important it is to take an unconventional path and
do things other people typically don't -- or won't -- consider.
Fortunately, all are traits anyone can
develop.
But Steve Jobs believed in one trait even
more: perseverance.
Jobs said,
I'm convinced that about half of what
separates successful entrepreneurs from the non-successful ones is pure
perseverance. It is so hard. You pour so much of your life into this
thing.
There are such rough moments ... that
most people give up. I don't blame them. It's really tough.
That happens to all of us. We set a huge goal.
We set out to achieve it. We hit the ground running -- and then we hit the
rough moments. It gets really tough.
Unfortunately, consistently doing what you
need to do to succeed, with total focus and resolve, is extremely difficult.
That's why having the ability to work hard and
respond positively to failure and adversity is so crucial. Resolve, willpower,
and determination help successful people work hard and stick to their long-term
goals:
·
Most successful people
are great at delaying gratification.
·
Most successful people
are great at withstanding temptation.
·
Most successful people
are great at overcoming fear in order to do what they need to do.
·
Most successful people
don't set priorities; they do the things they decide are most
important.
Fortunately there are ways you can
develop those qualities and, as a result, be even more successful
(in whatever way you choose to define success).
1. Start seeing your potential -- and your life -- as totally
within your control.
Jobs once said, " ... when the employee
becomes a vice president, he or she must vacate all excuses for failure. A vice
president is responsible for any mistakes that happen, and it doesn't matter
what you say."
Act as if success or failure is totally within
your control. If you succeed, you caused it. If you
fail, you caused it.
By not wasting mental energy worrying about
what might happen to you, you can put all your effort into
making things happen.
There are plenty of things you can't control,
but the one thing you can control is you -- and your perspective on personal
responsibility. As Jobs would say, "Reasons stop
mattering." Never make excuses. Never list reasons.
And never point fingers.
Unless, of course, you point them at yourself,
and resolve that next time you'll do whatever it takes to make sure things turn
out the way you plan.
2. Start seeing the past as training.
The past is valuable. Learn from your
mistakes. Learn from the mistakes of others.
Then let it go.
Easier said than done? It depends on your
perspective. When something bad happens to you, see it as an opportunity to
learn something you didn't know. When another person makes a mistake, don't
just learn from it -- see it as an opportunity to be kind, forgiving, and
understanding.
The past is just training. Unless you let it,
it doesn't define you. Think about what went wrong but only in terms of
how you will make sure that next time, you and the people around you will know
how to make sure it goes right.
3. Start ignoring what you can't control.
Mental strength is like muscle strength--no
one has an unlimited supply. So why waste your power on things you can't
control?
For some people, it's politics. For others,
it's family. For others, it's global warming. Whatever it is, you care, and
you want others to care.
Fine. Do what you can do:
Vote. Lend a listening ear. Recycle, and reduce your carbon footprint. Do
what you can do. Be your own change--but don't try to make
everyone else change.
(They won't.)
4. Start celebrating the success of others.
Many people (I guarantee you know at least a
few) see success as a zero-sum game: There's only so much to go around. When
someone else shines, they think that diminishes the light from their stars.
Resentment sucks up a massive amount of mental
energy -- energy better applied elsewhere.
When a friend does something awesome, that
doesn't preclude you from doing something awesome. In fact, where success is
concerned, birds of a feather tend to flock together--so draw your successful
friends even closer.
Don't resent awesomeness. Create and celebrate
awesomeness, wherever you find it, and in time you'll find even more of it in
yourself.
5. Start refusing to complain or criticize.
Your words have power, especially over you.
Whining about your problems always makes you feel worse, not better.
So if something is wrong, don't waste time
complaining. Put that mental energy into making the situation better. (Unless
you want to whine about it forever, eventually you'll have to make it better.)
So why waste time? Fix it now. Don't talk
about what's wrong. Talk about how you'll make things better, even if that
conversation is only with yourself.
And do the same with your friends or
colleagues. Don't just serve as a shoulder they can cry on. Friends don't let
friends whine; friends help friends make their lives better.
6. Start focusing on only impressing yourself.
No one likes you for your clothes, your car,
your possessions, your title, or your accomplishments. Those are all things.
People may like your things--but that doesn't mean they like you.
(Sure, superficially they might seem to like
you, but what's superficial is also insubstantial, and a relationship not based
on substance is not a real relationship.)
Genuine relationships make you happier, and
you'll only form genuine relationships when you stop trying to impress and
start trying to just be yourself.
And you'll have a lot more mental energy to
spend on the people who really do matter in your life.
7. Start creating meaningful reminders of long-term goals.
Say you want to build a bigger company; when
you're mentally tired, it's easy to rationalize doing less than your best. Say
you want to lose weight; when you're mentally tired, it's easy to rationalize
that you'll start changing your eating and exercise habits tomorrow. Say you
want to better engage with your employees; when you're mentally tired, it's
easy to rationalize that you really need to work on that report instead.
Mental fatigue makes us take the easy way out
-- even though the easy way takes us the wrong way.
The key is to create tangible reminders that
pull you back from the impulse brink. A friend has a copy of his bank note
taped to his computer monitor as a constant reminder of an obligation he must
meet. Another keeps a photo of himself on his refrigerator taken when he
weighed 50 pounds more to serve as a constant reminder of the person he never
wants to be again. Another fills his desk with family photos, both because he
loves looking at them and to remind himself of the people he is ultimately
working for.
Think of moments when you are most likely to
give in to impulses that take you farther away from your long-term goals. Then
use tangible reminders of those long-term goals to interrupt the impulse and
keep you on track.
Or, better yet, rework your environment so you
eliminate your ability to be impulsive. Then you don't have to exercise any
willpower at all. If you can't say no to checking your social media accounts
every few minutes, turn them off and put them away for a couple of hours at a
time so you don't have to be strong enough to say no.
8. Start regularly counting your blessings.
Before you turn out the light every night,
take a moment to quit worrying about what you don't have. Quit worrying
about what others have that you don't.
Think about what you do have. You have a lot
to be thankful for. Feels pretty good, doesn't it?
Feeling better about yourself is the best way
of all to recharge your mental batteries, so you can get up tomorrow and do it
all again.
Most of the time, the people who succeed are
the people who refuse to quit.
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