Generally you will find that success means lots of things to different people. People can cite success on the stage, in business, on the sports field, in politics or even just recognizing someone who is a fantastic father or mother.
Having a sense of balance also seems to be important. It really just isn’t good enough to be successful in business but hopeless in relationships. Being a good all-rounder seems to be an important factor in identifying those who are successful.
When I begin to present at conferences or on any of my courses, I always ask the audience for who they admire and why. It won’t surprise you to realize that the same old names come up again and again except, of course, in different countries, where local heroes or national icons are mentioned. You can imagine Mother Theresa, Mohammed Ali, Nelson Mandela, Lance Armstrong and so on.
If you think about it, you can narrow the characteristics of success down to four or five components. Firstly, if you are going to be successful, you will need to be able to manage the stress that will come with the journey. Being able to stay calm and have the energy to keep focused while others just can’t keep up will be critical for you. So having a method to manage it easily, and indeed daily, will give you the edge.
Next, you will have to ensure you develop a strong positive mental attitude. Attitude is clearly critical, yet up here in the north west of Europe (it may be the weather) you find that most people are fairly negative. Given half a chance, people you meet and talk with engage in moaning and you can regularly hear them talking themselves out of opportunities or putting others down. Of course, what about the love of a good piece of gossip? You simply don’t have the luxury of engaging in this energy sapping activity; if you wish to succeed and prosper you need to stay positive.
So then you have the notion of where are you heading. Notice if you will that all the examples above were driven by a tremendous sense of future. They were driven by goals and aspirations of what they wanted to achieve. Mandela was in the cell for 27 years and never lost his vision. We are lucky if most people around us think for 27 minutes in a year about a compelling goal. Being a futurist is something you will want to develop, so reviewing your goals regularly is obviously critical.
The fourth characteristic seems to indicate the need to use much more of your brain as you go about your business. You will probably already have heard of the left/right brain tendencies of thinking, the discovery of which led to a Nobel Prize. Surely you would not be arrogant enough to dismiss a Nobel Prize? So open your mind if you need to, to the realization that the left brain is the analytical and the right brain the imaginative, intuitive.
Perhaps you can reflect that your education probably majored on left brain activity with little or no real focus on the right, especially after age 11 or 12. All the greats seem to be able to imagine bold and wonderful futures, clearly a skill of the right brain. The left brain that dominates most people’s thinking is unable to imagine anything and tends to base the future on present experience and past results.
So what can you do? You need to find yourself some goals and really imagine exactly what it will be like once they are achieved, constantly think about them and stay positive as you journey towards their outcome. Over and above this you will need to manage your stress and somehow or other find ways to make sure you think more with your right brain. I wish you all the best with this.