The Road to Success

Posted on November 07, 2011 by Kirstin ODonovan, One of Thousands of Performance Coaches on Noomii.

The Road to Success!

Part 4 – Commitment and Persistence

Success is the result of our attitude, we decide if we want to succeed or not. This is not to say that if we don´t succeed, it is our fault entirely, but by being committed to what we want and perseverance in succeeding, will always be essential. It is said that 80% of the reasons that people don´t achieve what they want, is because of reasons within us and only 20% is related to external factors.

If we want to succeed we need to be committed to our success. We need to be 100% committed to making it work, no matter what. Some days are better than others and when things don´t seem to be going our way, it´s easy to feel despondent and unmotivated. We are human after all, but it is like learning to ride a bike, you fall, but you get up and keep going, you persist until you succeed at riding that bike. We have to keep persisting no matter what happens.

Perseverance is the key in reaching any goal. We must focus on what we want and we must dedicate ourselves to achieving it. We must be committed throughout the journey and it will pay off. Success is not only in the achievement but also in the achieving. It is not an easy journey, it is full of setbacks, mistakes, but the successful people are the ones who have the ability to overcome this and keep moving forward.

If you read the biography of many successful men, you will notice that they all have this quality and even they had to face rejection, disappointment, setbacks, many times, but they held onto their vision, their dream and they all achieved it in the end!

“Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no help at all.” Dale Carnegie

NEVER GIVEUP!

Part 3 – why your self-esteem is so important for your success!

For people with a low self-esteem, improving your self esteem must become a pre-requisite for your journey to success. That does not mean that you cannot start your journey but in parallel, also work on improving your self-esteem.

So how is our self-esteem formed? It is formed from birth, all the experiences we have had, what we have heard and felt and our thoughts we connect to our experiences. If we have low self-esteem, we could have experienced situations that made us feel uncomfortable, unwanted, embarrassed or alone in the past. Neural pathways are formed in our brains every time we think and the more often we have a certain thought, the stronger that pathway becomes. Eventually, it is the way you will automatically think about something.

Why is your self esteem so important to your success then? It is important because as individuals, we cannot perform beyond the limits of the way we see ourselves, whatever those limits may be. So if you have a low self-esteem, you may have more boundaries than a person who has high self-esteem. You might say, I would love to do this, but I am not clever enough – that is a boundary, a self imposed limit, you have put up for yourself.
Negative self-talk, consciously or unconsciously only reinforces the negative thoughts and brings us down. Very soon our minds start believing these statements as true, as facts and our behavior changes according to how we feel.

The way we feel about ourselves, good or bad, has a direct result on our productivity. Feeling low and bad about ourselves will most likely be followed by not being as productive as you could be if you had good feelings about yourself. When we feel good the world looks better, our relationships seem better and our productivity increases but the opposite is also true when we don´t feel good about ourselves. So feeling bad about yourself – effects how productive you are.

High self esteem on the other hand, does not mean having a big ego, people who have a high self-esteem are not arrogant and vain. People with high self-esteems don’t feel the need to compete with others, unlike people with a low self-esteem.

You want to ensure you are working towards improving your self-esteem. A negative self-esteem can impair your job performance and it can create depression, stress, anxiety and even problems with relationships. If you have a high self-esteem, it’s more likely that you are creating the life you love and that you are more motivated in doing this.

So what can we do to change a low self-esteem? Here are a few tips…

1. We need to become aware of our self limiting beliefs and ask ourselves, how does this way of thinking benefit me? If it does not, you need to change your belief on something. Read more about how your beliefs affect your world

2. We can also improve our self-esteem through the use of positive affirmations. When we say to ourselves, I am not good enough – we need to change these negative affirmations to ourselves for positives ones – I am good enough! Read more about auto-suggestion

3. Stop comparing yourself to others – comparing yourself to others could be the main source of a low self-esteem. It could be a habit we started at an early age – a bad habit. Try to catch yourself in the process next time you compare yourself and remember, comparing yourself to others is pointless, there has never been or will be a person just like you!

4. Read books and take courses – there are many free e-courses that you could do to improve your self esteem and books to read. If you need a few suggestions, send me an email.

5. You could sign up for a personal coaching program

6. Hang around positive people and people who make you feel good about yourself. Don´t spend time around people who put you down, criticize you or make you feel less about yourself!

Having a positive self-esteem seems to be necessary for having a healthy and a happy existence, it doesn’t matter who we are or what profession we have in life.

Part 2 – getting clear on your vision!

If we want to stay determined and focused, if we want to continue to pursue our dreams, we need specific goals! Putting a plan together is one of the most important steps to getting where you want to be and it starts with a vision. Be specific about what you want to achieve, if your starting point is vague this will only make your ending point vague too!

You need be so clear on what you want, your vision, that you can see it when you close your eyes! If you are not clear on what you want, how will you know when you get it? Or how will you know if you don´t get it? A common metaphor which really illustrates this idea is if you go to a travel agency and you ask for a ticket to Africa, your final destination is Africa. The agent organizes the trip and you end up in Morocco. Maybe you are happy to have a holiday in Morocco but you were actually hoping for a safari in Kenya, so it is not what you wanted, why? Because you weren´t specific. If we are not specific about where we want to go in life, we may end up one day where we don´t want to be.

Going back to ¨getting clear and specific¨ It is great saying ¨I want to be a millionaire by the age of 30¨ – ok , great…my next question is how? By selling a product, a service? How do you plan to do that? What do you vision for yourself? Get really clear on the end goal. Make sure it is aligned with your values and it lightens you up when you think about achieving it. Is it enough to keep you motivated whenever you think about it, to lift your mood and inspire you every day?

So my questions to you are: what is your vision? Where do you want to be in 3-5 years from now? How will you know once you have gotten there? What will it look like? How will you feel? What can you see around you? What can you smell and taste and hear? Write down the outcome of your goal using your five senses and impress this experience into your subconscious mind.
Getting clear on your vision is like the foundation – it’s the first step. You can start by taking a pen and paper and writing down whatever comes to mind – and just start somewhere.

Remember it’s also about the journey – not only the destination! Live in the present moving towards your goals!

Part 1 – how your attitude affects your success!

So how does your attitude affect your success?
Lets start by looking at – what is success? Success can be defined as the achievement of something desired, planned, or attempted.

So remember, success to some people might mean having a fast sports car, buying the house of their dreams, while to others it could be having a loving long term relationship with someone. We define what our own success is and success to everyone is different.

So now…how does my attitude in life affect me achieving what I desire or plan?

There are a few ways that our attitude affects our lives and the good news is – You can change your life by changing your attitude!

Our attitude determines how we look at a setbacks, events, and situations. If we have a positive attitude we could look at the same situation very differently to someone who has a negative attitude. We can apply this to small events that happen in our daily lives or to our business world. A failure in work could be very daunting for some people or it could be feedback to others. The feedback that they need to alter their course a little, change what they are doing to get a better result. Failure is guidance, helping to find the best way to succeed.

We become our own biggest obstacle when we have a negative attitude towards things. Many people can´t understand why they are not getting to where they want, and fail to look at themselves, their attitude towards it.
It is not a coincidence that many successful people all have a positive attitude. Read the biographies of successful people, and you will see that they all cultivate the habit of having a positive attitude!

Also remember that along the journey to your success, people are ultimately involved, and your attitude with them and towards them affects these people and how willing they are to help you.

So can you see how important it is to have the right attitude? So what can we do to change this? It is not easy, change is never easy. And we naturally try to avoid change in our lives; we are set in our ways. We are comfortable and don´t want to change, change can be very frightening for people.

Why don´t you start by identifying your attitude towards events,, ask yourself – is it negative? If so, how can I change my attitude to make this experience more positive?