It’s the roughest road that usually leads to the top. Why? Because it’s loaded with new challenges and experiences that enable you to learn, grow and expand your comfort zone. Successful people understand this, which is why they rarely take the easy way out of any challenging situation. They know that the rough road will…
A professional golfer once informed me that the biggest reason most golfers’ scores don’t improve much is that they tend to play with other golfers whose skill levels are roughly the same as their own. As a result, there’s no one to learn from, so there’s no growth or improvement. The same holds true for…
Study after study has shown that highly successful people possess high levels of self-confidence–a rock solid belief in their abilities. This confidence stems from the fact that they have very large “comfort zones.” The reason for this is that highly successful people, as they go through life, are constantly trying out new and different things–they…
Road Rage The last thing you want to do when someone cuts you off in traffic, doesn’t say thank you or doesn’t hold a door open for you, is to take it personally. Keep in mind that such behavior is not directed at you, it’s directed at the world. People who behave like this are…
Be Nice! A number of years ago, a group of researchers studied 16,000 corporate executives. They found that the “high achievers” in the group tended to be every bit as concerned with people as they were with profits. The “medium achievers” were concerned only with performance numbers, while the “low achievers” were obsessed with…
I came across an interesting quote made by a psychologist named Theodore Reik nearly 50 years ago. It went, “In order to be happy oneself, it is necessary to make at least one other person happy.” He went on to say, “The secret to human happiness is not in self-seeking, but in self-forgetting.” What this…
When you share with those around you that you’re getting ready to follow your dream–change careers, start your own business, go back to school–don’t expect them to tell you to go for it. Instead, expect them to say negative things like, “Are you sure you know what you”re doing?” Or, “You’re taking an awfully big risk.” The reason…
Maya Angelou appeared on the Oprah Winfrey show recently and said, “I’ve learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way he or she handles these three things: a rainy day, lost luggage and tangled Christmas tree lights.” Maya is right on the money. If you can negotiate events like this…
Embrace Failure Few people will argue with the old adage that, “Experience is the best teacher.” Experience is all about trying something new, failing, learning from that failure and then trying again until you get it right. When you think about it, that’s how you learned how to ride a bicycle. The only problem…
I’ve Got Some Advice For You Every now and then, you’ll come across someone who is struggling while trying to solve a problem that you already know how to solve. The temptation is to offer this person advice and thus put an end to his or her struggle–after all, offering a helping hand seems like…