There are few things in our chaotic lives that are more reliable and dependable than money. Dollars can be counted, budgeted, and allocated. Money acts the same way every time and will do exactly what you tell it to do, but it’s not magic. I’m always amazed when people take this down-to-earth medium of exchange and expect it to be magical.
Do you ever feel stuck? Do you ever feel that you are a slave to your work, yet your work doesn’t fulfill you and it leaves you feeling empty and unaccomplished? Have you ever felt that what you are doing is meaningless, or that despite your success you feel you aren’t on the right path in life?
It wasn’t too long ago I was stuck with no direction. I had my nose buried in the grindstone and I wouldn’t allow myself to look up from what I was doing for a second. I used to think I was a hard worker, and that I was dedicated, brave, and strong, but it took some time to realize that I was wrong about it all.
Nothing stifles our success more than the pressure we put on ourselves to do things perfectly, and avoid the possibility of falling short in the attempt.
We live in a culture that celebrates perfectionism even as it censures it. Every time we pick up a magazine or turn on the TV, we feel pressure to have perfect homes, perfect bodies, perfect children, perfect lives. And too often we want to feel like we have to do something perfectly before we attempt to do it at all. Nothing stifles our success more than the pressure we put on ourselves to do things perfectly, and to avoid the possibility of falling short in the attempt.
I am not a guru who will solve all your problems. I don’t know your current life situation and I cannot promise that you will succeed with what you do. I can’t say that after reading this article you will love your current job or that you will eliminate all the negative energy you receive day in and day out.
However, I can share some insights that will greatly reduce your stress levels at work. Not only that, but these solutions will improve your overall health, your self-esteem and your personal productivity & effectiveness as well.
At the beginning of each year, we all start with high aspirations and a lofty list of goals. Whether our objective is a promotion to district manager or an increase in sales by 5 percent per quarter over last year, on January 1 our sights are focused with laser-like intensity on our visions of greatness. But then, by January 10, a couple of curve-balls are likely to come from out of nowhere, and suddenly we’re down 0-2 in the count only ten days into the new year.
“Success isn’t a result of spontaneous combustion. You must set yourself on fire.” — Arnold H. Glasow
Most people talk about success so much that they rarely have any time to practice it.
They try to develop strategies, learn all about it, try to prepare and plan all outcomes, to analyze how others succeeded, etc.
And eventually they start worrying about what might happen, remind themselves of their past failures and put too much effort into thinking how not to let that happen again.
And in the end, they fear success, they think it’s too hard, too far away. It starts to look impossible.
When the term Emotional Intelligence first arrived on the public’s radar, it served as the missing link to the answer of a query the professional world had been perplexed over for years. People with average IQs were outperforming those with high IQs 70% of the time. The successful factor setting those with an average IQ apart was that their Emotional Intelligence (known as EQ or EI) was significantly higher. Further research proved that 90% of top performers have high EQ.
When I was a young person, one of my mentors told me, “If you want to get something done, ask someone who’s already busy to do it.” This seemed counter-intuitive or even ridiculous to me then. Today, while I can’t explain why it works, experience has, indeed, taught me that people who are already getting a lot done seem to be most able to do more.
In a recent study of college students, it was revealed that students who worked a part-time job up to 20 hours per week in addition to their coursework actually performed better and got higher grades than their fellow students who didn’t work at all. There is something about having a lot to do that forces us to both prioritize and focus.
We’ve all heard the clichés about how being happy is as simple as choosing it. The truth is, being happy isn’t a choice – being happy and leading a wonderful life is the result of a multitude of choices. It’s hard to always know whether what we’re doing is a foolproof decision, but there are certain choices that we can make every day that will guarantee a better life.
As my favorite quote goes, “life is 10 percent what happens to you and 90 percent how you react to it.” Only you can choose the attitude you’re going to have in life, and it will ultimately determine the course of your life.
The cliche of the 21st century is the word “success”. While this word didn’t assume wider usage in the present century, getting the attributes of it has eluded many sending the weak-hearted to their early grave. The promise of a nice estate, booming Business Empire, splash cars, great vacations, and bounded respect within one’s community and quality education for one’s protege are all promises of success. And it takes persons with guts to attain success of any kind.