Are you interested in additional sales, money, promotions, opportunities, happiness, joy, and success (however you define success)? If so, read on, take action, and implement that which will take you to where and who you want to be!
Nothing will more dramatically impact your life, earnings, values, contributions, mission, legacy and success than your habits. To achieve our full potential, each of us must intentionally and consistently examine and improve current habits and carefully create new habits! The most imperative and proven success principle in the world is to better align your habits in support of that which you want to become, achieve, and leave as your legacy. Nothing has a stronger impact in your life than your habits. Absolutely nothing!
Think about it. Habits dominate and virtually control every aspect of your life. Like it or not, accept it or not, we are all slaves to the habits we develop. They almost totally dominate and control our lives.
Unless you recently experienced a major change in your life, habit dominated your yesterdays, your today, and will dominate all of your tomorrows. Even major changes quickly subside and we revert to old or new habits. Habit almost completely determined what you ate for breakfast, the route you drove or commuted to work, the first hour at work, what you did and did not do during your morning, what you did for lunch, how you spent the afternoon, how you related to your supervisor, your colleagues, and those for whom you are responsible. Habit dominates the way you perform and complete your work, your typical sense of accomplishment or non accomplishment during the work day and your general philosophy of life. Habit dominates dinner, time with the family, time in front of a TV, time on the computer, time on social networks such as Facebook, time on your favorite websites, the way you handle and respond to emails. For the most part, habit determines our health, our earnings, our net worth, and how we will spend retirement. Even hobbies and recreational activities become habit.
Winning and losing are habits. The amount of time you do or don’t put into life long learning is a habit. Virtually all of what you read or don’t read is habit. Virtually all of what you learn or don’t learn is habit. Habit dominates the way you build and maintain relationships and the success with which you serve customers and clients. With relatively rare exceptions, your current physical and mental condition is a result of habit. How you spend virtually all your personal and professional time and energy is controlled by habit.
Working hard is a habit. Accomplishing more than is required or expected and delivering on your promises are habits. Happiness is a habit. A fulfilling social and family life, involvement in your community and in causes for which you are passionate are habits. Exercise, eating and sleeping are habits. Spending time thinking or not thinking and focusing on strategic priorities are habits. Setting specific, measurable goals and achieving your goals are habits. Planning or not planning, preparing or not preparing, being over prepared rather than under prepared are habits. Expecting the best or the worst is a habit. Your self confidence and self esteem is mostly habit. Thinking positively or negatively is a habit. Constant promotions are a result of habits. The culture you create in virtually all aspects of your life is a result of habits. The rate at which you read, learn and retain information and experiences is, for the most part, a result of habits. Using time effectively is a habit. Even the way you spend your vacations becomes habit.
From the time you get out of bed (a habit) until the time you go to bed (another habit), virtually everything you eat, wear, think, say, accomplish or don’t accomplish is a matter of habit.
Og Mandino, author of The Greatest Salesman in the World and arguably the most successful, best selling “self help” author in the history of the world wrote these words:
“The only difference between those who have failed and those who have succeeded lies in the difference of their habits. Good habits are the key to all success. Bad habits are the unlocked door to failure. Thus, the first law I will obey, which precedeth all others is – I will form good habits and become their slave.”
Application of this Success Principle
- Accept and understand the reality, power and impact of habits in your life. Arguing or disagreeing with the reality will not make habits go away. You are a creature of habit and you always will be.
- Resolve to better leverage this reality and power to your advantage for the rest of your life.
- Create and deeply ingrain the habit of spending at least 5 minutes a day mentally examining the current and future impact of one of your habits. Examine a different habit each and every day for the rest of your life. Don’t worry, you won’t run out of habits to examine. You have hundreds, if not thousands of habits. If you think you have covered them all, start over or frequently review those habits you believe will have the most positive impact on your life. Remember, none of us are perfect and never will be. Every habit in your life can probably somehow be improved, unless it should be completely eliminated from your life.
- Accept the fact that well ingrained habits are extremely difficult to permanently change. One need look no farther than the hundreds of billions of dollars spent each year around the world to change habits such as alcohol abuse, drug abuse, use of tobacco, obesity, and the health ramifications of an unhealthy diet and little or no exercise. Eliminating and improving current habits and creating new positive habits is not easy. But the payoff and ROI is exceptional and well worth the time, effort and energy.
- Understand that the most effective, efficient, and long lasting way to break a habit, change a habit or improve a habit is to substitute an improved or new habit in its place. To eliminate a habit and leave a vacuum is an almost guaranteed formula for failure.
- Be sure your habits, even your small habits, are properly aligned and are supportive of who, what, when, where and how you want to be.
Change your habits and you will change your world and the results in your life. Change your habits and you will change your success, your legacy and the joy, peace, and fulfillment in your life. Habits are the core, the essence, and the underpinning of virtually all we do, all we accomplish, all we earn, all we enjoy, all we contribute, all we are, and all we ever will be…
“Make Good Habits And Become Their Slave”
