Ten Top Tips for Success.

By Andy Brocklehurst of Succeed4u.com

PLEASE NOTE: This is a long report, but one that is very useful and contains vital steps that anyone who wants to succeed should master. You should refer it to often.

1. Attitude



If there is one thing more important than any other when it comes to being successful in anything you do, it is attitude. I would go as far as to say that attitude is 99% of what succeeding or failing relies on.

You must have a positive attitude about everything you do, if you are to succeed in life.

In waking up, going to sleep, working – everything you do in fact, you must have a positive attitude about it. When things don't seem to go your way, you need to still maintain a positive attitude and outlook about it. If you wake up late, don't let it ruin your day, be positive and say to yourself "ok, so I woke up late, now lets get on and make the best out of the rest of the day".

I do not believe that anyone in the world today who is successful has got there without having a good and positive attitude.

It is so easy to slip into negative thinking, and I really want to stress that keeping a good attitude really does take a lot of effort. Stick a note to your desk, to the visor on your car, on the cabinet in the bathroom, wherever you can, that simply says "ATTITUDE". Whenever you look at it, stop for a moment and think about the things that have happened so far that day, and if you see a point where you were not positive then re think that moment, get a positive outlook on it, and move forwards.

If you have a good attitude about everything you do, it makes it so much easier to get things done. If there is a job that you don't like doing, don't leave it till last, instead do it first and think to yourself "I am going to get this done and out of the way and then I have only the things I like doing left for the day".

Talk of "positive thinking" has become such a cliché in this day and age, and yet being positive and adopting a good attitude about everything really does make life better, it makes you happier and it will make you more successful.

 

2. Be careful who you listen to and who you mix with.

Many years back I worked in sales, in the company I worked for there were good sales people who generally did well and made a lot of money, and there were those who seemed to go in fits and starts. One of my good friends in the sales department was one of the companies most successful sales people, and I used to like to work close by him as I would always learn more from watching him work.

The thing that impressed me the most about him was how, if he had a bad month for sales, he never let himself get down, he never complained, he just stepped up his efforts and I don't think in the 3 or 4 years I worked with him that I ever saw him have two bad months in a row.

One of the secrets he taught me was that if I had a bad month, I needed to just hang out with the sales guys that were having a good month, and let their positive outlook lift me up.

As I looked around, it dawned on me that the sales guys in the department that were having one bad month after another, all hung out together all the time, and moaned and complained and basically pulled eachother down – the very opposite to what they actually needed to be doing.

If you are to succeed, you need to stop listening to negative people.

If you go to someone who is negative with an idea, they will think up a 101 reasons why it just won't work and why there is no point in even trying.

Take that same idea to someone positive and they will say "that's great" and probably give you some great ideas on how to take the idea further.

By all means get opinions from everyone, but don't let the thinking that comes from negative people affect or influence you into not doing something.

One thing to look out for here is this, and it's a sad thing, but please be aware that for many people, their family can be their worst enemies as far as negativity goes. They will tell their family about some idea they have, and even if there is initial support for it, a few months later will come the digs about "where's the thousands of dollars you were going to make??", and in those cases you need to just think "its ok, I haven't made it yet – but I am going to"

3. Take Action

This is another big issue for many people, they have a great business idea, they get excited about it, they go to a friend and tell them all about this great new business they are going to start, their friend is positive and supportive. They leave that friend and go tell someone else, and they talk and talk and talk about it, and eventually talk themselves out of it.

Having a great idea, is fine, but you must take action. Then when you have taken some action, you need to take some more action, then some more, and just keep acting on it and make it successful.

If you have an idea at the moment, maybe its one you have had in mind for some time, stop talking and thinking about it – and DO IT !!!

I have had so many people approach me with an idea, and its almost like they just want to give it away to me and have me do something with it. I will help them, make suggestions, tell them "I would start by doing this" and the sad thing is that 90% of those people never go and actually do it.

If you do not take action, you are denying yourself success.

I can remember starting my first business, I was living in the UK at the time, I was working a regular job and had been talking about starting a business for over 8 years, I would talk about it, think about but never actually do it. One day it finally dawned on me that unless I made it happen, I was going to be stuck where I was and never realize the dream. I started taking action and within 2 months that business was up and running and actually became my full time career! When I moved to the USA, I sold that business, and its great for me to see that its still going strong today, and the amazing thing is that I set that whole business up with the equivalent of just a few hundred dollars! These days I teach others how to get started in business with much less money, and how to become successful as quickly as I did (if not quicker), but I can only help those people if they are prepared to take action.

 

4. Change the way you were programmed.

From an early age we are socially conditioned to think "Job", schools teach it, our peers generally teach it – "do well in school and then get a job". Please don't misunderstand, I think when we are in school and getting educated we need to learn all we can, but I just long for the day that schools teach about the alternative – "Do well, leave school and start in business for yourself".

80% of the millionaires in the United States today have gotten there by starting a business of their own. They are first generation successful people, (the other 20% inherited it or won a lottery, etc). Surely then you can see for yourself, that if you really want financial freedom, the future is in starting your own business.

Sure, starting a business means taking risks, although those risks can be dramatically reduced to almost nothing if you begin part time, and use the techniques we teach to get started with little or no money, but the rewards of working for yourself are financial freedom, security, more time, and much much more.

The choice is yours, let social conditioning continue to influence you and hold you back, or make a decision to break free and do something that will give you the freedom and lifestyle that you and your family deserve.

5. Speak to successful people and ask questions.

Lets imagine for a moment that you planned to start your own business selling computer software. Go out and look for people who are already doing well in that kind of business, talk to them and ask questions. You will be amazed at how successful people love to help others, and in many cases will give you their advice for free. Then when you have asked questions, thank them for their time and say "if I have more questions, can I come back to you?" – almost always they will say yes.

Its just a fact that successful people love to help others to become successful. Hey – I have made a career out of it!

 

6. Write things down.

I don't care how good you think your memory is, why leave things to chance? Why risk forgetting something important? Why chance missing out on a great idea you had because you forgot all about it until it was too late?

Writing things down helps you clear your mind of clutter too, if it is written down you can relax and not worry that you will forget what it was.

Would you agree that you will be able to keep way more positive and on top of things if you had less to worry about? How about if I was to show you a way to reduce the amount of stress and worry that you usually go through as various things come up? Well its an easy solution, and I urge you to try it… Write things down!

If you have bills to pay, write them down, if there are things you are worried about, write them down.

When you write down your worries, you will find that you can think far more clearly about them, and soon have solutions to whatever those problems are. If the bills are mounting up, write them down, and soon you will find you can deal with them so much easier.

When you have ideas – Write them down.

Set yourself goals and – Write them down.

This tip may seem very small and insignificant, but please, please, PLEASE – get hold of it, try it for a while and you will be amazed at the results.

7. Set goals and dream.

If you don't have a target to aim for, you won't hit it. You have to have an action plan, you have to know where you want to get to, work out how you intend to get there, and then keep your eyes on those goals.

I meet too many people who have either not grasped this at all, or equally as bad, have grasped half of this approach and say "my goal is to make a million within 5 years" but when you ask how they will get there, they only have a very vague idea.

You need to set a long term goal, something like 5 or more years ahead, then you need to work out the steps you will take to get there, and set smaller, more quickly achievable goals along the way. Yearly goals, monthly goals, weekly and so forth.

Write those goals down, write down your ideas for how to get to each stage and review it every single week. Sure you may have to adjust some of the steps as you try things out, but unless you have eventual targets, you just cannot get where you want to go.

And referring to my previous point, please, write the goals down, don't leave it just in your head, or you will soon discover that you forget things, and you will allow yourself to change things too easily. If they are written down, you will work harder and stick to the plan.

8. Make the most out of every single day.

When you start each day, you need to have a clear idea of what you plan to get done, I suggest to everyone that they make a list (back on the writing things down again!) and work through it. Best of all is to make a list of things to do at the end of the previous day, then when you start for the day you don't waste time trying to throw a list together while the phone is ringing and other things are going on. If you make your list at the end of a day, before you sit down to relax at the end of a day, you will still have fresh in your mind the things you need to do tomorrow.

Work down that list each day, and at the end of the day anything left over needs to go on the top of the next days list.

Look out for my report on "Time management for success" which covers this in far more detail.

At the end of each day, ask yourself "have I made the most out today that I could?", if you suddenly remember something that you really wanted to get out of the way, go do it before you relax so that you really do feel a sense of achievement for the day. Having a good sense of achievement at the end of a day will make you so much happier and positive.

 

9. Help and give to others.

If you can learn to give to, and help others, and get a "high" from it, you will be happier, more motivated and more successful yourself.

I learnt from mixing with successful people that the more they give to others, the happier they are. Those people who have money, but who are scared to lose even a penny do not have happiness, which is a sad, sad state to be in. In fact, if you are scared to lose some money now and again, you will actually hold yourself back from becoming successful. In my business, I have tried new things, invested money into those new ideas, and sometimes those things don't work and you don't get any return on that investment, in fact in many cases you kiss that investment goodbye. But that's ok, because you can try something else. However, if you are scared to lose that money, you won't try new things, and you will hold yourself back from the success you deserve.

10. Look after your health