I have come up with a list of 14 best practices/ suggestions for success. This list is a result of my own experiences and experiences of a lot of great personalities. I have read and/ or heard a lot of these teachings, I am sure my own experiences are a result of these readings, teachings or discussions.
If one follows the list below by the word and implement 100% in his/ her life, the end result will be success in almost any field or aspect of life.
One must have a habit of improving everything around him/ her.
- Improve yourself and everything and everyone that come in contact with you.
- Apply open bottle concept. The concept is that if a bottle is left with open lid in the wilderness, it will collect anything falling in it without any effort from anyone BUT if lid is closed, the bottle can be left at the bottom of the sea for years but nothing will enter the bottle. One must guard what is allowed to enter the bottle.
- Either accept the results or change the environment, do not stay and complain in a situation.
- continuously gain all kind of knowledge, read A LOT. A nonreader lives one life but a reader may live 1000 lives.
- Know your strength and weaknesses, especially the weaknesses. Be brutally honest about your weaknesses and how to avoid/ fix them.
- The best way to get involved is to take the ownership of the activities.
- Volunteer to any available opportunities. Volunteer a lot
- Strive to make every next day better than today. As small as just 1% improvement every week will result in 100% improvement in less than 2 years.
- Every next day should be better than today. (BTW this can be a gauge to see if you are going in the right direction and doing the right thing)
- Life is not what you live, life is what you focus on. Change your focus and outcome will change.
Have specific goals and targets, both short term and long term.
- Create SMART goals.
- There is a difference between goal and wish; you do not need to do anything for a wish but you have to work on a goal with a plan and strategy.
- Know the difference between expectations and wants; act on what you want to achieve rather than what you expect.
- Look at the consequences and think 100 times before you make a decision but once you make a decision, do not look back; do not leave a path of return.
- The value of a person is what he/ she does best. Change your value by becoming best at what you do or become best at something.
- Raw, unplanned, directionless energy only destroy things. Lightning strike only destroy things.
Have a lot of courage; lack of courage or habit of giving up, results in poor performance.
- Be fearless and do not hesitate.; be extremely resilient
- Hesitation keeps you from what you deserve and fears keeps you away from your potentials.
- Accept difficult challenges regularly. Go for impossible and difficult will become easy.
- Boldness/ confidence is more important than intelligence or hard work.
Have unshakable trust in what you believe in.
- Yaqeen-e-Mohkam.
- Delayed gratification is key to the long-term success.
- If you are willing to die for something, you will get it!
- Thoughts become perception and perception becomes reality. Do not let your thoughts control you. Do not believe every thought.
- Success is linear about 80% of the way and then exponential for last 20%, do not give up mid-way through.
- To sweeten a cup of tea to the taste, only the last 1/4 spoon is needed for great taste, not the first several spoonsful.
Take action! Nothing matters unless you take actions.
- It does not matter what you have studied, know or have experience, action is the key for success.
- OKR: Objective Key Results
- Value and respect time because arrow of time only moves in one direction; time never comes back.
- Learn things when needed not after the effect.
- There is a very low probability of winning a lottery but there is only one sure way to lose it and that is by not buying the ticket
- There should be zero time between information/ inspiration and implementation; recognize an opportunity quickly and seize on the opportunity immediately.
- Running 100 miles an hour in the wrong direction moves you away from your destiny at 100 miles an hour; make sure to move in the right direction before moving fast.
Make sure to have clear priorities and emphasis.
- You must prioritize things and have emphasis on right things.
- Always have presence of mind; Pay 110% attention to everything you see and what you are doing.
- Pay attention to one thing at a time.
- Extra ordinary results require extra ordinary efforts and extremely hard work.
Recognize patterns.
- Everything in life has a pattern; learn to recognize patterns.
- Change bad patterns to good patterns in order to change the results.
- You reap what you sow!
- You cannot produce apples from an orange tree, no matter how hard you try.
- Creating good routines or following someone else’s proven routines can produce better results.
- Think outside the box without inhibitions.
Have a passion and go after it as if there is no tomorrow.
- Learn to communicate well in all forms.
- Communicate well about your passion to yourself and others.
- Work hard and advertise
Take responsibility for your actions.
- Stop “ poor me “ attitude.
- Hard work, sincerity and intelligence is needed for optimum results
- You cannot demand respect from a person or a group who has more knowledge or experience than you about a topic or subject.
Do not ask for help or favor unless absolutely needed.
- First respect yourself before expecting others to respect you.
- Respect cannot be demanded, it is earned.
- Give favors not request favors.
- Make things easy for others and God will make things easy for you.
Recognize opportunities.
- Take a hint and produce multi-X results.
- Everyone gets an opportunity; only lucky ones recognize it and only intelligent ones convert it into success.
- Isolation is not an attitude, it is a dream killer
- What is your wish and what is your hurdle?
Do good deeds because it is the right thing to do, NOT because you do not have any other or better choice.
- Resentment produces “poor me” attitude which results in eventual breakdown of things or people.
- Anything done without sincerity will result in unwanted outcome.
- When you accomplish a dream, you become a sun with its own solar system; recognize this fact and provide support to as many planets as you can
- A kind person takes care of him/ herself and others and an unkind person takes care of him/ herself at the expense of others.
Research yourself.
- Do not follow anyone blindly be it religion, culture or anything else.
- Ask a lot of questions.
- Do not ask or expect to get step by step instructions, take a hint and complete the story.
- Pack your own parachute
Know the difference between love and dependence.
- Do not make anyone your weakness, make them your strength.
- You are what you have created a story about you in your mind. You make sense out of things based on the story you tell yourself. Change the story and your thinking will change.
- You become what you think; change the way you look at things and things will change.