You cannot achieve big goals or your life dream without changing. To get to where you want to go, you have to change into the person you want to be.  You need to reach and keep reaching every day. You need to get out of your comfort zone and challenge yourself. It’s the effort and action you take that makes success possible. Every day take action and move forward.

Successful people don’t wait for the elevator, they take the stairs. If you had to climb the stairs of the Empire State Building it would seem overwhelming. But each step, in an of itself, is actually very easy to climb. If you are pursuing some big goal or life dream, don’t focus on how much work it will require and how long it will take. That will do nothing but overwhelm you. Break it down into small, easy to accomplish daily activities. And then each day, day after day, perform those specific activities that will move your toward accomplishing your goal or life dream. Success is not about hitting the home runs, or one momentous achievement; it’s about the unglamorous bunts, walks and singles. Baby stepping your way to success is the only way to achieve great things in life. Show up every day and do the little things and eventually you will realize your big goal or life dream.

Living in the present is a Rich Habit. But it’s not an easy Rich Habit. Life is challenging for everyone. Financial issues, relationship issues, job issues, customer/client issues, family issues and health issues can distract you from the present. If you allow these issues to occupy your mind during family get togethers or other happiness events, you lose that happiness event forever. You need to practice happiness every day. One of the ways you do that is to practice living in the present by not letting all of life’s distractions interfere with happiness events. Live in the moment. Be present during happiness events. Enjoy your family and friends in the moment. Smile and laugh, as if you haven’t a care in the world, when you are in the moment. Eat, drink and be merry, in the moment. Don’t let life’s problems destroy your happiness event. When we are all on our deathbed it will not be life’s problems that occupy our thinking. It will be those happiness events that we will remember. Live in the present today. Today is going to be a great day. Live it.

Successful people are outliers. They do certain things every day that 95% of the population simply don’t do. They process into their day specific habits, activities, behaviors and thinking that separate themselves from the herd. These Outlier Activities include:

• Investing in themselves every day through self-education: reading, listening to audio books, podcasts, webinars etc.
• Intensely focusing on specific daily activities that move them forward in achieving some big goal, life dream or major purpose
• Seeking out relationships with other success-minded people and strengthening those relationships through daily communication, periodic networking, mastermind group participation and volunteering
• Practicing positivity (positive mental outlook) every day by being thankful for what they have or focusing on what they want instead of focusing on what they don’t have, visualization and affirmations
• Developing and following a scrip of their ideal, future life
• Developing and honing their skill-sets through constant practice and research
• Living below their means and expanding their means
• Living in the present by making happiness a habit

Happy, successful, wealthy people focus on what they have in life, not on what they lack in life. This is positive thinking. People who are unhappy, unsuccessful and struggling financially focus on what they lack and fail to give thanks for what they have. This is negative thinking. Being grateful is positive thinking. Being ungrateful is negative thinking. Positive thinking and negative thinking are daily habits. Being positive crates the mental infrastructure that is required for a happy, successful and rich life. Being negative creates the mental infrastructure for an unhappy, unsuccessful, poor life.

EVERYONE has things in their life that could cause them to be critical of others and themselves or cause them to complain about others or their own life. When you criticize or complain, you are pulling yourself into a negative world. If you don’t stop it in its tracks it will eventually become a Poverty Habit that will perpetuate a negative outlook on life. Instead compliment and be thankful for what you do have. This will eventually become a Rich Habit that will create a positive outlook on life.

As most of you who follow me know, I’ve spent more than ten years studying the habits of the rich and poor. Which is really a study of the habits of those who succeed and those who do not. Well, I’ve learned quite a few things about success and failure along the way. One of the things I’ve learned from my research, is about mistakes. Here’s my philosophy on mistakes:

Mistakes are wonderful things. I think they are so great, in fact, that I try to make as many as I possibly can. I just make an effort not repeat the mistakes that make life worse and make an effort to embrace the mistakes that make life better. You see, mistakes are never a bad, negative thing. Some mistakes teach you what not to do, and some mistakes inadvertently improve your life and are worth repeating over and over again. So, on this journey, let’s vow to make as many mistakes as possible.

Each week focus on improving the life of just one of your relationships. Devote a portion of one day each week, intensely focusing on helping just one person. The goal is to focus on that one person for that one week. It will deepen the roots to your relationship tree. If you do this each week you will strengthen 52 of your relationships each year, year in and year out.

Is your mind frozen by ideology, beliefs, your upbringing? Nothing grows on ice. Close minded people never grow, never expand their thinking and are stuck in old beliefs. Successful people are open minded to new ideas, new thinking and new beliefs. They understand that in order to grow into the successful person they long to be, they need to be a sponge to new ideas and new thinking.