Here are two lists which should serve as a valuable guide toward helping you make progress in all of your efforts. The first one is from Think and Grow Rich and describes the 30 major reasons for failure and incorporates the 13 major principles through which people accumulate fortunes. As you go through them, check yourself point by point for the purpose of discovering how many of these causes of failure stand between you and success.
The second list is from 21 Success Secrets of Self-Made Millionaires by Brian Tracy. This information will change your life for the better, but only if you apply the concepts. These lists are very potent…so do your best to use it in ways that will affect everything you do as you move through your week.
Thirty Reasons People Fail:
- Unfavourable hereditary background
- Lack of a well-defined purpose in life
- Lack of ambition to aim above mediocrity
- Insufficient education
- Lack of self-discipline
- Poor health
- Unfavourable environmental influences during childhood
- Procrastination
- Lack of persistence
- Negative personality
- Uncontrolled desire for something for nothing
- Lack of a well-defined power of decision
- One or more of the six basic fears
- Wrong selection of a mate in marriage
- Over cautious
- Wrong selection of associates in business
- Superstition and prejudice
- Wrong selection of a vocation
- Lack of concentration of effort
- The tendency to spend indiscriminately
- Lack of enthusiasm
- Intolerance
- Intemperance
- Inability to cooperate with others
- Possession of power that was not acquired through self-effort
- Intentional dishonesty
- Egotism and vanity
- Guessing instead of thinking
- Lack of capital
- Other
Napoleon Hill states that most people cannot see themselves as others see them. You may be one who cannot. He says that it will be helpful if you can induce someone who knows you well to go over this list with you, and help to analyse you and also, it may be beneficial if you try this alone, as well.
21 Success Secrets of Self-Made Millionaires:
- Dream big dreams
- Develop a clear sense of direction
- See yourself as self-employed, even if you’re not yet
- Do what you love
- Commit to excellence
- Develop a workaholic mentality
- Dedicate yourself to lifelong learning
- Pay yourself first
- Learn every detail of your business
- Dedicate yourself to serving others
- Be impeccably honest with yourself and others
- Set priorities on your activities and concentrate single mindedly on one thing at a time
- Develop a reputation of quality, speed, and dependability
- Be prepared to climb from peak-to-peak in your life and in your career
- Practice self-discipline in all things
- Unlock your inborn creativity
- Get around the right people
- Take excellent care of your physical health
- Be decisive and action oriented
- Never consider the possibility of failure
- Back everything you do with the twin qualities of persistence and determination.
These lists are very accurate. Both authors, Hill and Tracy, are big on “success,” with as much resources to draw from as you move forward to make your dreams a reality. Personal growth could be compared to adolescence…the change is confusing and uncomfortable. So, ask yourself, “Are you a child or an adult? Are you a success or a failure?”. The distinction between success and failure exists in the “lens” through which you view your life and everything inside and outside of your very essence as a human being.
You can have anything you want, you just can’t have everything. Each “want” demands a focused effort. The only place that success comes before work is in the dictionary, because of the first letter in the spelling. If you can grasp the reality of your own dreams coming true, or in other words, wrap your brain, mind, and thoughts around the possibility of some magnificent changes, very positive things will happen for you.
Action usually follows belief. Get very clear on what you believe in and go to work immediately to join the increasing numbers who decide that life is not a dress rehearsal and that one receives only one opportunity to put on a good show.
