Journey to Success

Have you ever asked yourself, “Why didn’t I do what I should do?” or “Why did I do what I should not do?”

Many people fail in life because they did not make the right choices. Even if they did, they did not invest enough time, energy, and other resources to make them work.

They did not persevere to turn their goal into a reality. Sadly, at the end of their life, they look back and realised that they did not achieve their desired outcomes and live a fulfilling life.

To achieve success, you need to put into practice 8 critical success factors.

Question: What are the barriers that are holding you back from success and how can you overcome them?

1. Have a compass for success.

Set a concise, clear, current, and challenging goal.

Goal-setting motivates you to improve your performance and achieve mastery over whatever is needed to achieve success.

Having a goal will act like a magnet to draw you to success. It will spur you to adopt the right knowledge, attitude, skills, and habits (KASH).

Goals will also act like a compass. They guide you on the right track to the specified destination.

One of the keys to success is to constantly assess your progress in achieving a predetermined goal.

After every course of action, you also need to evaluate the outcomes and their impact on your life and others.

For example, don’t just set a goal for weight loss. Place a weighing machine at your kitchen and office.

Weigh yourself regularly and especially before you go for a meal. You will be more motivated and cautious about eating healthily.

It will do more to help you lose weight than just setting a goal for it.

In whatever goal-setting process, with constant evaluation and improvement, you will be on the way to achieving your goal.

Question: How can you track your progress and boost your discipline to achieve your goal?

2. Be a self-regulated leader.

After you have set a goal, you need to be a self-regulated learner and achiever.

In other words, learn how to manage and control your inner life.

For example, practice self-monitoring and self-evaluation.

As you reflect on your performance and seek to improve on it, you are “sharpening your axe” so that you can “chop more trees.”

You are also engaging actively in self-motivation and self-instruction. In case you are not aware, all motivation and learning begin with a personal inertia.

To put this principle into practice, you should make the first appointment every day with none other than yourself and our Creator.

Use the time to evaluate your life and improve on it.

Stretch yourself to set a higher quality and standards of living. Exercise self-control over every area of your life.

Have discipline to direct your thoughts, emotions, words, and action to achieve the required results.

These are metacognitive skills that are pertinent to survival and success in a fast changing world.

Just as importantly, learn to design and if necessary, implement self-imposed contingencies.

In other words, develop the capability, agility, and ability to adapt to any situation and make a success out of it.

Explore all ways to learn, improve, and achieve better results, including attending seminars by world-class gurus and effective trainers

In short, lead the way independent of whatever happen within you and without.

Question: How can you control your words, thoughts, and actions and direct them to help achieve success?

3. Manage your emotions.

To be a self-regulated leader, you need to ask yourself, why do you want to fulfill your dream and be successful?

One of the underlying reasons is because you want to enjoy a set of positive emotions.

These emotions include love, joy, peace, satisfaction, and fulfillment.

Emotion is one of the end results of your pursuit. It is also what predominantly drives your thought process, values, and behaviour.

Therefore, you need to manage your feelings, moods, and other emotions. Do not let your emotions manage and control you.

For example, when you are about to react emotionally such as hatred, anger, or retaliation, force yourself to hold back your mood. Reflect and contemplate over the consequences before you unleash your feeling.

Under control, your emotions are powerful tools to help you achieve desired outcomes.

Question: How can you manage your emotions and leverage on them to achieve success?

4. Stay optimistic.

Research have shown that self-efficacy, the belief in your ability to learn or accomplish a task at a desired level is a key to being successful. It also has a major influence on your motivation, well-being, and success.

Your self efficacy is shaped by confidence and competence in performing a task. It is determined by your experience in learning and improving yourself.

In addition, it depends on the influences of people around you. It is also the result of your physiological and emotional state.

There is a positive correlation between self-efficacy and personal achievement.

For example, if you want to be an entrepreneur and if you do not have a reasonable belief that you are able to succeed in it, you will not start a business or have the passion to succeed in it.

In other words, if you are optimistic about yourself and the desired outcomes, you will be in a better position to achieve success.

Question: How can you increase your self-efficacy so as to put yourself in a better position to succeed?

5. Exercise responsibility.

If anything negative happens, bear in mind it does not happen all the time and it is temporary.

Don’t take it personally and remember, “This, too, will come to past.”

Never lay blame, justify, and give excuses.

Taking responsibility means you have the ability to respond to the situation. You can learn from it, overcome it, go around it, and use it to raise yourself to a higher level of accomplishments.

Every time, you bounce back from a failure, you increase your resilient muscles. You learn how to be in a better position to persevere through the unpredictable storms and dark clouds in life ( 天有不测风云, 人有旦夕祸福).

Lke an aeroplane going through a temporary turbulence, soon, you will see sunshine and beautiful clouds again. You will land shortly on your beautiful destination.

Question: How can you take full responsibility even if it is not entirely your fault and then, put yourself on track to success?

6. Take charge.

To do that, you must have a winner’s belief system.

As a winner, believe that our Creator has given you whatever you need to manage “the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, and all the living things that crawl on the earth” (Genesis 1:28).

You have a tremendous amount of power that is beyond what you think or imagine.

What stands between you and success is one word – action.

Make no bones about it. You need to put in effort and perseverance to achieve success.

Every now and then, you will need to renew your commitment and effort.

Success is proportionate to the amount of what I call your “smart sweat.” The smarter you sweat to achieve your goal, the more successful you will become.

Therefore, take charge and make things happen.

Question: How can you tap your maximum potential and live up to your highest calling?

7. Surround yourself with success.

Success is being in the right place and at the right time.

Therefore, learn from and model after successful people. Choose the people that you are going to mix around with.

Always seek wise counsel and ask for help. Look for experts who can help coach and guide you.

Pursue useful sources of information to help you live out your dream life.

Be found in the right sociocultural setting, places that can only inspire you and propel you forward to success.

Immerse yourself in the right culture and community so that you will be filled with and will manifest all the goodness of life.

Question: How can you immerse and surround yourself with catalysts of success?

8. Enjoy your journey to success.

Along the journey to achieve success, find meaning, joy, and purpose in whatever you do.

Be grateful and thankful for all the wonderful things around you.

Show interest in everything that is beautiful and positive. Be in awe over what our Creator has given to you at every given moment.

Make every one of your tasks creative, interesting, and reasonably challenging. Enjoy it and strive to do well in it.

Learn to operate effectively and efficiently so as to achieve the best outcomes.

Question: How you maximise your enjoyment as you pursue success?

See you along the journey to success.

Go4It!

By the way, I have also recorded other reflections.

Visit my Inspiration blog at http://liewinspiration.wordpress.com/

For my opinions on social affairs, please visit my Transformation blog at http://hsrpatrickliew.wordpress.com/

Please read my reflections and continue to teach me.

Life is FUNtastic!