Everyone has a different definition of success. Some people want to be financially free, some want to get back in shape and have more confidence, some want to become a best-selling author, some want to build a multi-million dollar business, while others, just want to be happy.
No matter what kind of success you are pursuing, you need to grow into the right person in order to attract the success you desire.
The truth is… Everyone can be successful if they possess the prerequisite and have what it takes to produce the results they want.
So, you want to be successful? Here are the 10 things you are going to need…
1. A Dream Written as a Goal
Yes, it all started with a dream. Without knowing what you want, you will never get it. And that’s exactly why most people are living a mediocre life.
They find life to be meaningless and they go through each day without passion. They live like a zombie because they follow the crowd and do as the general masses do, without having their own thoughts and consciousness of what they want.
So, the first thing you need to live a successful life is to have a dream. And once you have a dream, you want to turn it into a goal by writing it down.
And trust me, 99% of the people are not going to write down their goals even though they know that doing so will help them materialize their goals. Studies have shown that people who write down their goals will increase their rate of success.
I have no idea why people just don’t want to write down their goals, maybe they are just not committed. Or perhaps they can live with or without their goals.
Anyway, don’t let that happen to you. Find out what are your dreams. Understand what kind of life you want to live. And then turn them into goals.
Read: Ultimate Goal Setting Guide: How to Set Goals and Achieve Them
2. A Workable Plan or Strategy
Turning your dream into a goal is just the first step. The next step is to create a workable plan and strategy to get it.
You see, you want to consciously work on your goals. You want to be proactive and make things happen rather than being reactive and wait for things to happen.
You can’t just write down your goals and then wish that what you want will come to you automatically. No, that’s not how success is created.
Success is not created through accidents but by design.
You want to consciously plan for things to happen. But sadly, too many people don’t plan for their lives. They spend more time planning their dinner than they spend time planning their lives and the success they want.
For example, if you want to become a best-selling author, plan for it. Read books on how successful authors made it, join writer’s club, develop a writing habit, consciously work on improving your writing skills, publish and share your work every day, and so on.
There is no way you can become successful if all you do is sit there and wait for results (money/fame/power) to come knocking on your door.
Money and success are not going to fall from the sky. If you want them, you need to go and get them. And first, get yourself a plan.
Read: 10 Tips How to Plan Your Day and Live a More Successful Life
3. Discipline and Habits
As you already know, the success you want isn’t going to come knocking on your door. You need to take action and put in the action to create the results you want.
Hence, what are the things that you need next? Discipline and habits.
You want to develop self-discipline so that you will do the necessary work to produce the results you want. And you want to repeat the process or the behavior until it becomes your habit.
Take losing weight through exercise as an example. You’re not going to lose the excess fat if you hit the gym once. You need to do it consistently.
And that’s why discipline and habits are so important. Because things don’t come immediately, and you need to do it for a sustained period.
Therefore, you want to have the discipline to stick to your plan and take consistent action until you developed the habit of doing it.
I have been blogging on this blog since 2015. And I have been able to write and publish new content at least once a week. And I’m happy to say that when I first began, I pushed through and have turned this into a habit.
And now, I don’t have to make the decision or think about whether I should publish or procrastinate, when the time comes, I will sit in front of my computer and chunk out content.
That’s the power of self-discipline + habits. And the good news is… Anyone can be disciplined and grow a productive habit for success. Just read the article suggested below to learn how…
Read: 10 Great Tips How to Discipline Yourself to Achieve More
4. A Guide or a Mentor
Yes, you need a mentor or a guide to become successful. Can you make it without a mentor? Probably, but you will go through a lot of detours before you get to your destination.
- In Lord of the Rings, Frodo has Gandalf.
- In Harry Potter, Harry has Professor Dumbledore.
- Steve Jobs has Mike Markkula as his early mentor when he started Apple.
- What about Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg? He was mentored by Steve Jobs.
- Virgin Group founder, Richard Branson was mentored by Sir Freddie Laker.
Even Oprah Winfrey had a mentor – Maya Angelou. And this was what Oprah said about their relationship…
“She was there for me always, guiding me through some of the most important years of my life, Mentors are important, and I don’t think anybody makes it in the world without some form of mentorship.”
Oprah Winfrey
Everyone needs a guide to show us the direction and give up encouragement at some points.
And mentorship can come in many forms. If you can get someone to guide you throughout your journey, great. But if you can’t, getting insights from books and learning indirectly from others would help a lot too.
Enroll in this training: Unstoppable Success from John Assaraf
5. The Willingness to Improve and Get Better
The next thing you need for success is your willingness to improve and become better. You see, you are where you are right now because of your knowledge and skills.
So, if you want to get somewhere else, you need to learn, improve, and grow yourself to a higher level. There is no way you can produce better success without improving yourself.
It is just like playing games. If you are at level 3 and you want to fight an enemy at level 5, the fight is going to be tough.
But once you leveled up your character to level 9, the same level 5 enemy will be easy to beat. That’s why you want to work on improving your level and getting better each day.
Many people want to earn a million dollars, but they lack the ability, mindset, and skillset to earn that amount of money. They want the result, but they are not willing to work on themselves to upgrade their level so that they can attract it.
Never let this happen to you. Read more, learn more, and always be open to opportunities to improve yourself.
Find out: Why Do You Need to Read Books and the Benefits of It
6. Your Ability to Focus and to Say “No” to Distractions
Yes, once you have identified the success you want, doing other things means you are distracting yourself and deviating yourself from your destination.
I want to share a short video about how Warren Buffett focuses on his goals. He gave a piece of great advice to his friend and ex-pilot where I believe everyone should learn. Watch…
Once you have identified your main priority, you want to make sure you give it your 100% focus. Doing other things or pursuing other goals means you are being distracted.
That’s how you should focus on your goal. Many people think that being focus means saying ‘yes’, but it is the opposite. Being focus means saying ‘no’ to other opportunities or things on your to-do list that are less important.
You want to make sure you get the most important thing done first before you move on to the next want. All else are distractions.
Check out this guide: 10 Amazing Ways How to Improve Your Focus
7. The Never-Give-Up Spirit
Alright, this is common sense. The moment you give up, you fail, and you are not going to achieve the success you want.
Here’s what you MUST understand – you will make mistakes and you are going to fail.
Yes, you read that right. You will make mistakes and you are going to fail. But, it doesn’t mean that you have to quit or give up.
A winner will never quit and a quitter will never win. You can face many defeats in your life, but that doesn’t mean you are going to be defeated.
You can fall down 9 times and still choose to get up for the 10th time. When you fail, it doesn’t that you have to quit or give up on your goal or the success you want.
It means that what you have done isn’t working. And you need to reflect and do it again. Do it one more time. Do it until you get it.
Your spirit to never give up is going to be one of the most vital requirements for your success.
Develop this spirit right now: 7 Steps How To Not Give Up On Your Dreams
8. Your Ability to Bounce Back
It is important to NOT give up, but at the same time, you want to make sure you have the ability to bounce back quickly and make a swift change.
Many people fail because what they do isn’t working. And guess what, when they try again, they do the same thing. And you know what will happen? They are going to get back the same old results, which is another failure.
Once you failed, don’t repeat the same mistakes. Learn more about your mistakes and understand why you fail, and then bounce back higher.
The key is that every time you fail, you need to stop for a moment, do a post-mortem, find out why you fail, identify what is working and what is not working, and then ADJUST your strategy and make a BETTER plan.
That’s how successful people pivot on their past failures and bounce back higher.
If you want to become a YouTuber, you published 10 videos but you are not seeing the results or your videos are not getting traction, there are only 3 things you can do:
- Give up and quit.
- Keep trying and keep publishing more videos.
- Or improve your strategy, try different videos, use different styles, etc.
The point is, you can keep trying, but if you are still not getting the success you want, then you should your way or your approach isn’t working, and you need to change that.
And that’s how you create results and achieve the success you want in life.
If you need to understand better, read this: Ultimate Success Formula: How to Achieve What You Want in Life
9. Trust and Believe in Yourself
Do you believe in yourself? Do you trust that you have the ability to achieve the success you desire and that the success you want is possible? Because if you don’t, nobody else would.
The first fundamental principle to success is to say that you can. You want to create a strong belief within yourself that success is within your reach.
If you don’t believe you can do it, you will never do it. Even if you did do it, you will never do it with 100% commitment. Why? Because you don’t believe it, so why give it 100%, right?
This is like if you go into a relationship without 100% confidence. You will doubt yourself. You will doubt your partners. You won’t give your best because you doubt yourself. Eventually, the relationship will fall.
The same goes for everything you want to achieve in life. If you want to succeed, you must give it your best. You must do it with your whole heart, not half. And to do that, you need to trust and believe in yourself.
Read: How to Believe in Yourself to Achieve Your Goals and Dreams
10. Your Optimism
Finally, the last thing you need to succeed in life is to be optimistic. I know, this is very general advice, but it is something important that most people lack.
We all know it is important to think positive, but the question is, are you doing it?
And when I say positive thinking, I’m not referring to those ‘rah-rah’ or shouting to keep yourself motivated and positive. Instead, I’m referring to being optimistic, meaning, looking at things as it is and understand that you have the ability to change things.
A lot of people think negative because they look at things as they are fixed. They believe that that’s all there is to life. And if they are not successful, there’s nothing they can do about it.
On the other hand, optimistic people understand that things can still go bad. Negative stuff can still happen, but they look at it with an open eye and an open heart. They believe that things are not going to be that way forever. And if they don’t like it, they can change.
They know they are responsible for their lives, and hence, they understand that success is created through them.
And that’s the kind of optimism you want to develop.
Check this out: How to Stay Positive No Matter What Happens in Life
Conclusion
These are the 10 things you need to be successful in life and everything you do. I believe that we all can learn and develop these 10 prerequisites to help us prepare for the success we want in life.
If you want to discover more about success and to truly unleash your inner potential, I suggest you take this training from John Assaraf: Unstoppable Success.
Before you go, let me know what you think about these 10 requirements for success above. Do you agree with my list?
Leave your comment below to let me know.
I keep reading all your writings and it inspired me more to set everything for myself. I am also using these learnings to inspire my clients to better themselves and get to where they wanted to be.
Thank you. Continue inspiring us with your wisdom.
Hello, cheers. That’s great, and yeah, spend time for yourself, planning, and always know your direction. 🙂