First time around, Michael didn’t make it on his high school team. Teachers felt Albert, probably, wouldn’t amount to much, since he’d space out in class and didn’t learn to speak until he was 4. Richard, born dyslexic, always had to work extra hard to do just as well as everyone else.
Most people are familiar with Richard Branson, Albert Einstein, and Michael Jordan. Most people, however, have yet to realize that the successful people of the world (Steve Jobs, Theodore Roosevelt, Oprah Winfrey, etc.) have several good habits in common.
There are common threads that contribute to success. What are they?
The following consists of only 7 good habits, but if you use the principles and skills outlined throughout this site, you can learn at least one, and that is enough to change your life.
Remember though: you don’t need to do everything at once to develop good habits; just the absolute minimum to hit a threshold (or as Tim Ferris calls it: the minimum effective dose).
1. Reading Habits
During his presidency, Theodore Roosevelt, would read a book a day. On “slow days,” he read 2 or 3. Steve Pavlina- world renowned blogger,consultant, and creator of the highest trafficked blog in the world- claims to have read over 1,000 books on personal development. Lincoln would pass the time reading books on rhetoric, psychology, law, and justice.
One of the easiest methods for thinking like a successful person is to read their thoughts.
If you hate reading- change that frame. Sure…you may accomplish your goals but why make it more difficult, and why would anyone choose to reduce their chances dramatically?
If you follow the minimum absolute threshold, you can establish the habit of reading, almost effortlessly. I did, and,now, I enjoy reading 3 or 4 books a month!
2. The Habit of Focus
Your capacity to focus is a muscle that needs training. You are born with a particular temperament. Some people are much calmer than others. Some people are more focused.
Focus is the ability to say no.- Steve Jobs
Focus, however, can be developed in at least 2 ways.
One way to focus on good habits (or anything) is to trim off the fat. Eliminate distractions, and focus on the 20 percent of things in life that give you 80 percent of the results.
Pareto Principle
The Pareto principle is simple and can help you keep good habits and eliminate bad habits.
- 20 percent of the things you do, create 80 percent of the results.
- 80 percent of the fitness you gain, comes from 20 percent of your effort.
- 80 percent of your happiest moments, involve 20 percent of the people in your life.
The 80/20 rule is also applicable in the NBA. The following stats are from Stumbling on Wins in Basketball.
From 1977-78 to 2007-08, 90% of all wins produced in the NBA came from 22.6 % of all player season observations. To apply this analysis of a typical NBA team, let’s start with the fact that the average NBA team employs about 16 players. Following the Pareto Principle, this means 80% of a team’s wins are generally produced by about three players. – Stumbling on Wins in Basketball
3. The Habit of Meditation
Did you notice I said there are 2 ways to improve your focus? Meditation is the second method.
There are so many benefits to meditation and ways to meditate that are covered on Habit Transformation already, but lets summarize:
When you meditate, you train your mind to focus on good habits and not bounce back and forth between thoughts of insecurity, doubt, pain, or anything that slows down your success. You don’t need beads or a beard to meditate: people like Russell Simmons, Hugh Jackmann and Oprah Winfrey meditate.
Meditation is an Exponential Habit- it is something that if you learn to do, will affect all areas of your life. (Actually, every one of these good habits is an exponential habit.)
(Bonus: here is a list of other famous entrepreneurs that meditate )
4. Carry a Notebook
Comparatively, more ideas die before they are born, simply because the parent of them fails to reproduce them, by writing them down. The mind’s memory is unlimited, but your ability to encode or decode ideas is limited by how much time you put into learning, memorizing, etc.
Easiest habit to develop to lower this sticking point is to write things down. You lower the amount of RAM (random access memory) that your attention span has to use in the moment, so your thinking will flow better.
(Bonus: want to know what kind of things these people put into their notebooks? Check out this excellent article-and note the overlapping of the other good habits.)
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