Top 3 Habits of Successful People

Successful people are people who know how to bounce back from setbacks. They believe they can cope when life doesn’t go their way. And because they keep going even when it gets hard, eventually that pays off, and they experience success. If you’d like to steal their secrets and start creating your own success, here’s how to do it.

Know Your ‘Why’

The first key to being successful is to believe strongly in what you are doing. Anyone at the top of their field has this attitude. That they will do whatever it takes –stay longer, train harder, sleep less, risk more – to pursue what matters to them. They don’t see pain or failure as a sign that says stop: they see it as a sign that says ‘put even more into this.’

The way to get that is to figure out the kind of person you are. What matters to you? Allow yourself time and space to think about what you think makes a life well lived. Find at least one thing you’re willing to chase, no matter if you’re ever ‘successful’ at it or not, because it feels important. Finding that thing will not only give your life meaning and purpose, it’ll give you the greatest chance of succeeding too.

When you know where you’re headed and why, then you are powerful. You will become strong from pursuing what matters to you and your belief in your why turns setbacks into opportunities to learn, grow and improve.

Successful People Have a Plan

Author Liz Gilbert writes that when she used to receive a rejection letter for one of her short stories, she would do the following: Read the rejection letter, detach her copy of her story from it, and then straight away put the story in another envelope to go to another publisher.

If you get rejected, how can you get back up again, fast? By having a plan on how to pursue what matters to you, even if the world doesn’t co-operate all the time. Once you have a plan, follow it. Start with item one on the list. Once you complete that item, move onto the next. Straight away. No matter what. Like Liz, for every rejection you get or problem you encounter, you fire back with another action designed to move you forward. Every time you eat unhealthily, you do an extra workout. Every time you’re rejected by a date, you call up two more people for dates next week. Treat rejection or failure as an expected part of your plan, not a sign that you’re heading in the wrong direction.

Successful People Stick to the Plan

When you know what you’re after in life, you’re less likely to be pushed around by life or circumstances or other people. You’ll be able to keep going no matter what’s thrown at you: no matter how you feel, what negative thoughts creep in, what others say, what circumstances arise. Sure, they’ll knock you around temporarily, but you just keep getting back up. You learn from your mistakes. And you just keep going.

Once you get used to this idea, you’ll become unstoppable. After all, a setback makes us feel temporarily powerless. By having a plan and sticking to it, you take your power back. It’s a way of saying to yourself ‘I’m still in charge.’

So once you know what you want, don’t give up on it. Change your tactics, your methods, your approach, but never stop shooting for what you want. Success is getting up one more time than you’re knocked down.