Good habits can be your shortcut to success

Talent is overrated. Success is all about building good habits and practicing them consistently in all areas of your life.

Of late, there’s much hype about cultivating positive habits, and rightly so. The reason’s not difficult to figure out, though.

Good habits serve you better and are more reliable than willpower when getting things done and achieving long-term goals.

With empowering habits in place, you don’t have to worry about your state of mind or mood. You’re in a position to take action at the appropriate time and get things done when they need to be done without your mind or whims playing spoilsport.

Habits, thus, hold the key to your success in life. If you put in the effort and develop good habits, anything is possible. Like Charles Duhigg said, “There’s nothing you can’t accomplish if you get the habits right.”

Here are the six best habits to build and stick around if you want to be insanely successful.

Read also: 5 unavoidable laws about life

1. Audit your time

Time is the most precious resource that you have, but most people don’t realize it. All they do is complain about how time flies past each day and they’re not able to do what they plan to.

Doing work effectively and productively is critical for success in all areas of life. To get more control over your time, you must know where your time goes daily. For this, get into the habit of tracking your time. People who work at their peak level of productivity regularly engage in monitoring their time closely and actively looking for time drains.

Audit your time by tracking how you spend your day and note where your get carried away and lose sense of time. Be honest with yourself and record every hour of your waking time.

Recording time over several days or weeks will provide sufficient data, which you can then sit down and analyze. Going through the numbers of the log will give you valuable information and provide you with a clear idea of your time drains.

Once you understand where and how you’re wasting time, you’ll be able to plug the loopholes, avoid frittering away time, plan better, and schedule tasks mindfully.

Saving your precious time will increase productivity, keep stress at bay and help maintain a proper work-life balance. You’ll also be able to spend quality time with your loved ones, carve out me-time and do things you love.

2. Work through your problems

Problems are an integral part of anyone’s life. They are stressful because they obstruct the smooth working of your life and jeopardize your plans or threaten to stall your progress.

Simply put, problems are undesirable situations or conditions that are difficult to deal with and prevent you from carrying out your day-to-day tasks effectively.

While fixing problems is challenging, and many ignore or try to dodge their problems, not sorting them out and clearing the obstacles out of your way poses even greater challenges.

Lingering problems can be a source of great distress. Therefore, whether they are work-related or personal issues, get into the habit of addressing them as soon as you identify them.

Dealing with any problem is not as difficult as people make it out to be. As with most other things, there’s a method to it. Problem-solving is indeed a skill that you must master if you want to succeed in life.

Most problems, including the complicated ones, can be easily broken down into smaller parts and dealt with piecemeal.

Your ability to find solutions, figure your way out through perplexing situations, and fix the mess you find yourself in will serve you throughout and help you better your life.

3. Pay attention to small things

Most of your precious time is wasted when you are lost in thoughts and work with a wandering mind.

When you’re zoned out, you operate on autopilot mode and do things mechanically without being aware of them. You are detached from your surroundings and go with the flow.

Such a mental state may be helpful when you’re engaged in a creative pursuit or solving a problem. However, in this spaced-out state, you just go through the motions without really thinking about what you are doing. Hence, you cannot expect to do quality work or learn new things.

There are several reasons for low attention span, ranging from physical exhaustion to mental stress to emotional overwhelm and sleep deprivation. Finding and removing the underlying causes that steal your attention can help you focus better on your work and unburden your mind.

To zone in and pay attention to small things, build the habit of examining closely the process you are involved in and the steps you are taking.

Make conscious efforts to pay attention to what you are doing, why you are doing it, and the outcome of the efforts you are expecting. This will drastically boost your productivity and reduce your chances of making mistakes.

Eliminating the clutter, creating a minimalist environment, and working in a distraction-free space can help you a lot in being attentive while working.

4. Dismiss negative thoughts

The pursuit of success involves facing difficulties and enduring many challenges. You also have to deal with the naysayers who laugh at your goals and demoralize you by calling them pipe dreams.

However, the worst enemy lies within you. Negative thoughts and the non-stop inner chatter create feelings of doubt and make you anxious. Any time you allow them to overpower you, the disempowering thought process can take control over you, shake your confidence, and stop you in your tracks.

If you are serious about achieving your goals, develop the habit of combing your thoughts. Be mindful of your inner dialogue, and red flag all the negative thoughts that cross your mind.

Regular practice of the habit of thought processing, separating the chaff from the grain, and dismissing negative thoughts will enable you to adopt a positive mindset and help you march forward boldly towards your goals.

5. Fix the excuses

To accomplish goals and reach great heights, you need to put in the work and follow through. However, if your mind is not wired to go the hard way, it will offer resistance by making random excuses of all kinds.

Excusing yourself from doing something or taking action by telling yourself false stories is your way of avoiding immediate pain and effort but costs you dearly in the long run.

To avoid following the path of least resistance, build the habit of catching yourself when you have an urge to make an excuse.

Examine what action you need to take and the excuses and justifications your mind is pushing your way. This will help you figure out the space from where the excuse is originating.

Many times you’re unsure of what needs to be done, how to do it or where to start. Lack of clarity breeds disinterest and pushes you to come up with excuses. You might also offer an excuse because you’re tired or bored. A few times, excuses pop up when your actions are not aligned with your values or what you stand for.

Singling out the cause and talking yourself out of lethargy by weighing the pros and cons and reminding yourself of the benefits of taking action will go a long way in beating the negative habit of making excuses.

Read also: 10 qualities of smart people ( highly recommended)

6. Develop big picture thinking

Too often, people get into the nitty-gritty of things and los bye sight of the whole. It’s good to be detail-oriented but knowing what is the context of the matter, where you are headed, what is the outcome you are targeting is equally important.

Delving too deep into the minor details can distract your focus from what’s essential for the desired outcome to paying very close attention to small things, thus sidestepping you.

Highly successful people train themselves to see life in its entirety and never lose sight of the big picture.

To see how your present actions fit into the grand scheme of things, you must step back, give up the myopic view and think long term.

Your life is not divided into watertight compartments. One sphere of personal or work life causes ripples in other areas as well and so there’s a need to cultivate the habit of viewing the bigger picture.

Becoming a big picture person can be of huge benefit to you. You will become more mindful of your choices and decisions, and how they will affect the course of your life. Also, keeping in mind your long-term goals and the results you want will help you bypass the frustration of growing slowly or encountering rough patches.

In Conclusion

Simple every day habits can drastically improve your life. No one knows the importance of positive habits better than the uber successful people who have leveraged their daily habits and routines to accomplish their big goals, which wouldn’t have been otherwise possible.

When you build good habits, you automatically do things that must be done when they must be done, irrespective of your mood, motivation, or state of mind. Habits, therefore, ensure each day is a productive day, and you take action and make some progress towards your goals.

CONTRIBUTED BY Dr. Roopleen

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