We all want to find true success in life, which generally means to both have success in our careers and finances, as well as being happy and content with our lives in lifestyle, relationships and health.
Many who get a lot of material success often finds their lives to be empty at the end of the day, and struggle with happiness.
People that seek only inner fulfillment might get spiritual success, but often are struggling financially.
So let’s just assume you want a good balance of both internal and external success.
For the purpose of this article, I’m going to assume that you already have some goals in mind, and hopefully specific goals.
How To Be Successful In Life: The Four Keys
1) Develop Your Values
When people get too goal oriented, they lack enjoyment in whatever they are doing.
By focusing on living from your values (aka what matters to you) it makes it far easier to enjoy whatever you are doing AND move towards your goals for success.
Yes, goals are important for achievement, but we cannot live from goals, as they come and go quickly with achievement.
Here’s a metaphor to help illustrate how to be successful using values: if life is an ocean and you are a sailboat on the ocean then goals are the destination, then values are your map and compass to get you there to navigate the ocean of life.
Here are some common values of successful people that allow both achievement and contentment.
- Flexibility – the ability to roll with whatever comes your way, especially when challenges arise.
- Assertiveness – knowing how to ask for what you want confidently, but not aggressively. Willing to stand up for yourself when things get rough.
- Openness – being open to new ideas and others input and feedback.
- Collaboration – willing to work with others to achieve goals.
- Courage – whenever fear shows up, the ability to act in spite of it.
- Compassion – ability to understand where others are coming from.
- Ambition – desire and drive to achieve and move things forward, with a sense of hope.
- Accountability – taking responsibility for your actions and not blaming others.
2) Serve Others
This goes hand in hand with the value of collaboration above, but a strong focus on relationships and serving others is required. As human beings, we got to where we are by the help and collaborating with each other.
No one can do it on their own. It also takes the focus off of you, which helps alleviate any fear that might be showing up, especially in achieving big goals or meeting deadlines.
*Beneath your values list, write out how you can serve others and make a difference in the world.
3) Set Specific Goals
It’s very important to have specific and measurable goals when going for success in life. I’ve seen it many times where we set goals that aren’t goals at all, they’re merely desires.
Saying “I want to be happy” or “I want to be rich” isn’t a goal, it’s a wish. Wishes are fine to have and necessary for motivation towards goals, but they aren’t goals themselves.
The best goals are SMART Goals which are specific, measurable, accountable, realistic and time-oriented.
A good example of this would be “I will make five calls to potential new employers by this Friday” or “I will release my kettlebell fitness product on April 30th, 2012.”
The first example is one of a smaller action oriented goals and the second is a bigger goal related to a bigger project.
Either way, getting as specific as possible and using both big and small goal scales helps to get the eagle eye view as well as break down the smaller steps.
Both are important.
*Under your previous two lists, write out specific goals that come from your values and serving others.
4) Take Committed Action
Last and certainly not least, action must be taken to get to your goals and achieve success in life. Brainstorming and creativity are very important, but without action nothing comes to fruition in the real world.
Taking action every day that is based on your values makes action much easier to take, then just to target your goal alone.
*Beneath your previous lists, now write out 5 actions you can take this week as next steps towards your goals.
I hope these tips on how to be successful in life have been valuable to you. I think these three keys are an amazingly powerful combination to bring true success in life.
Of course, this is but a suggested approach. Take what you like and discard the rest.
To find out about success coaching, please check out the Everlution coaching page.
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