The Success Principles by Canfield

Ref: Jack Canfield (2025). The Success Principles. Mariner Books (Originally published in 2005).

Resources: https://www.jackcanfield.com/tsp-resources

Training: https://www.canfieldtrainings.com

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Summary

• This is a book of timeless principles used by successful men and women throughout history. These principles and techniques have not only worked for me but they have also helped hundreds of thousands of my students achieve breakthrough success in their careers, greater wealth in their finances, greater aliveness and joy in their relationships, and greater happiness and fulfillment in their lives. 

• Work through each principle one at a time, in the order they are presented- take 100% responsibility for your life and your success, clarify your life purpose, decide what you want, set specific and measurable goals for all the parts of your personal vision, break them down into specific action steps you can take, create affirmations for each one of your goals, and begin the practice of visualizing your completed goals every day. If you’re smart, you’ll also enroll someone to be your accountability partner, or you’ll start a mastermind group to do these first steps with you.

• Pay the price by doing whatever it takes, ask for whatever you need with no expectation or fear of rejection, ask for and respond to feedback, commit to never-ending improvement, and persist in the face of whatever obstacles may come up. Anything valuable takes time.

• One of the most pervasive myths in the American culture today is that we are entitled to a great life- that somehow, somewhere, someone (certainly not us) is responsible for filling our lives with continual happiness, exciting career options, nurturing family time, and blissful personal relationships simply because we exist. But the real truth—and the one lesson this whole book is based on—is that there is only one person responsible for the quality of the life you live. That person is you. 

• THE PRINCIPLES IN THIS BOOK ALWAYS WORK IF YOU ALWAYS WORK THE PRINCIPLES 

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Introduction 

• Part I, “The Fundamentals of Success,” consists of 25 chapters that contain the absolute basics you must do to get from where you are to where you want to be. 

• Part II, “Transform Yourself for Success,” addresses the important inner work you’ll need to do—work that will help you remove any mental and emotional blocks you may have to success. 

• Part III, “Build Your Success Team,” reveals how to build different kinds of support teams so you can spend your time focusing exclusively on your core genius. 

• Part IV, “Create Successful Relationships,” teaches a number of principles, as well as some very practical techniques, for building and maintaining successful relationships. 

• Part V, “Success and Money,” teaches how to develop a more positive money consciousness, how to ensure that you have plenty of money to live the lifestyle you want, both now and after you retire, and the importance of tithing and service in guaranteeing your financial success. 

• Part VI, “Success in the Digital Age,” discusses the technological principles that successful people follow.

• Like many of my past students and clients, you, too, may find yourself resisting taking some of the suggested action steps. But my experience has shown that the ones you most resist are the ones you most need to embrace. 

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---Part One The Fundamentals of Success---

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Principle 1 Take 100% Responsibility for Your Life

• If you want to be successful, you have to take 100% responsibility for everything that you experience in your life. This includes the level of your achievements, the results you produce, the quality of your relationships, the state of your health and physical fitness, your income, your debts, your feelings- everything!

• Stop looking outside yourself for the answers to why you haven’t created the life and results you want, for it is you who creates the quality of the life you lead and the results you produce. 

• Taking 100% responsibility means you acknowledge that you create everything that happens to you. It means you understand that you are the cause of all of your experiences…Something doesn’t turn out as planned, you will ask yourself, How did I create that? What was I thinking? What were my beliefs? What did I say or not say? What did I do or not do to create that result? How did I get the other person to act that way? What do I need to do differently next time to get the result I want? 

• E + R = O (Event + Response = Outcome): Every outcome you experience in life (whether it is success or failure, wealth or poverty, health or illness, intimacy or estrangement, joy or frustration) is the result of how you have responded to an earlier event or events in your life…If you don’t like the outcomes you are currently getting, there are two basic choices you can make. You can blame the event (E) for your lack of results (O) or you can instead simply change your responses (R) to the events (E) until you get the outcomes (O) you want. 

• Everything you think, say, and do needs to become intentional and aligned with your purpose, your values, and your goals. 

• You have control over only three things in your life- the thoughts you think, the images you visualize, and the actions you take (your behavior). How you use these three things determines everything you experience. 

• IF YOU KEEP ON DOING WHAT YOU’VE ALWAYS DONE, YOU’LL KEEP ON GETTING WHAT YOU’VE ALWAYS GOT.

• YOU HAVE TO GIVE UP BLAMING. YOU HAVE TO GIVE UP COMPLAINING. Complaining is an ineffective response to an event that does not produce a better outcome…Learn to replace complaining with making requests and taking action that will achieve your desired outcomes. 

• You have to be willing to pay attention to what you are doing and to the results you are producing. You have to ask yourself, your family, your friends, your colleagues, your managers, your teachers, your coaches, and your clients for feedback. “Is what I’m doing working? Could I be doing it better? Is there something more I should be doing that I am not? Is there something I am doing that I should stop doing? How do you see me limiting myself?” Do more of what is working, do less of what isn’t, and try on new behaviors to see if they produce better results. 

• Be ruthlessly honest with yourself. Take your own inventory. 

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Principle 2 Be Clear Why You’re Here

• “Decide upon your major definite purpose in life and then organize all your activities around it” -Brian Tracy.

• Without a purpose in life, it’s easy to get sidetracked on your life’s journey. It’s easy to wander and drift, accomplishing little. With a purpose, everything in life seems to fall into place. To be “on purpose” means you’re doing what you love to do, doing what you’re good at, and accomplishing what’s important to you…The things that bring you the greatest joy are in alignment with your purpose. 

• Make a list of the times you have felt most joyful and alive. What are the common elements of these experiences? Can you figure out a way to make a living doing these things? 

• THE LIFE PURPOSE EXERCISE: List two of your unique personal qualities, such as enthusiasm and creativity. List one or two ways you enjoy expressing those qualities when interacting with others, such as to support and to inspire. 

• Assume the world is perfect. What does this world look like? How is everyone interacting with everyone else? What does it feel like? Write your answer as a statement, in the present tense, describing the ultimate condition, the perfect world as you see it and feel it. EXAMPLE: Everyone is freely expressing their own unique talents. Everyone is working in harmony. Everyone is expressing love…Combine the three prior subdivisions of this paragraph into a single statement. EXAMPLE: My purpose is to use my creativity and enthusiasm to support and inspire others to freely express their talents in a harmonious and loving way.

• Once you have determined and written down your life purpose, read it every day, preferably in the morning. 

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Principle 3 Decide What You Want

• If you are going to re-own your power and get what you really want out of life, you will have to stop saying, “I don’t know; I don’t care; it doesn’t matter to me”. When you are confronted with a choice, no matter how small or insignificant, act as if you have a preference. Ask yourself, If I did know, what would it be? If I did care, which would I prefer? If it did matter, what would I rather do? 

• MAKE AN “I WANT” LIST. One of the easiest ways to begin clarifying what you truly want is to make a list of 30 things you want to do, 30 things you want to have, and 30 things you want to be before you die…Make a list of 20 things you love to do, and then think of ways you can make a living doing some of those things. 

• To create a balanced and successful life, your vision needs to include the following seven areas: work and career, finances, recreation and free time, health and fitness, relationships, personal goals, and contribution to the larger community. 

• Ideal Life Exercise: Ask yourself what your ideal life would like if you could have it exactly the way you wanted it. 

• Financial: What is your ideal annual income and monthly cash flow? How much money do you have in savings and investments? What is your total net worth? 

• Home: What does your home look like? Where is it located? Does it have a view? What kind of yard and landscaping does it have? Is there a pool or a stable for horses? What does the furniture look like? Are there paintings hanging in the rooms? Walk through your perfect house, filling in all of the details. 

• Car: What kind of car you are driving and any other important possessions your finances have provided. 

• Career: Where are you working? What are you doing? With whom are you working? What kind of clients or customers do you have? What is your compensation like? Is it your own business? 

• Free Time: What are you doing with your family and friends in the free time you’ve created for yourself? What hobbies are you pursuing? What kinds of vacations do you take? What do you do for fun?

• Vision: What is your ideal vision of your body and your physical health? Are you free of all disease? Are you pain free? How long do you live? Are you open, relaxed, in an ecstatic state of bliss all day long? Are you full of vitality? Are you flexible as well as strong? Do you exercise, eat good food, and drink lots of water? How much do you weigh? 

• Relationships: What is your ideal vision of your relationships with your family and friends. What is your relationship with your spouse and family like? Who are your friends? What do those friendships feel like? Are those relationships loving, supportive, empowering? What kinds of things do you do together? 

• Personal: Do you see yourself going back to school, getting training, attending personal growth workshops, seeking therapy for a past hurt, or growing spiritually? Do you meditate or go on spiritual retreats with your church? Do you want to learn to play an instrument or write your autobiography? Do you want to run a marathon or take an art class? Do you want to travel to other countries? 

• Community: What does it look like when it is operating perfectly? What kinds of community activities take place there? What charitable, philanthropic, or volunteer work? What do you do to help others and make a difference? How often do you participate in these activities? Who are you helping? 

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Principle 4 Believe It’s Possible

• It is wise to question all of your assumptions about how things are done and be open to new possibilities. 

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Principle 5 Believe in Yourself 

• It is your responsibility to take charge of your own self-concept and your beliefs. You must choose to believe that you can do anything you set your mind to- anything at all- because, in fact, you can. 

• Remove “I can’t” from your vocabulary.

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Principle 6 Use the Law of Attraction

• “What you radiate outward in your thoughts, feelings, mental pictures, and words, you attract into your life” -Catherine Ponder.

• You must disregard how things are- as well as how others are seeing you- and give more of your attention to the way you prefer things to be.

• Law of Attraction: What you think about, talk about, believe strongly about, and feel intensely about, you will bring about.

• STEP ONE: ASK FOR WHAT YOU WANT, NOT FOR WHAT YOU DON’T WANT 

• Become more deliberate about what you think and feel. 

• Start intentionally creating your future.

• Replace negative images and thoughts with positive ones. 

• STEP TWO: BELIEVE THAT YOU’LL GET WHAT YOU WANT, THEN TAKE ACTION 

• Many people have limiting beliefs which keep them from allowing abundance and happiness into their lives. If this describes you, realize that you must first change your limiting beliefs into thoughts that you are deserving, worthy, lovable, desirable, and capable- as well as smart enough, strong enough, attractive enough, rich enough, good enough, and “enough” in every other way that matters to you. 

• STEP THREE: RECEIVE WHAT YOU WANT BY BECOMING A VIBRATIONAL MATCH FOR IT 

• Use Affirmations to Create a Vibrational Match 

• Affirmation: A statement of your goal or desire- now realized in present time. 

• The two most powerful feelings for quickly manifesting your goals are appreciation and gratitude. 

• Make a list in your journal of all the things you are grateful for. 

• Rampage of Appreciation: Look around you and gently notice something that pleases you. Hold your attention on it while you think about how wonderful, beautiful, or useful it is. 

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Principle 7 Unleash the Power of Goal-Setting

• Whatever goal you give to your subconscious mind, it will work night and day to achieve. 

• Three essential success principles: (1) write down your goals; (2) make a public declaration of your goals; and (3) be accountable to another person.

• Your goals must include two criteria: how much (some measurable quantity such as pages, pounds, dollars, square feet, or points) and by when (a specific time and date). 

• Set a breakthrough goal that would represent a quantum leap for you and your career. 

• REREAD YOUR GOALS THREE TIMES A DAY. Take time to read your list of goals. Read the list (out loud with passion and enthusiasm) one goal at a time. Close your eyes and picture each goal as if it were already accomplished. 

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Principle 8 Chunk It Down

• Chunking: Breaking down a large goal into smaller tasks- and accomplishing them one at a time. 

• Get used to asking, “Can you tell me how to … ?” and “What would I have to do to … ?” and “How did you … ?”

• Mind-Mapping: Center circle: In the center circle, jot down the name of your stated goal—in this case, Create an Educational Audio Program. Outside circles: Next, divide the goal into the major categories of tasks you’ll need to accomplish to achieve the greater goal—in this case, Title, Studio, Topics, Audience, and so on. Spokes: Then, draw spokes radiating outward from each minicircle and label each one (such as Write Copy, Color Picture for Back Cover, and Arrange Lunch). On a separate line connected to the minicircle, write every single step you’ll need to take. Break down each one of the more detailed task spokes with action items to help you create your master to-do list. 

• In his excellent book, Eat That Frog! 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time, Brian Tracy reveals not just how to conquer procrastination but also how to prioritize and complete all of your action items. In his unique system, Brian advises goal-setters to identify the one to five things you must accomplish on any given day, and then pick the one you absolutely must do first. This becomes your biggest and ugliest frog. If you know you have to eat a big ugly frog before the end of the day, you don’t want to spend the whole day dreading eating it. The simplest thing is to eat it first and get it over with. He then suggests you accomplish that most important task first—in essence, eat that frog first—and, by so doing, make the rest of your day much, much easier. 

• Plan your next day the night before. 

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Principle 9 Success Leaves Clues

• For virtually everything you want to do, there are books and courses on how to do it. Better yet, just a phone call away are people who’ve already successfully done what you want to do and who are available as teachers, facilitators, mentors, advisors, coaches, and consultants. 

• Three ways you can begin to seek out clues: (1) Seek out a teacher, coach, mentor; a manual, book, audio program, or an Internet resource to help you achieve one of your major goals. (2) Seek out someone who has already done what you want to do, and ask the person if you can interview him or her on how you should proceed. (3) Ask someone if you can shadow them for a day and watch them work. Or offer to be a volunteer, assistant, or intern for someone you can learn from. 

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Principle 10 Release the Brakes

• Most people drive through life with their psychological emergency brake on. They hold on to negative images about themselves or suffer the mental and emotional effects of powerful experiences they haven’t yet resolved and released. They stay in a comfort zone entirely of their own making. They maintain inaccurate beliefs about reality or harbor guilt and self-doubt. And when they try to achieve their goals, these negative images and preprogrammed comfort zones always cancel out their good intentions- no matter how hard they try. Successful people, on the other hand, have discovered that instead of using increased willpower as the engine to power their success, it’s simply easier to “release the brakes” by letting go of and replacing their limiting beliefs, by changing their self-images, and by releasing negative emotions like fear, resentment, anger, guilt, and shame. 

• Change your comfort zone. How? 

• 1) Use affirmations and positive self-talk to affirm already having what you want, doing what you want, and being the way you want.

• 2) Create powerful and compelling new internal images of having, doing, and being what you want.

• 3) Use a technique called Tapping Therapy.

• 4) Change your behavior.

• An important concept that successful people understand is that you are never stuck. You just keep re-creating the same experience over and over by thinking the same thoughts, maintaining the same beliefs, speaking the same words, and doing the same things.

• Affirmation: A statement that describes a goal in its already completed state. To create an affirmation, 1) start with the words “I am”; 2) use the present tense; 3) state it in the positive- affirm what you want, not what you don’t want; 4) keep it brief; 5) make it specific; 6) include an action word ending with -ing; 7) include at least one dynamic emotion or feeling word- enjoying, joyfully, happily, celebrating, proudly, calmly, peacefully, delighted, enthusiastic, lovingly, secure, serenely and triumphant; 8) make affirmations for yourself, not others; 9) add “or something better”.

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Principle 11 See What You Want, Get What You See

• “Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life’s coming attractions” -Albert Einstein. 

• Visualization: The act of creating compelling and vivid pictures in your mind. Visualization activates the creative powers of your subconscious mind and focuses your brain by programming its reticular activating system (RAS) to notice available resources that were always there but were previously unnoticed. Visualization, through the Law of Attraction, magnetizes and attracts to you the people, resources, and opportunities you need to achieve your goal.

• To multiply the effect many times over, add sound, smells, tastes, and feelings to your pictures. 

• Eidetic visualizers are people that when they close their eyes, see everything in bright, clear, 3D images. Most of us, however, are noneidetic visualizers, who don’t really see an image as much as just think about it. 

• When you perform any task in real life, your brain uses the same identical processes it would use if you were only vividly visualizing that activity. In other words, your brain sees no difference whatsoever between visualizing something and actually doing it. 

• Reticular Activating System (RAS): At any one time, there are ~11M bits of information streaming into your brain-most of which you cannot attend to, nor do you need to. So, your brain’s RAS filters most of them out, letting into your awareness only those signals that can help you survive and achieve your most important goals. 

• Set aside time each and every day to visualize every one of your goals as already complete. 

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Principle 12 Act As If

• Act as if you are already where you want to be. This means thinking like, dressing like, acting like, and feeling like the person who has already achieved your goal. 

• Successful people exude self-confidence, ask for what they want, and say what they don’t want. They think anything is possible, take risks, and celebrate their successes. They save a portion of their income and share a portion with others. 

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Principle 13 Take Action

• “What we think or what we know or what we believe is, in the end, of little consequence. The only consequence is what we do”- John Ruskin.

• “The world doesn’t pay you for what you know; it pays you for what you do.”

• People get bogged down in analyzing, planning, and organizing when what they really need to do is take action…The one thing that seems to separate winners from losers more than anything else is that winners take action. 

• Some people spend their whole lives waiting for the perfect time to do something. There’s rarely a “perfect” time to do anything. What is important is to just get started.

• “There are three keys to success: 1. Being at the right place at the right time. 2. Knowing you are there. 3. Taking action”- Ray Kroc.

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Principle 14 Just Lean Into It

• Pick an area of your life- career, financial, relationship, health and fitness, recreation, hobby, or contribution- that you would like to explore and just lean into it.

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Principle 15 Experience Your Fear and Take Action Anyway

• Fantasized Experiences Appearing Real (FEAR).

• It is those very things that we are most afraid to do that provide the greatest liberation and growth for us. 

• Make a list of the things you are afraid to do. Now restate each fear using the following format: I want to __, and I scare myself by imagining __. Using some of the same fears listed above, the new format would look like this: I want to ask my boss for a raise, and I scare myself by imagining he would say no and be angry with me for asking.

• A technique that works for relieving fear is to focus on the physical sensations you’re currently feeling- sensations you’re probably just identifying as fear. Next, focus on those feelings you would like to be experiencing instead- courage, self-confidence, calm, joy. Fix these two different impressions firmly in your mind’s eye, then slowly shuttle back and forth between the two, spending about 15 seconds in each one. After a minute or two, the fear will dissipate and you will find yourself in a neutral, centered place.

• If you want to remain calm and peaceful as you go through life, you have to have high intention and low attachment. You do everything you can to create your desired outcomes, and then you let it go.

• “If you can’t, you must, and if you must, you can”- Anthony Robbins.

• “I have lived a long life and had many troubles, most of which never happened”- Mark Twain.

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Principle 16 Be Willing to Pay the Price

• “When you’re not practicing, someone somewhere is. And when the two of you meet, given roughly equal ability, he will win.”

• Not only do top performers practice more than people of average talent, but they spend hours in “deliberate practice.”

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Principle 17 Ask! Ask! Ask!

• “You’ve got to ask. Asking is the world’s most powerful and neglected secret to success and happiness”- Percy Ross. 

• If you are like most people, you may be holding yourself back by not asking for the information, assistance, support, money, and time that you need to fulfill your vision and make your dreams come true. 

• Ask as if you expect to get it. Ask with a positive expectation…Assume you can. Don’t start with the assumption that you can’t get it…Ask someone who can give it to you. Qualify the person. “Who would I have to speak to get . . .” “Who is authorized to make a decision about...

• Be specific. When it comes to money, you need to ask for a specific amount…Don’t say: I want a raise. Do say: I want a raise of $500 a month…When it comes to when you want something done, don’t say “soon” or “whenever it’s convenient.” Give a specific date and time. Don’t say: I want to spend some time with you this weekend. Do say: I would like to go out for dinner and a movie with you on Saturday night. Would that work for you?...When it comes to a behavioral request, be specific. Say exactly what you want the person to do. Don’t say: I want more help around the house. Do say: I want you to wash the dishes every night after dinner and take out the garbage Monday, Wednesday, and Friday nights. 

• Ask repeatedly. One of the most important principles of success is persistence.

• Herbert True, a marketing specialist at Notre Dame University, found that 44% of all salespeople quit trying to sell to a prospect after the first call 24% quit after the second call 14% quit after the third call 12% quit trying to sell their prospect after the fourth call This means that 94% of all salespeople quit by the fourth call. But 60% of all sales are made after the fourth call. This revealing statistic shows that 94% of all salespeople don’t give themselves a chance at 60% of the prospective buyers. 

• Take time now to make a list of the things that you want that you don’t ask for at home, school, or work. Next to each one, write down how you stop yourself from asking. What is your fear? Next, write down what it is costing you not to ask. Then write down what benefit you would get if you were to ask. Take time to make a list of what you need to ask for in each of the following seven goal categories- financial, job and career, fun time and recreation, health and fitness, relationships, personal projects and hobbies, and contribution to the larger community. 

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Principle 18 Reject Rejection

• Some will, some won’t, so what- someone’s waiting (SWSWSWSW): Some people are going to say yes, and some are going to say no. So what! Out there somewhere, someone is waiting for you and your ideas.

• If you’re committed to a cause that evokes your passion and commitment, you keep learning from your experiences, and you stay the course to the end, you will eventually create your desired outcome.

• “Success consists of going from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm”- Winston Churchill. 

• After 26-year-old Nicholas Woodman’s marketing company called FunBug failed in 2002, he decided to travel around the world surfing. In an effort to capture his surfing activities on film, he attached a 35mm camera to the palm of his hand with a rubber band. Seeing that amateur photographers like him, who wanted to capture quality action photos of their activities, had difficulties because they could not get close enough to the action or were unable to purchase quality equipment at affordable prices, he was inspired to found GoPro. His solution was to develop a belt that would attach the camera to the body. He and his future wife financed the business by selling shell necklaces from their car- paying $1.90 in Bali and selling them for $60 in California- eventually combining the proceeds with money borrowed from his mother and father. The original cameras he developed have evolved into a compact waterproof digital camera that supports Wi-Fi, can be remotely controlled, and is affordable to the average action sports enthusiast. In 2004, he made his first big sale when a Japanese company ordered 100 cameras at a sports show. Sales have doubled every year since, and in 2012, GoPro sold 2.3 million cameras. That same year, a Taiwanese contract manufacturer purchased 8.88% of the company for $200M, which set the market value of the company at $2.25B, making Woodman, who owned the majority of the stock, a billionaire at the age of 38.

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Principle 19 Use Feedback to Your Advantage

• Feedback can be negative or positive, however it is simply information.

• Ask as many people as possible the following question: “How do you see me limiting myself?”…Intentionally and actively solicit feedback…Be grateful for the feedback. 

• A magical question that can improve the quality of every relationship you are in, every product you produce, every service you deliver, every meeting you conduct, every class you teach, and every transaction you enter into? Here it is: On a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate the quality of our relationship (service/product) during the last week (two weeks/month/quarter/semester/season)?...Any answer less than a 10 gets this follow-up question: What would it take to make it a 10? EXAMPLE: “How would you rate the quality of our relationship this past week?” “Eight.” “What would it take to make it a ten?” 

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Principle 20 Commit to Constant and Never-Ending Improvement

• Kaizen: The Japanese word for constant and never-ending improvement. 

• Whenever you set out to improve your skills, change your behavior, or better your family life or business, beginning in small, manageable steps gives you a greater chance of long-term success. 

• To keep yourself focused on constant and never-ending improvement, ask yourself every day, “How can I/we improve today? What can I/we do better than before? Where can I learn a new skill or develop a new competency?” 

• “He who stops being better stops being good”- Oliver Cromwell (1599-1658).

• “The secret of your success is found in your daily routine”- John Maxwell. 

• If you were to cut out an hour of watching TV a day, that 365 hrs would add up to 9x 40-hr workweeks. That’s adding an extra 2 months of productive time to your life every year. In 12 yrs, that would equal 2+ years of focused time.

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Principle 21 Keep Score for Success

• “You have to measure what you want more of”- Charles Coonradt.

• Scorekeeping stimulates us to create more of the positive outcomes we’re keeping track of…Decide where you need to keep score in order to manifest your vision and achieve your goals- then post your scores where you and any others playing the game can easily see them. 

• In every business, there is a checklist of goals and targets that- when reached, surpassed, and improved upon- will continually drive revenue and increase profits. These targets are called critical drivers. 

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Principle 22 Practice Persistence

• Persistence is probably the single most common quality of high achievers. They simply refuse to give up. 

• Admiral Robert Peary attempted to reach the North Pole seven times before he made it on try number eight. 

• “We usually overestimate what we think we can accomplish in one year, but we grossly underestimate what we can accomplish in a decade” -Anthony Robbins. 

• One small improvement in your abilities, once a week, would be 52 improvements a year.

• Whenever you confront an obstacle or run into a roadblock, you need to stop and brainstorm three ways to get around, over, or through the block.

• Difficulties are opportunities to better things; they are stepping-stones to greater experience.

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Principle 23 Practice the Rule of 5

• Every day, do five specific things that will move your goal toward completion. 

• “Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out”- Robert Collier.

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Principle 24 Exceed Expectations

• “It’s never crowded along the extra mile”- Wayne Dyer. 

• Instead of focusing on how you can get more, focus on how you can give more. 

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---Part Two Transform Yourself for Success---

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Principle 25 Drop Out of the “Ain’t It Awful” Club . . . and Surround Yourself with Successful People

• “Confidence is contagious. So is lack of confidence”- Vince Lombardi. 

• “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with”- Jim Rohn.

• “Pay any price to stay in the presence of extraordinary people”- Mike Murdock.

• Surround yourself with people who have a positive attitude, a solution-oriented approach to life- people who know that they can accomplish whatever they set out to do.

• “I do not hang around anybody that I don’t want to be with. Period. For me, that’s been a blessing, and I can stay positive. I hang around people who are happy, who are growing, who want to learn, who don’t mind saying sorry or thank you . . . and [are] having a fun time”- John Assaraf. 

• Make a list of everyone you spend time with on a regular basis- your family members, coworkers, neighbors, friends, people in your civic organization, fellow members of your religious group, and so on. When you’ve completed your list, go back and put a minus sign (–) next to those people who are negative and toxic, and a plus sign (+) next to those who are positive and nurturing…Stop spending time with those people with a minus sign next to their name. If that is impossible (and remember, nothing is impossible; it is always a choice), then severely decrease the amount of time you spend with them. You have to free yourself from the negative influence of others. 

• If you are going to be successful, you have to start hanging out with the successful people. You need to ask them to share their success strategies with you. Then try them on and see if they fit for you. Experiment with doing what they do, reading what they read, thinking the way they think, and so on. If these new ways of thinking and behaving work for you, adopt them. If not, drop them, and keep looking and experimenting. 

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Principle 26 Acknowledge Your Positive Past

• There is almost always more emotional intensity around your errors, mistakes, and failures than there is around your successes. Because the brain more easily remembers events that are accompanied by strong emotions, most people underestimate and underappreciate the number of successes they’ve had compared to the number of failures they’ve had. One of the ways to counteract this phenomenon is to focus on and celebrate your successes. 

• Start by dividing your life into three equal time periods- for example, if you are 45 yo, your three time periods would be from birth- 15, 16-30, and 31-45 years. Then list three successes you’ve had for each time period.

• What you see in your environment has a psychological impact on your moods, your attitudes, and your behavior…A valuable technique that will help build your self-esteem and motivate you to greater future success is the practice of surrounding yourself with awards, pictures, and other objects that remind you of your successes. 

• Just before going to bed, stand in front of a mirror and appreciate yourself for all that you have accomplished during the day. Start with a few seconds of looking directly into the eyes of the person in the mirror- your mirror image looking back at you. Then address yourself by name and begin appreciating yourself out loud for the following things: Any achievements- business, financial, educational, personal, physical, spiritual, or emotional. Any personal disciplines you kept- dietary, exercise, reading, meditation, prayer Any temptations that you did not give in to- eating dessert, lying, watching too much TV, staying up too late, drinking too much. Maintain eye contact with yourself throughout the exercise. When you’re finished appreciating yourself, complete the exercise by continuing to look deep into your own eyes and saying, “I love you.” Then stand there for another few seconds to really feel the impact of the experience—as if you were the one in the mirror who had just listened to all of this appreciation. 

• Inside all of us are three distinct and totally separate ego states that work in concert to make up our unique personality. We have a parentlike ego, an adult ego, and a childlike ego who act much the same way that parents, adults, and children do in real life. Your adult ego state is the rational part of yourself. It gathers data and makes logical decisions devoid of emotion. It plans your schedule, balances your checkbook, figures out your taxes, and determines when to rotate your tires. Your parentlike ego tells you to tie your shoes, brush your teeth, eat your vegetables, do your homework, exercise, meet your deadlines, and finish your projects. It has two sides to it. The negative side shows up as your inner critic- the part that judges you when you don’t live up to its standards. The positive side shows up as the nurturing part of yourself that makes sure you’re protected, taken care of, and provided for. It is also the part that validates, appreciates, and acknowledges you for doing a good job. Your childlike ego, on the other hand, does what all children do- it whines, begs for attention, craves hugs, and acts out when it doesn’t get its needs met. 

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Principle 27 Keep Your Eye on the Prize

• Successful people maintain a positive focus in life no matter what is going on around them. They stay focused on their past successes rather than their past failures, and on the next action steps that will get them closer to the fulfillment of their goals rather than on all the other distractions that life presents to them. They are constantly proactive in the pursuit of their chosen objectives. 

• Reading bedtime stories is important for children- not just to get them to fall asleep, but because the repeated messages, lessons, and morals of the story become part of the fabric of the child’s consciousness. 

• THE EVENING REVIEW: Sit with your eyes closed, breathe deeply, and give yourself one of the following directions: Show me where I could have been more effective today. Show me where I could have been more conscious today. Show me where I could have been a better (fill in your profession—manager, teacher, coach, salesperson, etc.) today. Show me where I could have been more loving today. Show me where I could have been more assertive today. Show me where I could have been more (fill in any quality or characteristic) today. 

• Sit calmly in a state of quiet receptivity, you’ll see that a number of events from the day will come to mind. Just observe them without any judgment or self-criticism. When no more events come to mind, take each incident and replay it in your mind the way you would have preferred to have done it had you been more conscious and intentional at the time. 

• CREATE YOUR IDEAL DAY: Visualize the entire day going exactly as you want it. Visualize everyone being there when you call them, every meeting starting and ending on time, all of your priorities being handled, all of your errands being completed with ease, making every sale, and so on. See yourself performing at your best in every situation you will encounter during the next day. This will give your subconscious all night to work on creating ways to make it all happen just as you have visualized it. 

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Principle 28 Clean Up Your Messes and Your Incompletes

• Four Ds. Do it, Delegate it, Delay it, or Dump it: When you pick up a piece of paper, decide then and there whether you’ll ever do anything with it. If not, dump it. If you can take care of it within 10 minutes, do it immediately. If you still want to take care of it yourself, but know it will take longer, delay it by filing it in a folder of things to do later. If you can’t do it yourself or don’t want to take the time, delegate it to someone you trust to accomplish the task. 

• If there’s anything new that you want in your life, you’ve got to make room for it- psychologically as well as physically…Make a list, and then write down how you’ll complete each task. Once you’ve made your list, choose four items and start completing them. Choose those that would immediately free up the most time, energy, or space for you- whether it’s mental space or physical space. 

• Walk through every room of your house, your garage, and all around your property; jot down those things that irritate, annoy, and bother you and then arranging to get each one handled. 

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Principle 29 Complete the Past to Embrace the Future

• Total Truth Process: Conducted verbally or in writing; express the anger, hurt, and fear, and then move toward understanding, forgiveness, and love. The process has six stages. 

• Anger and Resentment: I’m angry that… I’m fed up with… I hate it when… I resent… 

• Hurt: It hurt me when… I feel hurt that… I felt sad when… I feel disappointed about…

• Fear: I was afraid that… I get afraid of you when… I feel scared when… I’m afraid that I…

• Remorse, regret, and accountability: I’m sorry that… I’m sorry for… Please forgive me for… I didn’t mean to…

• Wants: All I ever want(ed)… I want(ed)… I want you to… I deserve…

• Love, compassion, forgiveness, and appreciation: I understand that… I forgive you for… I appreciate… Thank you for… I love you for…

• Total Truth Letter: Write a letter to the person who has upset you, with roughly equal portions of the letter expressing each of the feelings in the Total Truth Process. If the other party is not someone who is likely to agree to cooperate with this process, you may choose to simply throw the letter away once you have completed it. Remember, the main purpose here is to get you free from the unexpressed emotions—not to necessarily change the other person. If the person you are upset with is willing to participate, have him or her write a Total Truth Letter to you, too. Then exchange letters. Both of you should be present when you read the letters. Then discuss the experience. Avoid trying to defend your position. Make an effort to understand where the other person is coming from as you read their letter. 

• Learn whatever lessons there are, forgive the other person, and move on. 

• “Resentment is like drinking poison and then hoping it will kill your enemies”- Nelson Mandela. 

• Forgiving: Acknowledge your anger and resentment. Acknowledge the hurt and pain it created. Acknowledge the fears and self-doubts that it created. Acknowledge any part you may have played in letting the behavior or the event occur or letting it continue. Acknowledge what you were wanting that you didn’t get, and then put yourself in the other person’s shoes and attempt to understand where he or she was coming from at that time, and what needs they were trying to meet- however inelegantly- by their behavior. Let go and forgive the person. 

• All people (including you) are always doing the best they can to meet their basic needs with the awareness, knowledge, skills, and tools they have at the time. If they could have done better, they would have done better. As they develop more awareness of how their behavior affects others, and as they learn more effective and less harmful ways to meet their needs, they will behave in less harmful ways. 

• Tapping (Thought-Field) Therapy (TFT): You can stimulate the instant release of stored emotions by tapping along meridians in acupressure-like fashion while focusing your mind on the past hurt or current stress (phobia, fear, or anxiety). The first part of the tapping protocol is to close your eyes, focus on the fear, anxiety, emotion, pain, or belief that you wish to release, and then determine on a scale of 1 to 10 (10 being high) how intense the feeling or belief is. Tap 5-7x firmly at each point. Accompany each tapping point with a statement that keeps you focused on the emotion. Like this: Top of the Head: I’m afraid to ask for a raise. Eyebrow: I’m afraid to ask for a raise. Outside of Eye: I’m afraid he’ll say no, and I’ll be embarrassed. Under the Eye: I’ll be embarrassed. Under the Nose: I’ll be so embarrassed if he says no. Chin: I’ll be mortified if he says no. Collarbone: I’m afraid to ask for a raise. Under the Arm: I’ll be so embarrassed. 

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Principle 30 Face What Isn’t Working

• Face what isn’t working in your life.

• Yellow Alerts: Those little signals you get that something’s not right.

• Make a list of what isn’t working in your life. Start with the seven major areas where you would normally set goals- financial, career or business, free time or family time, health and appearance, relationships, personal growth, and making a difference. Ask: What’s not working? How can we improve it? What requests can I make? What do you need from me? What do I/we need to do? What action steps can I/we take to get each of these situations to work the way I/we would like? 

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Principle 31 Embrace Change

• When change happens, you can either cooperate with it and learn how to benefit from it or you can resist it and eventually get run over by it. It’s your choice. 

• Cyclical Change: Change we see in the stock market, happens several times a year. 

• Structural Change: Change that occurs when the computer was invented and the Internet was created and both of these technologies completely changed how we live, work, get our news, and make purchases. 

• To help embrace any change, ask yourself the following questions: What’s changing in my life that I’m currently resisting? Why am I resisting that change? What am I afraid of with respect to this change? What am I afraid might happen to me? What’s the payoff for my keeping things the way they are? What’s the cost I’m paying for keeping things the way they are? What benefits might there be in this change? What would I have to do to cooperate with this change? What’s the next step I could take to cooperate with this change? When will I take this next step?

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Principle 32 Transform Your Inner Critic into an Inner Coach

• Your body reacts to your thoughts- changing your temperature, heart rate, blood pressure, breathing rate, muscle tension, and how much your hands sweat. Negative thoughts affect your body negatively- weakening you, making you sweat, and making you uptight. Positive thoughts affect your body in a positive way, making you more relaxed, centered, and alert.

• Automatic Negative Thoughts (ANTs). Learn to stomp the ANTs. First, become aware of them; next you have to shake them off and stomp them by challenging them. Finally, you have to replace them with more positive and affirming thoughts. Common kinds of negative thoughts and how to eliminate them:

• Always-or-Never Thinking: If you think something is always going to happen or you will never get what you want, you are doomed from the outset. When you find yourself thinking always-or-never thoughts, replace them with what is really true.

• Focusing on the Negative: Learn to look for the positive.

• Catastrophic Predicting: In catastrophic predicting, you create the worst possible scenario in your mind and then act as if it were a certainty.

• Mind-Reading: You are mind-reading when you believe you know what another person is thinking even though he or she hasn’t told you. Replace mind-reading with the truth: I don’t know what he is thinking unless I ask him. Maybe he’s just having a bad day. Ask rather than assume you know.

• Guilt-Tripping: Guilt happens when you think words such as should, must, ought to, or have to. As soon as you feel like you should do something, you create an internal resistance to doing it.

• Labeling: Labeling is attaching a negative label to yourself or someone else.

• Personalizing: You personalize when you invest a neutral event with personal meaning. Kevin hasn’t called me back yet. He must be mad at me.

• Redirect your inner voice from one of judgment and criticism to one of correction and support.

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Principle 33 Transcend Your Limiting Beliefs

• A four-step process to transform any limiting belief into an empowering belief: 1) identify a limiting belief that you want to change; 2) determine how the belief limits you; 3) decide how you would rather be, act, or feel; 4) create a turnaround statement that affirms or gives you permission to be, act, or feel this new way.

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Principle 34 Develop Four New Success Habits a Year

• “The individual who wants to reach the top in business must appreciate the might and force of habit. He must be quick to break those habits that can break him- and hasten to adopt those practices that will become the habits that help him achieve the success he desires”- J. Paul Getty. 

• Up to 90% of our behavior is habitual.

• If you want to create higher levels of success, you are going to need to drop some of your habits- not returning phone calls, staying up too late, watching too much TV, making sarcastic comments, eating fast food every day, smoking, being late for appointments, spending more than you earn- and replace them with more productive habits- returning phone calls within 24 hours, getting 8 hours of sleep each day, reading for an hour a day, exercising 4x week, eating healthy food, being on time, and saving 10% of your income.

• “Success is a matter of understanding and religiously practicing specific, simple habits that always lead to success”- Robert Ringer. 

• Your habits determine your outcomes. Successful people don’t just drift to the top. Getting there requires focused action, personal discipline, and lots of energy every day to make things happen.

• One of the problems for people with poor habits is that the results of their bad habits usually don’t show up until much later in life.

• Common Unsuccessful Habits include procrastinating, paying bills at the last minute, not delivering on promised documents and services in a timely way, letting receivables get overdue, arriving late for meetings and appointments, forgetting someone’s name within seconds of being introduced, talking over others’ comments, instead of listening, answering the telephone during family time or spouse time, handling mail more than once, working late, choosing work over time with your children, having fast-food meals more than two days a week.

• If you develop just four new habits a year, five years from now you’ll have 20 new success habits that could bring you all the money you want, the wonderful loving relationships you desire, a healthier, more energized body, plus all sorts of new opportunities.

• If you repeat a behavior for 13 weeks- whether it is meditating for 20 minutes a day, flossing your teeth, reviewing your goals, or writing thank-you letters to your clients- it will be yours for life.

• Put up signs to remind you to follow through on the new behavior. Find an accountability partner. Commit 100%.

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Principle 35 99% Is a Bitch; 100% Is a Breeze

• “There is a difference between interest and commitment. When you’re interested in doing something, you do it only when it’s convenient. When you’re committed to something, you accept no excuses, only results”- Ken Blanchard. 

• In life the spoils of victory go to those who make a 100% commitment to the outcome, to those who have a “no matter what it takes” attitude. They give it their all; they put everything they have into getting their desired result.

• To achieve your goals- commit 100% to those daily disciplines that will get you there.

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Principle 36 Learn More to Earn More

• The average American watches TV and on-demand content an astounding five hours a day.

• ATTEND SUCCESS RALLIES, CONFERENCES, AND RETREATS.

• To learn and grow in life, you need to be teachable, too. You need to let go of already knowing it all, needing to be right and looking good- and open yourself to being a learner.

• If you’re an industry expert and believe your consulting business would skyrocket after presenting a workshop at the national convention, why not get prepared now…by writing your speaker’s kit, joining Toastmasters, outlining and practicing your speech, and getting ready to be on the platform?

• Whatever you need to do to get ready, start now by making a list of the top 10 things you could be doing to be ready when opportunity finds you. Take classes on your own time. Read books. Get new skills. Go to your industry’s trade show. Dress the part. Look like a player before you’re there.

• “If I were to attribute my success to any one thing, it would be the hundreds of personal development seminars I have attended over the past 50 years”- Canfield.

• To stay competitive in today’s world you must focus not only on your own learning and development but also on your team’s development. Make sure that everyone in your organization is constantly learning and growing- or you and your organization will ultimately be left behind.

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Principle 37 Stay Motivated with the Masters

• “A successful person realizes his personal responsibility for self-motivation. He starts with himself because he possesses the key to his own ignition switch”- Kemmons Wilson. 

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Principle 38 Fuel Your Success with Passion and Enthusiasm

• “Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm”- Ralph Waldo Emerson. 

• The word enthusiasm comes from the Greek word entheos, which means “to be filled with God.”

• Enthusiasm and passion come as a result of caring about what you do.

• Imagine that you just won the lottery. After buying your expensive mansion, a Rolls-Royce, and all the toys and travel you wanted, what would you do with your day? What you’re doing now or something different?

• The most successful people I’ve met love what they do so much, they would actually do it for free. But they’re successful because they’ve found a way to make a living doing what they love to do.

• Ask yourself, What is the why underneath what I am doing? If you can get in touch with that, it is a lot easier to get enthusiastic about whatever it is that you have to do. You’ll discover that all of the things you feel like you have to do are really choices that you are making that serve some higher purpose.

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---Part Three Build Your Success Team---

• “Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much”- Hellen Keller.

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Principle 39 Stay Focused on Your Core Genius Success follows doing what

• Core Genius: That one thing you love to do and do so well, you hardly feel like charging people for it. It’s effortless for you and a whole lot of fun. It’s effortless for you and a whole lot of fun. And if you could make money doing it, you’d make it your lifetime’s work. Successful people put their core genius first. They focus on it- and delegate everything else to other people on their team.

• Why is delegating routine tasks and unwanted projects so difficult for most people? Most people are simply afraid to give up control or reluctant to spend the money to pay for help. Deep down, most people simply don’t want to let go. Others- possibly you- have simply fallen into the habit of doing everything themselves. “It’s too time-consuming to explain it to someone,” you say. “I can do it more quickly and better myself anyway.” But can you?

• Delegate tasks once and completely.

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Principle 40 Redefine Time

• The most successful people I know create superior results yet still maintain a balance among work, family, and recreation in their lives.

• Entrepreneurial Time System (Dan Sullivan): Divides all of your time into three kinds of days: Focus Days, Buffer Days, and Free Days.

• Focus Day: A day in which you spend at least 80% of your time operating in your core genius, or primary area of expertise- interacting with people or processes that give you the highest payoffs for the time you invest. To be successful, you must schedule more Focus Days and hold yourself accountable for producing the results. Do whatever you can to increase your number of Focus Days.

• Buffer Day: A day when you prepare and plan for a Focus or Free Day- either by learning a new skill, locating a new resource, training your support team, delegating tasks and projects to others, or traveling to a work site. Buffer Days ensure that your Focus Days are as productive as possible.

• Free Day: Extends from midnight to midnight and involves no work-related activity of any kind. It’s a day completely free of business meetings, business-related phone calls, cell phone calls, e-mails, or reading work-related journals and documents.

• For the most part, you need to take some time away from your children on a regular basis.

• Everyone’s ultimate goal should be 130-150 days off each year.

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Principle 41 Build a Powerful Support Team and Delegate to Them

• Your goal is to find the top one, two, or three activities that best use your core genius, bring you the most money, and produce the greatest level of enjoyment. Start by listing all those activities that occupy your time…whether they’re business-related, personal, or related to your civic organizations or volunteer work. List even small tasks such as returning phone calls, filing, or photocopying. Next, choose from this list those one, two, or three things you are particularly brilliant at, your special and unique talents, those things very few other people can do as well as you. Also choose from this list the three activities that generate the most income for you or your company. Any activities that you are brilliant at and that generate the most income for you or your company are the activities where you’ll want to focus the most time and energy. Finally, create a plan for delegating everything else to other people. Delegating takes time, training, and patience, but over time you can keep chipping away at the low-payoff, nonessential tasks on your list until you are doing less and less of those and more and more of what you are really good at. That is how you create a brilliant career.

• Find trustworthy advisors and build and maintain those relationships over time. Once you determine who members of this support team are, you can begin to build and nurture those relationships. Make sure team members are clear about what you expect from them and that you are clear about what they expect from you. Is this a paid relationship? What kind of working relationship is preferable? How can both of you be there when the other person needs you? How can team members help you grow and succeed?

• Create a schedule of monthly, quarterly, or semiannual meetings with every member of your team.

• “If you don’t have an assistant, you are one”- Raymond Aaron. 

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Principle 42 Just Say No!

• We suffer under project and productivity overload at work- taking on more than we can comfortably deliver in an unconscious desire to impress others, get ahead, and keep up with others’ expectations. Meanwhile, our top priorities go unaddressed.

• Successful people know how to say no without feeling guilty. To them, “No” is a complete sentence.

• Make a “stop doing” list.

• Highly successful people say no all the time- to projects, to crazy deadlines, to questionable priorities, and to other people’s crises. In fact, they view the decision to say no as equally acceptable as the decision to say yes.

• Pareto Principle (‘Law of the Vital Few’): Named after the 19c economist who discovered that 80% of the land in Italy was owned by 20% of the population. Later researchers discovered that 80% of an enterprise’s revenue usually comes from 20% of its customers.

• Instead of dedicating yourself- and your time- to mundane, nonproductive, time-stealing activity, imagine how rapidly you would reach your goals and improve your life if you said no to those time-wasting activities and instead focused on the 20% of activity that would bring you the most benefit.

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Principle 43 Become a Leader Worth Following

• “Leaders are made rather than born”- Warren Bennis. 

• Successful leaders know how to communicate their vision in exciting and compelling terms. They’ve mastered the skill of motivating others to jump on board with full commitment. They recognize potential in their people, coach their team members to go above and beyond, and routinely acknowledge others’ positive contribution.

• Help followers develop and grow into leaders themselves. That’s the true definition of great leadership.

• Leadership Behaviors

• 1) KNOW YOUR OWN STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES

• Knowing your strengths and weaknesses gives you the ability to discern when your skills will add value- or not- and keeps you open to delegating and listening to people with other points of view.

• The key to being self-aware as a leader is your willingness to be wrong, to not know everything, to recognize that you have certain biases, and to see where your opinions may be simply getting in the way.

• 2) HOLD YOURSELF ACCOUNTABLE…AND OTHERS, TOO

• Do you arrive at meetings on time? Do you deliver your part of projects completed and on deadline? Do you abide by promises made to your team members and others? Do you react in the same steady manner to every crisis? Do you soberly consider new opportunities in light of goals your team is already working on? These are the hallmarks of a leader who is responsible and consistent- versus one who is perpetually late, unprepared, emotional or continually led astray by the latest fad.

• Consistency is far more impactful than perfection because it builds integrity and reliability with your team.

• When people on your team are not creating the results you want, you must have the courage to confront what isn’t working and engage the people involved in what can be a difficult and uncomfortable conversation about accountability and getting back on track with the goal.

• 3) INSPIRE YOUR TEAM WITH A CLEAR, COMPELLING, CONTINUOUS VISION

• “The very essence of leadership is that you have to have a vision. It’s got to be a vision you articulate clearly and forcefully on every occasion. You can’t blow an uncertain trumpet”- Rev. Theodore Hesburgh. 

• To inspire others to work tirelessly to help accomplish your goal, you must first have a clear and compelling vision of the future. What will you and your team ultimately achieve? By when? What will everyone gain when the goal is reached? Is it honorable, beneficial, ethical, and uplifting? What’s so compelling about it? What else will also be achieved as your team is striving for this major goal?

• Articulate who your team will become as they learn and grow on the path to achieving your vision. Your team must be able to see themselves in the future as better, smarter, stronger, more valued, and more confident. Defining that outcome- plus other benefits people will experience- is an important part of your clear and compelling vision.

• Your belief in your vision must be unshakable. That means that you must believe it’s not only possible- but also desirable, essential, and inevitable. Be able to tell the story of your vision so convincingly that it captures the imagination, hearts, and hands of others. Your words must communicate the certainty of the goal- which will carry your team when they lose confidence in themselves and the process.

• 4) LISTEN FOR POSSIBILITY 

• Develop your listening skills, you’ll be more present in the moment, you’ll be curious to hear other options, you’ll be able to truly hear what emerges from a discussion, and you’ll be open to a true dialogue with your team- instead of simply delivering orders or explaining the game plan. This requires a willingness to be transformed by what you hear. But more important, it requires you to shift your focus from listening for “the right way or the wrong way” to listening for what is possible.

• Always ask- “What do you think? What would you do? Why?”

• 5) COACH OTHERS TO TAKE A LEADERSHIP ROLE

• “The most essential work of the leader is to create more leaders”- Mary Parker-Follett. 

• How can you coach your people to become leaders in their own right? Start by asking your people to correctly define the problem. This gets them fully engaged in the process and helps them “take ownership” of the problem as one that they need to solve. Studies show that once a problem or challenge is theirs, it will be solved more efficiently and stay solved longer if you allow your team to create the solution. You provide direction only when they have reached the limits of their experience or training. Give people the tools and information they need to solve problems- then let them stretch.

• “Leaders often become overwhelmed by monkeys on their back- that is, projects and problems that don’t belong to them”- Ken Blanchard.

• 6) MAINTAIN AN ATTITUDE OF GRATITUDE

• Whether you are leading a team of executives, athletes, community volunteers, school parents, or family game night, everyone needs to be acknowledged for what they do and who they are.

• Build in systems and rituals to appreciate people more often and more consistently.

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Principle 44 Create a Network of Mentors and Others Who Will Up-Level You

• One of the main strategies of the successful is that they constantly seek out guidance and advice from experts.

• Seek a Mentor: Make a list of specific points you’d like to cover in your first conversation, such as why you’d like them to mentor you and what kind of help you might be looking for. Be brief, but be confident, too.

• Successful people like to share what they have learned with others.

• Service Corps of Retired Executives (SCORE): An extensive, national network of over 10,000 retired and working volunteers providing free business counseling and advice as well as low-cost workshops as a public service to all types of businesses, in all stages of development, from idea to start-up to success.

• Networking is the single most powerful marketing tactic to accelerate and sustain success for any individual or organization…The more time I have spent consciously building and nurturing my network of advisers, colleagues, clients, students, customers, and fans, the more successful I have become…Networking is much more than just meeting people. It is following up and following through and continuing to connect and reconnect over and over again.

• “Your network will determine your net worth”- Jim Bunch.

• Casual-Contact Network: A sort of de facto association based on one or more shared interests.

• Credibility: Being reliable and worthy of someone’s confidence. Credibility grows when appointments are kept, promises are acted upon, facts are verified, and services are rendered.

• “The richest people in the world look for and build networks. Everyone else looks for work”- Robert Kiyosaki.

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Principle 45 Hire a Personal Coach

• A coach will help you clarify your vision and goals, overcome and support you through your fears, keep you focused, confront your unconscious behaviors and old patterns, expect you to do your best, help you live by your values, show you how to earn more while working less, and keep you focused on your core genius…A coach can help you…1) determine your values, vision, mission, purpose, and goals, 2) determine specific action steps to help you achieve those goals, 3) sort through opportunities, 4) maintain focus on your top priorities, 5) achieve greater balance in your life while still accomplishing your business or career goals.

• My coach immediately spotted that I was a perfectionist- something I had always been very proud of. But he helped me to see how my perfectionism was having a very negative effect on me and my performance, and steered me toward something much better: excellence.

• Bestseller Blueprint: An online training course (including some live coaching calls) that provides step-by-step instruction on every aspect of writing, publishing, and marketing your book.

• Coaching for Breakthrough Success: Proven Techniques for Making Impossible Dreams Possible.

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Principle 46 Mastermind Your Way to Success

• “When two or more people coordinate in a spirit of harmony and work toward a definite objective or purpose, they place themselves in position, through the alliance, to absorb power directly from the great storehouse of Infinite Intelligence”- Napoleon Hill.

• Masterminding: A group of five or six people who meet once every week or two for the purpose of problem solving, brainstorming, networking, encouraging, and motivating each other. Choose people who are already where you’d like to be in your life- or who are at least a level above you. Meetings should go for ~60-90 min and be conducted weekly or every other week with all members of the group in attendance.

• Accountability Partner: A partner with which to set goals and hold each other accountable for meeting deadlines, accomplishing goals, and making progress.

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Principle 47 Inquire Within

• “Brain researchers estimate that your unconscious database outweighs the conscious on an order exceeding 10,000,000:1. This database is the source of your hidden, natural genius. In other words, a part of you is much smarter than you are. The wise people regularly consult that smarter part” -Michael Gelb. 

• The regular practice of meditation, including informal meditation- going for a run, sitting outside, watching the ocean, staring at the clouds or the stars, writing in a journal, will help you clear out distractions and teach you to recognize subtle impulses from within.

• “The intellect has little to do on the road to discovery. There comes a leap in consciousness, call it intuition or what you will, and the solution comes to you, and you don’t know how or why”- Albert Einstein. 

• Coherence: A psychophysiological state in which your nervous, cardiovascular, hormonal, and immune systems are all working together efficiently and harmoniously.

• STEPS Heart Focus: Focus your attention in the area of your heart, in the center of your chest. If you prefer, the first couple of times you try it, you can place your hand over the center of your chest to help keep your attention in the heart area. Heart Breathing: As you focus on the area of your heart, breathe deeply but normally and imagine your breath is coming in and going out through your heart area. Continue breathing with ease until you find a natural inner rhythm that feels good to you. Heart Feeling: As you continue to breathe through the area of your heart, recall a positive feeling, a time when you felt good inside, and try to re-experience the feeling. It could be feeling appreciation for the good things in your life, or the love and care you feel for a family member, close friend, or a pet.  Give yourself 3-5 min several times a day to focus on your heart.

• Research in neuroscience indicates that an intuitive insight- or any new idea- not captured within 37 seconds is likely never to be recalled again. It’s not what you think of; it’s what you write down and take action on that counts.

• Mindfulness: Bringing one’s complete attention to the present experience on a moment-to-moment basis.

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---Part Four Create Successful Relationships---

• “Personal relationships are the fertile soil from which all advancement, all success, all achievement in real life grows”- Ben Stein.

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Principle 48 Be Hear Now

• “Listen a hundred times. Ponder a thousand times. Speak once”- Unknown.

• Listening: The art of paying thoughtful attention with a mind toward understanding the complete message being delivered. Unlike simply hearing someone’s words, listening requires maintaining eye contact, watching the person’s body language, asking for clarification, and listening for the unspoken message.

• Start your meetings with just one sentence: ‘The purpose of this meeting is for me to find out from you what you feel is going on in each of your departments, what you feel the breakdowns are, and what you need from me.’ And then you should be quiet and just let them talk and talk and talk until they have totally talked themselves out. If they stop talking, just say, ‘Well, what else?’ and let them talk some more.”

• BE INTERESTED RATHER THAN INTERESTING

• One way people fail to listen carefully is to be too concerned with being interesting themselves, rather than being interested in the person they’re listening to. They believe the route to success is to constantly talk- showing off their expertise or intelligence with their words and comments.

• The best way to establish rapport with people and to win them over to your side is to be truly interested in them, to listen with the intention of really learning about them. When the person feels that you are really interested in getting to know them and their feelings, they will open up to you and share their true feelings with you much more quickly.

• Work to develop an attitude of curiosity. Be curious about other people, what they feel, how they think, how they see the world. What are their hopes, dreams, and fears? What are their aspirations? What obstacles are they facing in their lives? If you want people to cooperate with you, to like you, or to open up to you, you must be interested…in them. Instead of focusing on yourself, start focusing on others. Notice what makes them happy or unhappy.

• Ask yourself a series of four questions: If we were meeting three years from today, what has to have happened during that three-year period for you to feel happy about your progress? What are the biggest dangers you’ll have to face and deal with in order to achieve that progress? What are the biggest opportunities that you have that you would need to focus on and capture to achieve those things? What strengths will you need to reinforce and maximize, and what skills and resources will you need to develop that you don’t currently have in order to capture those opportunities?

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Principle 49 Have a Heart Talk

• Heart Talk: Start by asking people to sit in a circle or around a table. Introduce the basic agreements, which include these: Only the person holding “the heart” is allowed to talk. You don’t judge or criticize what anyone else has said. You pass the heart/object to the left after your turn, or say “I pass” if you have nothing to say. You talk only about how you feel. You keep the information that is shared confidential. Keep passing the heart/object around the circle- multiple times if necessary- to ensure participants have more than one opportunity to share. If you have plenty of time, a Heart Talk completes when the heart makes a complete circle without anyone having something to say.

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Principle 50 Tell the Truth Faster

• “When in doubt, tell the truth”- Mark Twain.

• When we don’t tell the truth, and others don’t tell us the truth, we can’t deal with matters from a basis in reality.

• The three things that most need to be shared are resentments that have built up, the unmet needs and demands that underlie those resentments, and unexpressed appreciations. Underneath all resentments are unfulfilled needs and desires.

• As soon as you start asking yourself the question- “I wonder when would be the best time to tell the truth”, that’s the best time to do so.

• If you need to have a crucial conversation, but stop yourself by saying, I’m afraid of how they’ll react or I don’t know how to begin, realize that the issue you’re failing to address is probably not going to go away- no matter how much you ignore it. In these situations, it’s helpful to have a formula that not only steps you through the conversation but also helps both of you determine a solution. To begin, determine your motivation for having the conversation, whether it’s merely to express yourself and get something off your chest- or to eventually solve a problem. Make sure to schedule enough time to have the conversation. Plan your conversation in advance by crafting a clear message that keeps you on track. Start with the facts of what actually happened or is happening versus the story you may have made up in your head. How will you report the facts of the situation? Be sure to separate the actual facts from the feelings you’ve attached to the situation or the event. After reporting the facts, ask the other person, “How do you see this?” What do they think the impact is? Oftentimes we presuppose or imagine some horrible reaction or consequence without knowing what the other person’s actual experience of the situation is. Ask the other party what they would like to do to resolve the matter- if in fact you are looking for resolution. Sometimes simply expressing yourself might be your goal. If you decide to resolve the issue, agree on and document what actions you will both take, by when you will take them, and how you will follow up with each other.

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Principle 51 Speak with Impeccability

• For most of us, our words are spoken without consciousness. We rarely stop to think about what we are saying. Our thoughts, opinions, judgments, and beliefs roll off our tongues without a care for the damage or the benefits they can produce…Successful people, on the other hand, are the master of their words. They know that if they don’t take dominion over their words, their words will take dominion over them. They’re conscious of the thoughts they think and the words they speak- both about themselves and others.

• To be more successful, speak words that will build self-esteem and self-confidence, build relationships, and build dreams- words of affirmation, encouragement, appreciation, love, acceptance, possibility, and vision.

• To speak with impeccability…means that you speak with intention and with integrity. It means that your words are in alignment with what you say you want to produce- your vision and your dreams.

• Always ask yourself, Is what I am about to say going to advance the cause of my vision, mission, and goals? Will it uplift the hearer? Will it inspire, motivate, and create forward momentum? Will it dissolve fear and create safety and trust? Will it build self-esteem, self-confidence, and a willingness to risk and take action? If not, find words that will, or keep silent.

• Make a commitment to be impeccable in your speech when talking to others. Make an effort to appreciate something about every person you interact with. Look for their positive aspects. Make a commitment to tell the truth, as best you can, in all of your interactions and dealings with others. Make a commitment to do it for one day, then two days in a row, then a whole week. If you falter, start over. Keep building that muscle. Make it the intention of every interaction with others that you uplift them in some small way. Notice how you feel when you do that.

• Prejudice: Prejudging a person before you ever really get a chance to know them.

• Stop gossiping: Change the subject. Say something positive about the other person. Walk away from the conversation. Keep quiet. Clearly state that you no longer want to participate in gossiping about others.

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Principle 52 When in Doubt, Check It Out

• Too many people waste valuable time and precious resources wondering what other people are thinking, intending, or doing. Rather than just asking them for clarification, they make assumptions- usually assuming against themselves- and then make decisions based on those assumptions. Successful people, on the other hand, don’t waste time assuming or wondering. They simply check it out: “I’m wondering if…” or “Would it be okay to…?” or “Are you feeling…?” They are not afraid of rejection, so they ask.

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Principle 53 Practice Uncommon Appreciation

• “There is more hunger for love and appreciation in this world than for bread”- Mother Teresa. 

• A recent management study revealed that 46% of employees leaving a company do so because they feel unappreciated; 61% said their bosses don’t place much importance on them as people, and 88% said they do not receive acknowledgment for the work they do.

• Whether you are an entrepreneur, manager, teacher, parent, coach, or simply a friend, if you want to be successful with other people, you must master the art of appreciation.

• Every year, a management consulting firm conducts a survey with 200 companies on the subject of what motivates employees. When given a list of 10 possible things that would most motivate them, the employees always list appreciation as the number one motivator. When asked to rank-order that same list, the managers and supervisors ranked appreciation number eight. This is a major mismatch.

• These are the three different ways the brain takes in information, and everybody has a dominant type they prefer. Auditory people need to hear it, visual people need to see it, and kinesthetic people need to feel it.

• Five Love Languages

• Words of Affirmation: Telling people how wonderful you think they are, how much you appreciate them and what they do, and sharing words of encouragement expressing your belief in their talents and abilities.

• Quality Time: Being fully present and engaged with someone when you are talking with them or engaging in the activity at hand, no matter how trivial.

• Receiving Gifts: Giving gifts to someone so they feel loved and appreciated.

• Acts of Service: Doing something for someone that makes them feel appreciated.

• Physical Touch: Providing a warm hug, a kiss, snuggling, holding hands, a massage, and sexual intimacy will make them feel most loved.

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Principle 54 Keep Your Agreements

• When you don’t keep your agreements, you pay both external and internal costs. You lose trust, respect, and credibility with others- your family, your friends, your colleagues, and your customers.

• Make only agreements that you intend to keep…Write down all the agreements you make…Communicate any broken agreement at the first appropriate time…Learn to say no more often.

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Principle 55 Be a Class Act

• Strive to become the kind of person who acts with class, who becomes known as a class act, and who attracts other people with class to his or her sphere of influence.

• Class acts establish personal standards of thinking and behavior that are more demanding and exacting than those of conventional society. These standards are consciously chosen, established, and applied…You can do this three ways: (1) Remain imperturbable in the face of chaos. (2) Maintain a calmness that gives courage. Your calmness gives others hope that things will turn out all right. (3) Develop and express the quality of certainty.

• Class acts are in touch with their own humanity, they have a deeper understanding and compassion for the humanity of others. They feel inextricably linked to others, are compassionate about human failures, and are courteous in the midst of conflict.

• Class acts have the ability to transform seemingly insignificant situations into something enjoyable, meaningful, and memorable because of their conscious thinking and actions. They are creators rather than merely consumers, and they constantly enrich the lives of others by introducing greater beauty, significance, uniqueness, and stimulation into every experience.

• Class acts are accountable when others hide; they tell the truth about their failures; and they transform defeats into progress.

• Communicate to people, “You’re special. You count.”

• Have you taken a good look lately at your friends, your colleagues, your partners, clients, and contacts? Are they class acts? If not, consider that disparity as a mirror reflecting your status back to you. Make the decision now to re-create yourself as a class act, and see what kind of people you start attracting. Do fewer things, but do them better. Raise the quality of your attitude and change your behaviors for the better.

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---Part Five Success and Money---

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Principle 56 Develop a Positive Money Consciousness

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Principle 57 You Get What You Focus On

• In life, you get what you focus on.

• I will have a net worth of $__ by the year__. I will earn at least $__by December 31st next year. I will save and invest $__every month. A new financial habit I will develop starting now is__. To become debt free, I will__...

• Calculate and decide exactly how much money you’ll need to live the lifestyle of your dreams. If you don’t know, research how much it would cost you to do and buy everything you want over the course of the next year. This could include rent or mortgage, food, clothes, medical care, automobiles, utilities, education, vacations, recreation, insurance, savings, investments, and philanthropy. For each category, visualize those items or activities in your life, then write down what you would need to spend to get them.

• Charles Schwab suggests that for every $1,000 in monthly income you’ll want during retirement, you’ll need to have $230,000 invested when you stop working.

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Principle 58 Pay Yourself First

• Your future must initially be built on the solid bedrock of a long-term investment plan.

• “Compound interest is the eighth natural wonder of the world and the most powerful thing I have ever encountered”- Albert Einstein.

• Never spend more than you save.

• More than 99% of millionaires are hardworking, methodical savers and investors. These folks typically make their fortune in one of three ways: from entrepreneurship, which accounts for 75% of all the millionaires in the USA; as an executive at a major corporation, about 10% of millionaires; or as a professional practitioner (doctor, lawyer, dentist, certified public accountant, architect). Additionally, about 5% become millionaires through sales and sales consulting…Most US millionaires are regular folks who worked hard, lived within their budgets, saved 10% to 20% of all their income, and invested it back into their businesses, real estate, and the stock market.

• The simplest way to implement the pay-yourself-first plan is to have a plan that’s totally “automatic”- that is, set up so a percentage of your paycheck is automatically deducted and invested as you direct.

• “Know the difference between an asset and a liability and buy assets. Poor and middle class acquire liabilities, but they think they are assets. An asset is something that puts money in my pocket. A liability is something that takes money out of my pocket”- Robert Kiyosaki.

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Principle 59 Master the Spending Game

• “Too many people spend money they haven’t earned, to buy things they don’t want, to impress people they don’t like”- Will Rogers.

• “Ask yourself if what you’re buying is a need or a want. There is a big difference” -Dave Ramsey.

• “That man is richest whose pleasures are the cheapest”- Henry David Thoreau.

• If you can’t seem to curb your spending, try this exercise. Go through every closet, drawer, and cabinet in your house and take out everything you haven’t used in the past year. This includes clothes, shoes, jewelry, utensils, consumer electronics and appliances, blankets, craft supplies, sporting equipment, games, toys, auto accessories, and tools—anything and everything you spent money on but didn’t use in the last year. Gather it all together in one place, such as your living room, family room, or garage. Then add up the price you paid for each and every item.

• Start paying cash for virtually everything.

• Stop borrowing money.

• Don’t get a home equity loan to pay off credit card debt.

• Pay off your smallest debts first.

• Slowly increase your debt payments.

• Pay off your home mortgage and credit cards early.

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Principle 60 To Spend More, First Make More

• There are really only two ways to end up with more money for investing or additional luxuries- either spend less money in the first place or simply make more of it.

• The first step to making more money is to decide how much more you want to make. The second step is to ask yourself, What product, service, or additional value can I deliver to generate that money? What does the world, your employer, your community, fellow businesspeople, fellow students, or your customers need that you could provide? Finally, the third step is simply to develop and deliver that product, service, or extra value.

• Use links to Amazon, which will pay you an affiliate fee, a percentage of every book that is sold through your link.

• Upwork: Links you up with people who are looking to outsource various services.

• The two best resources I know for really understanding and mastering multiple sources of income are Multiple Streams of Income: How to Generate a Lifetime of Unlimited Wealth, second edition, and Multiple Streams of Internet Income: How Ordinary People Make Extraordinary Money Online, both by Robert G. Allen.

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Principle 61 Give More to Get More

• Tithing

• Financial Tithing: Contributing 10% of your gross income to the organization from whence you derive your spiritual guidance or whose philanthropic work you want to support. 

• Time Tithing: Volunteering your time to serve a charity that could use your help.

• “Money is like manure. If you spread it around it does a lot of good. But if you pile it up in one place it stinks like hell” -Junior Murchison. 

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Principle 62 Find a Way to Serve

• Take some time to determine what causes and groups of people are important to you. What issues call out to you?

• One of the keys to success is building a huge network of relationships, and volunteering lets you meet all kinds of people you would never meet otherwise.

• “It is one of the beautiful compensations of this life that no man can sincerely try to help another without helping himself”- Ralph Waldo Emerson.

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---Part Six Success in the Digital Age---

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Principle 63 Master the Technology You Need

• Twenty years from now, computers will be roughly a million times faster, a million times smaller, and a thousand times cheaper than they were when they were first invented. New technologies like 3-D printing, robotics, self-driving cars, nano-materials, artificial intelligence, and computational biology- all considered “exponential technologies” that merge the digital world into the physical world- will enable us to enjoy more abundance by generating more breakthroughs in the next two decades than we have experienced over the last two hundred years. Thousands of high-flying start-ups will be launched, creating millions of new high-paying jobs. In fact, it is likely that humanity will eventually develop the ability to meet and exceed the basic needs of every man, woman, and child on the planet. Planetary abundance is within our grasp.

• Just as with our food- where most of us eat too many calories and calories of no nutritional value- we are consuming too much information, and usually it’s of no real value.

• Develop the habit of asking yourself the question, “Will I definitely use this information for something immediate and important?” If the answer is no on either count, don’t consume it.

• Be more present with the people you’re interacting with.

• Use Cloud Applications to Mirror Your Devices for Safety and Ease of Reinstatement.

• Acknowledge That You Have No Privacy with Digital Materials and Information.

• According to a report by McKinsey, AI has the potential to create an additional $13T in economic activity by 2030, boosting global GDP by about 1.2% annually.

• “You don’t have to worry about AI taking your job, but you do need to worry about someone using AI taking your job”- Peter Diamandis. 

• CastMagic: Takes any content- like podcasts, YouTube videos, or sales calls- and turn it into newsletters, YouTube timestamps, and lead magnets.

• Those who can skillfully apply information, synthesize insights, and combine technology with storytelling and marketing will continue to be the highest value producers- whether as artists, engineers, creators, or innovators.

• Leverage AI as a “Capability Amplifier”.

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Principle 64 Brand Yourself with an Online Persona

• Successful people carefully manage their online persona. They post only information that will contribute positively to the image they present to the world. Even when they are voicing their opinions and bringing their personality to the Internet, they think about the impact it will have. They have mastered the art of appearing competent, authoritative, respected- someone worth listening to- wherever they are found online.

• Steps to create your online person: 

• 1) Decide who you want to be. 

• Start distributing content that positions you as someone who can benefit a potential employer, customer, investor, or donor, or inspire a future mentor, coach, or sponsor.

• Determine the Market You Want to Reach

• Post Regularly; nothing looks worse than having large gaps in your posts. It makes you look inattentive and unprofessional- even though you may have nothing important to say for weeks or months.

• 2) Make sure your online content advances your “brand”.

• WAPO reports that 75% of human-resources professionals are required to research job applicants online- with a whopping 70% having rejected job candidates in the past following such searches. What was their biggest factor in deciding not to hire someone? Provocative photographs posted by the job candidate on their own social networking page or even on the pages of their friends.

• Live Your Brand. Be, think, breathe, and eventually manifest the ideals that you seek.

• Don’t just sign up and lurk around. Get involved in conversations, be genuinely interested in what people do, and help others if you have a fact, contact name, idea, or something else that would be valuable. Contribute to the community, and give before you take.

• Command Positivity. There are a lot of negative, critical, sarcastic, and cynical people online. Don’t be one of them.

• Speak with impeccability, use empowering words when you post, always respect other viewpoints in a controversy, assume that other people have the best intentions (even if they don’t), and be a person of integrity- both online and off.

• Radiate the Energy of Success. Inspire people by sharing your success stories. 

• 3) Monitor your online personal and clean up any negative information. 

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Principle 65 Use Social Media in a Way That Enhances Your Reputation

• How to Engage your Fans on social media

• 1) Use “rich media” in combination with written words. Rich media such as photos and videos are known to get more attention and help your message stand out. Posts of about 100-250 words are recommended, as are lifestyle-type images. Try sharing photos of people living your recommendations or using your product.

• 2) Increase engagement with your posts by creating a two-way conversation between you and your followers. Post a quote, a video, or an idea and ask followers to share their thoughts, feedback or their own stories about what they’ve seen. On my FB Fan Page, a short article will generate 10-20 comments in response, while a cool quote I’ve found or short video from me will inspire over 1,600 comments.

• 3) If you own a business, share discounts and promotions that are exclusive to followers. Always include a clear call-to-action with the exact steps to take to redeem the voucher or coupon or discount code- plus always tell when the promotion will end in order to create a sense of urgency. You can drive readers directly to a page on your website to improve online sales. 

• 4) Provide access to exclusive information.

• 5) Tie your posts to current events or other things that are trending and top-of-mind- including news stories, holidays, and consumer trends. Reply in a timely way to comments on your page. The faster you reply, the more likely fans will engage with you in the future. 

• 6) Plan a calendar of activity- even if it’s just a calendar of those ideas you want to talk about each week or each month. This will help you stay on track with posting on a regular basis, but also ensure that your content is well planned and interesting.

• 7) Write your posts in batches ahead of time and schedule them to be posted at specific times. You can also schedule your posts to appear when most of your fans are online. To find out when this is, visit your Page Insights and go to the posts tab.

• 8) Target posts to specific demographics within your fan base.

• 9) Create posts in such a way that they drive readers to your website.

• 10) Check the performance of individual posts to see where you can improve. You can see what’s working by going to the Page Insights area.

• Authenticity is the key to keeping social media friends, fans, and followers engaged. Be humble- let others talk about you. Never be selling. Protect your reputation so that it’s as golden offline as it is online. Avoid giving out your own political, religious, or medical views- unless your personal branding is based on those subjects.

• Learn how to brag in a way that gets people to cheer you- not envy you. 

• Humblebragging: The annoying technique of telling people how fantastic your life is, while interjecting self-effacing humor or fake “woe is me” claims.

• Don’t engage in online combat over others’ controversial viewpoints, but instead diffuse them using the Feel Felt Found social persuasion technique- “Wow, I totally see why you FEEL that water legislation is a real threat. I FELT concerned for my property values, too! But then I FOUND this article about how we’re not getting the whole story from either corporate interests or our state legislators.

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Principle 66 Use the Exponential Power of Crowdfunding

• When describing yourself or your idea, use simple and clear language that gives an honest and concise portrayal of who you really are, as a real person. Show that your passion is real and worth supporting.

• Communicate on multiple levels your credibility and your expertise.

• Kickstarter: A Kickstarter used by many technology entrepreneurs.

• Indiegogo: A Kickstarter that allows you to raise money for absolutely anything, using an optional “keep what you raise” model in addition to the standard all-or-nothing funding approach.

• GoFundMe: A personal fund-raising website that has helped thousands of people raise millions of dollars for causes like school tuition, sports teams, medical bills, volunteer trips, business ideas, special events, and travel expenses.

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Principle 67 Connect with People Who Can Expand Your Vision

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Misc Quotes

• “You can’t hire someone else to do your push-ups for you”-Jim Rohn.

• “True learning only occurs when you assimilate and apply new information- when there is a change in your behavior.”

• “Successful people experience fear and negativity on a daily basis yet still choose to move forward toward their goals. Negative thoughts, rejection, fear- they’re just part of the process!”

• “Authority is 20% given and 80% taken…so take it!”- Peter Ueberroth.

• “You must take personal responsibility. You cannot change the circumstances, the seasons, or the wind, but you can change yourself”- Jim Rohn.

• “80% of success is showing up”- Woody Allen; “99% of all success in life is following up”- Kent Healy. 

• “All blame is a waste of time. No matter how much fault you find with another, and regardless of how much you blame him, it will not change you” -Wayne Dyer.

• “Your dreams are your real job”- Joyce Spizer.

• “Nothing changes until you do”- Unk.

• “New idea lasts for only about 40 seconds in short-term memory and then it is gone.”

• “The man who complains about the way the ball bounces is likely the one who dropped it” -Lou Holtz.

• “I am looking for a lot of men who have an infinite capacity to not know what can’t be done” -Henry Ford.

• “The greater danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it” -Michelangelo.

• “When you’re 18, you worry about what everybody is thinking of you; when you’re 40, you don’t give a darn what anybody thinks of you; when you’re 60, you realize nobody’s been thinking about you at all” -Dr. Daniel Amen’s 18/40/60 Rule.

• “The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex, overwhelming tasks into small, manageable tasks, and then starting on the first one” -Mark Twain.

• “Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored” -Aldous Huxley.

• “No amount of reading or memorizing will make you successful in life. It is the understanding and application of wise thought that counts”- Bob Proctor. 

• “If you would thoroughly know anything, teach it to others”- Tyron Edwards. 

• “If you think you’re too small to have an impact, try going to bed with a mosquito in the room”- Anita Roddick. 

• “Many people die with their music still in them. Why is this so? Too often it is because they are always getting ready to live. Before they know it, time runs out”- Oliver Wendell Holmes. 

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Terminology

• Docent: A person who acts as a guide, typically on a voluntary basis, in a museum, art gallery, or zoo. 

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Chronology

• 2023: Swift fans spend ~$5B on travel, food, hotels, tourist activities, and other local expenditures while attending her concerts (according to Question Pro). The US Travel Association put that estimate at >$10B (Success Principles by Canfield).

• 14 Oct, 2012: Baumgartner jumps from 127,852 feet (~24 miles) for the highest skydive ever- more than 4 miles higher than Kittinger’s record-breaking jump of 19.5 miles in 1960. With Joe’s help and supported by the Peak Performance Team at Red Bull, Baumgartner broke the records for the highest manned balloon flight, longest jump (9 minutes and 9 seconds), and fastest freefall at 833 mph (1,357.64 km/h), achieving Mach 1.25 and becoming the first person to break the sound barrier outside a vehicle before landing safely in the desert of NM (Success Principles by Canfield).

• 1995: Pierre Omidyar creates eBay to help his fiancée trade PEZ candy dispensers. It soon becomes the world’s largest online auction service (Success Principles by Canfield).

• 1760 : Jethro Tull invents a seed planter that revolutionizes farming, increasing productivity tenfold (Success Principles by Canfield).

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