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a bias toward action
They knew that hoping to achieve good things without taking action is like hoping for help without asking for it.
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We’re less courageous as a society today because we avoid struggle, and that decision leaves us with underdeveloped character and strength—two key ingredients for courage.
We’ll have to stop getting so annoyed and start seeing the struggle as part of growing our character. We must learn to honor the struggle.
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To achieve excellence requires hard work, discipline, routines that can become boring, the continual frustrations that accompany learning, adversities that test every measure of our heart and soul, and, above all, courage.
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When we learn to see struggle as a necessary, important, and positive part of our journey, then we can find true peace and personal power.
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Talk to them about difficult times in their past, when circumstances forced them out of their comfort zones to perform, grow, or win, and they’ll speak of those times with reverence, not dread.
Look the problem in the eye and ask, “What is the next right action for me to take right now?” If you aren’t yet ready to take that action, plan. Study. Prepare yourself for when the fog lifts and you are called to lead.
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You have to deal with it, face it, and will yourself to persevere and rise. You have to embrace the suck.
But for anyone who doubts or diminishes you, forget about it. Don’t bother trying to please them. Live a life that is yours. Don’t seek the approval of the doubters. You’ll find no lasting joy in seeking acknowledgment from others. If it comes, it’ll never be enough. So the only path left is to express your own truth and pursue your own dreams.
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that I hope you meet with judgment and friction. It’s a sign you’re on your own path and aiming for great things. Indeed, if no one has looked at you sideways lately or, better yet, said, “Who do you think you are? What, are you crazy? Are you sure that’s a good idea?” then maybe you’re not living boldly enough.
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“My friend, if you’re ashamed of the truth, then you’ve yet to find the truth.”
No one wants to be in connection with a fake person.
How would you feel if you were in a relationship with someone for five years, and out of nowhere they said to you, “You don’t know the real me. I haven’t been honest with you. All this time, I’ve been holding back my real dreams from you. Because I was scared of you or I thought you were too small-minded to handle it.”
No one can quiet you without your permission. No one can minimize your self-image but you. And no one can open you up and release your full power but you.
Worse, it will prevent the right people from coming into your life.
The people who are in your life for the right reasons will listen to your truth. They’ll applaud your ambition. They’ll be happy to meet the person behind the face. They’ll thank you for sharing, for being real, for trusting them. Trust others with your truth, and the golden values of real friendship and love reveal themselves like lost treasures.
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“I don’t know what your destiny will be, but one thing I know: The only ones among you who will be really happy are those who will have sought and found how to serve.” —Albert Schweitzer
From that moment, I decided to follow my dreams with more focus and intensity. I was not going to waste my days meandering about, lost in distractions.
I decided not to worry about the critics and instead give my whole heart and effort to those who wanted positivity and progress in life.
The kinds of courageous acts that you are proud of at the end of your life are those in which you faced uncertainty and real risk, with real stakes, when doing something for a cause or person beyond yourself, without any assurance of safety, reward, or success.
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“When was a time you had an initial period of success—say, three to five years—then suddenly failed?”
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When high performers rose back up, the habits in this book were the vehicle for that ascension.
Motivation was not the issue.
The real traps are internal—negative patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaving that slowly kill our humanity, zest, and well-being. The traps are superiority, dissatisfaction, and neglect. If you’re going to maintain high performance, you need to maintain your high performance habits and avoid these three traps.
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“There are two kinds of pride, both good and bad. ‘Good pride’ represents our dignity and self-respect. ‘Bad pride’ is the deadly sin of superiority that reeks of conceit and arrogance.” —John Maxwell
When you are succeeding beyond others, it’s easy to get a big head. You can begin to think you’re special, separate from, better than, or more important than other people.
When any of these realities is a constant in your life, you’ve begun the decline, even if you don’t know it yet. What these thoughts have in common is a sense of separateness. You just feel so much more capable or accomplished than others that, in your mind, there is you at the top and then everyone else.
It’s this separateness that fueled Don’s belief that “it’s lonely at the top.” Yet Don isn’t alone. A lot of people believe this bizarre idea.
Their lack of understanding only grows in your silence.
They understand they’re still students of life, and no matter how stellar their success, they feel that they’re just a few steps in on the path of mastery. This is a widely held attitude with the top scorers of our assessments whom I interviewed.
That’s why I often have to remind the superior minded: You are not better than anyone.
These things are not inherent to who you are. These things, if given to another person, would help them rise to your level.
The myth of the naturally superior human has been deconstructed and obliterated by research across dozens of fields.3
condescending
You know that your mind has tipped into condescension the moment you start hearing yourself say, “What’s wrong with these idiots?”
Superior-minded people are certain they are better, more capable, more deserving.4 And it’s that certainty that closes their minds to learning, connection with others, and, ultimately, growth.
If you can’t hire someone, find a mentor and call or meet with them at least twice each month. Consistency in receiving feedback is the hallmark of consistent growth.
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Ultimately, the dark, exhausting, negative emotional prison that is constant dissatisfaction saps performance. Perennial dissatisfaction is the first step on the path to misery.
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the kicker is that no matter what you do or what you achieve, you’ll always be dissatisfied. It’s a miserable loop to be caught in, and that’s why, as the research shows, it is often related to depression.
When you can be in the moment and satisfied with what you’re doing, you can access greater flow and potential. People around you will enjoy and appreciate and recommend you more. Soon, in the place of all that dissatisfaction will be a sense of real connection and play, and when that happens, you’ll reach an entirely new level of mastery and performance.
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Start noticing what’s going well, appreciate your blessings, enjoy the journey, and record your wins.
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Get your family or team together once a week for no other reason than to talk about what’s working, what people are excited about, what difference your efforts are making in real people’s lives.
you are so focused in one area that you are completely unaware of the growing problems in another.
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going for too much, too fast, in too many domains.
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When you’re good, you want to take on more. But beware the impulse.
It also means saying no to the good things that would stretch your day too far.
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can’t think just about how flashy something is this month. You have to be executing against a plan—your five moves—that’s already in place for the next several months. If the new thing you want to commit to doesn’t strategically move you toward your end goals, it must be delayed.
The culprits that steal your success are not lack of values or intelligence. The culprits are ultimately allocations of attention. You feel separate from others, so you stop paying attention to feedback, diverse viewpoints, new ways of doing things. You get so good that you start noticing only what’s wrong, and a constant state of disappointment drains your passion. You rationalize neglecting one area of life so you can get ahead, saying it will be “worth it,” so you stop focusing on what really matters in life. None of these things has to be your reality.
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