Financial Success Comes From Having The Right Mindset
Posted on November 9, 2007
One thing that constantly astounds me about life in this great country is not so much the huge contrast between the rich and poor, but the astounding contrast between the successful and the unsuccessful. Some people seem to achieve great wealth with seemingly little effort, and all too many are unable to survive without the help of others. And this in the wealthiest country the world has ever known!
All people are created equal, or so we are told. Look through the maternity ward window at your local hospital at the newborn babies. Can you tell which of them will be successful? I doubt it. They all look physically much the same and they all have many more brain cells that they will ever use. Which one will be building an empire of wealth and influence, and which one will be standing on a street corner saying, “I’m homeless, can you spare some change?” It’s really hard to tell isn’t it?
Why do some people zoom down the highway of financial success, while others end up as road kill on life’s economic highway? That’s what happens to so many well-meaning, hard working individuals. Sometimes it’s short-sightedness. They spend more money on casino gambling or lottery tickets than it would take to build a safe and secure financial future. Others are so cautious they are afraid to take any risks at all; they want a sure thing. Although their styles are vastly different, the results are often the same � they are rarely able to build wealth and achieve financial security.
Is the willingness to take risks a key to financial success? That sounds right. Most wealthy people will tell stories of the giant risk they took on the way to success. But beware of coming to that conclusion. It’s deceptive because we always hear about the people who successfully take risks, we rarely hear about the thousands who take similar risks and lose. We hear about the $10 million lottery winner, but we don’t hear about the more than 10 million people who risked a dollar and lost while trying to win. It’s not the risks that make you successful; it’s developing a mindset that gives you courage to take informed risks that’s the key.
If you’re not where you want to be financially and you don’t see yourself getting there doing what you’re doing, you’re probably going to have to change the way you think, and change it a great deal. Instead of thinking, “What do I have to do to become rich?” start thinking, “What am I doing wrong that’s keeping me from already being rich?” If you’re not doing well in this country, you’re doing something substantially wrong. The economy in the United States today provides opportunities that people only dreamed about in past centuries. And the incredible thing about America is that the opportunity to build wealth exists for everyone, not just a privileged few. If you’re not financially successful in this country, you’re doing something wrong, and the first step to changing your future is changing the way you think.
Developing the right mindset for financial success is simple, but it does require you to look at life from a different perspective. If you have the ability to anticipate problems and are prepared to deal with them when they arise, you will always enjoy more success that those who are surprised by problems and don’t have a clue what to do when they come up. Everyone has bad things happen at times, but if you learn to realize that there are valuable lessons to be learned from each negative experience, you can turn them into good learning experiences. Some of the best lesson you can learn are what not to do. In fact, a big part of developing a financially successful mindset is learning to distill positive lessons from what appear to be bad experiences.
Here’s a tip! Changing your mindset requires making a commitment to the three Ds of success: Discipline, Dedication and Desire. Discipline is developed by making the small decisions, like getting out of bed when the alarm goes off rather than hitting the snooze button and rolling back over to sleep some more. Dedication comes from making decisions to persevere with a course of action until it is brought to a successful conclusion; in other words by deciding not to be a quitter. Desire is increased by constantly measuring the results of the decisions you make. Are you better off today than you were yesterday? Truly successful people don’t measure themselves against others, they measure themselves against the way they were last week, last month, or last year. They develop a tremendous desire to be better with each passing day.
Ordinary people have achieved tremendous success while other with seemingly more opportunities and more education have faltered. Look around. Pick any field you want and you will see some people developing great wealth while others in the same field are struggling to get by from paycheck to paycheck. Why? I believe it all has to do with developing the right mindset. Those with it soar and those without it crash and burn.
You can learn much more about developing the right mindset by reading my book Weekend Millionaire Mindset, which is available in bookstores everywhere. Don’t let life pass you by; change your thinking and you will change your life�guaranteed.
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