Habits You Need To Kick To Be Successful

Whether it's due to the society that we live in, the way we were brought up by our parents, or just our natural disposition as humans, a common thought and perspective is that being successful in life will bring us the ultimate happiness. What's more, we're often naturally drawn to share those successes and compete with those who are more successful.

Hearing the success of someone else can somehow fuel our own creativity and mind. It can boost us to try harder and to achieve something from scratch. It's kind of nice knowing there is a community out there that is just like the rest of us that wasn't of afraid of failing and still achieved something great after all the hurdles. So what exactly makes someone successful? Well, it goes back to the individual. They have a dream that they want to blossom and become a fully formed entity of what they have envision. But along that long, are-we-there-yet road, there are a few things you need to drop off before you can truly be successful. Below are a few tips as to what you should do to help you become successful in your career and life.

1. Always Saying Yes

This one might be hard to figure out in the beginning, but always saying yes might actually be harmful to your work. This also goes along with thinking you can do all the tasks, too. Although this might sounds like a contradiction, bare with me. While saying yes to multiple tasks in your internship or at the beginning of a new job is recommended, you don't want to overload yourself with work to the point where you are not doing a good job anymore and are just rushing through things. From personal experience, I know that a lot of times, it's easy to say yes in an effort to try to please others. This might actually hurt the growth of your company and yourself, though. According to an article on lifestyle site The Muse, saying yes all the time can create a bad habit and can lead into making bad decisions. Ultimately, you start thinking about the small picture and lose focus on the big picture.

2. Having Toxic People In Your Life

No one is going to feel great about themselves or what they are trying to achieve when you have people who are constantly negative and pessimistic. Being realistic is one thing, but when you are surrounding yourself with people who don't believe in you or what you are doing, well, you need to cut them loose. According to an INC. article, a study conducted by TalentSmart with over a million people found that 90 percent of top performers (successful people) know how to neutralize toxic people in their life. While a few tasks include setting limits with complainers and not letting anyone limiting their joy, essentially, if they are only decompressing you in any which way, you have to get rid of them ASAP.

3. Not Planning Out Your Day

This is a great way to set out your goals and know exactly what you need to accomplish for the day. If you are just aimlessly going throughout your day with your tasks, you might lose focus of what needs to get done and that's when procrastination occurs. According to a Forbes article, Laura Vanderkam, author of “What the Most Successful People Do at Work,” said that many people find themselves in triage mode, which basically means you are only taking care of super urgent situations one at a time. By doing this you are not thinking about the big picture. Vanderkam suggested having a planning session at least once a week or having a big plan at the end of the year and continue to have weekly meetings with yourself to keep on top of things.

4. Fear Of Rejection Or Failure

Failure is the greatest thing you will ever go through. It took me a long time to understand this, because as a perfectionist, I have a hard time not overthinking and stressing out about the little things to only try to avoid the big "F" word. The thing is, failure is not a bad thing, and successful people believe that same mantra. According to a Forbes article, successful people boldly fail because they understand they learn from their mistakes.

5. Procrastination

Hello, college best friend. You were there when I didn't want to study for a test and all the times when I needed to finish a group project, but searching through blogs sounded so much more enticing. While it might sound fun to procrastinate, it's actually pretty sucky to do so. You are only hurting yourself by stressing at the last minute to finish something. While I'm not saying that everyone is perfect, most of the time, successful people choose not to go down this path. According to another INC. article, by completing tasks early, it will allow for other doors to be open. I wish I knew this sooner. You can't keep on saying yes to something, when you are still working on the past.

6. Caring About What Others Think

You have to listen to your gut and do what you think is best to be successful. Whether you are starting your own business or you are taking the lead on something, you have to listen to your gut and make the decisions you think are best, even when you have no idea what you are doing. According to a Fast Company article, Robert Greene, best-selling author of The 48 Laws of Power said, "Some people have a hard time with that [some connection to yourself]. They listen so much to other people. They’re on Facebook all the time. They’re so concerned with what other people are thinking that they have no relationship to themselves and what they really love."

With these tips in mind, you will start to say no to the things that don't matter as much and start saying yes to more success in your life.

Images: Giphy (6); Pexels