How Can I Be Successful In Life? 13 Reasons You Aren’t Successful In Life

“How can I be successful in life when my life is a hot mess?” she said as we stood together in the gym before I started my workout. Coaching friends is a no-no for sure. It’s never easy for me to listen to comments and questions like this, without an overwhelming desire to go into coaching mode.

I have to remember that I am a friend FIRST and a coach second. As much as I want to help them, a gym buddy is not often as likely to have an open mind as a desperate stranger or a paying client.

Lending my ear to a friend is one thing, but I also see value in learning from others. Here, I’m free to step into my coaching shoes with you.

Today, I’ll help you answer this burning question… “How can I be successful in life?”

Being successful in life is not cut-and-dry, since the idea of what ‘successful’ really means to each of us is different. Even though we all have our own idea of success, it’s usually only a loose framework that we don’t often think about.

When you put it like that, it seems a bit odd. How can we know ourselves, what we need and what we want… yet completely disregard them? We go through our lives not understanding what our own human needs are. Knowing these is so important, because it’s like having a user manual for our whole life!

How Can I Be Successful In Life? Read Your User Manual.

Instead, we all find ourselves going through the motions. It’s not surprising that we come out of it at 40 years old, wondering why we aren’t happy and successful.

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I never could have done what I have done without the habits of punctuality, order, and diligence… Without the determination to concentrate myself on one subject at a time. ~ Charles Dickens

It boils down to what I have identified as the top 13 reasons you aren’t successful in life. Here is the list and how you can become more successful in life.

1. Closed to new ideas – Being stuck in a box is surely going to prevent you from growing. If you don’t understand what’s really possible, then you’ll never reach your potential. Many of us are taught to follow the rules set for us in the 9-5 career path, and we come home feeling drained and empty.
   • Tactic: It’s okay to dream a little and see what’s possible for you. Set goals that are bigger and bolder than your usual day-to-day or weekly goals. In time, you’ll build belief in yourself that you can achieve anything.
2. Multi-tasking steals creativity – Simply put, there is no way possible that you can be successful in life if you don’t have a plan.
   

   When you are so preoccupied with being “busy” instead of ever being productive, you’ll never experience the flow of creativity and the joy it brings.

   • Tactic: Write your list of things to do, and do one thing until they are completed.
3. Lack of focus – Understanding what your priorities are is difficult for some. For example, many of my married male clients believe that their #1 priority is providing for the family. That doesn’t sound so bad, until you delve deeper and realize that he’s putting quality time WITH his family on the back-burner.
   

   Ultimately, if he dies today, his family will not want to remember him for how many hours he toiled away. They want to remember him for the times he was together with them!

   • Tactic: Identify your “core values” so that your focus can be driven by what’s really important in life.
4. Lack of inspiration – There are so many people who are living their lives bored and uninspired. Going to a job they hate and being with people who don’t resonate are among the top reasons why people aren’t successful in life.
   • Tactic: Begin to see out people who are doing what you want to do. Follow their stories in order to provide you with more inspiration of hope for a successful life.
5. Winging it (having no purpose) – Spending another day in a meaningless job with people who don’t want to grow will steal your soul. These are the people who are winging it and have no purpose in life or drive. Do you know someone like this?
   • Tactic: Do more of what excites you and makes you smile.
6. The victim mindset – Thinking that there is no way out of a bad situation will not allow you to progress in the right direction. Your mind is so powerful. When you have the internal stories of “why me” or “poor me”, you can be certain this will hold you back from reaching a higher level of success.
   • Tactic: Eliminate negative words like: horrible, terrible, or awful from your vocabulary wherever possible. Avoid damaging your subconscious with “I’m sorry”. Instead, you can express the same thing with things like “I never meant to hurt you”, and “I won’t do it again”. Both of those things are true, while not attaching negativity to your identity. You are not a sorry person.
7. Living someone else’s dreams – I see this mistake a LOT! Parents mean well, but sometimes they decide the career path for the child before the child is experienced enough to know what they’d rather do. With the inherent need to please our parents, it’s only later that they then discover how unfulfilled they are.
   

   Don’t waste another day, move into the direction of your own future and stop living someone else’s dreams. 

   • Tactic: Decide today that you want to start living your life for YOU. Not because you want to, but because you NEED to. It’s far more fulfilling to be living your own dream and enjoying every minute of it, rather than feeling a brief moment of happiness each time your parent says they’re proud of you. 
8. No inner peace – In a world full of social media and the fast-paced, fast-food mentality, we often get lost in the noise.
   • Tactic: Identify what brings you peace and joy. Initiate a social media detox day once a week. I promise, the world won’t fall apart.
9. Not continuing to grow – The “status quo” is not an exhilarating way to live. I’m not going to tell you what to do. That’s not my place.
   

   I can tell you, however, that coasting through life without a plan to challenge yourself or grow is a tragedy. It’s the surest way to start dying emotionally, spiritually, and mentally… far before your time to go for good.

   • Tactic: Read more books, learn a language, learn an instrument, take a class.
10. Not contributing to the world – To think that improving the world is someone else’s job is a small way of thinking. These days, we’re so overwhelmed with obligations, that our minds are too clouded to think about the bigger picture.
    

    While you’re taking the time to read this, I have an important question for you to ponder. What is your legacy?

    • Tactic: Plan ahead at some point in your future to help people in your neighborhood, town or city. As an example, go online to give a Christmas present of clean water or livestock to a third-world county.
11. Not concentrating on love – “Oh, here we go again, just another day on the hamster wheel” will never allow you to experience the next-level of success. What’s your focus? Are you thinking about what you don’t like all the way to work?
    • Tactic: Begin your day with appreciation for what you love. Start with “I love…” and follow with what immediately comes to mind. Start small and expand outward. Do this until you begin to feel grateful and loving. You can practice this in any situation to raise your vibrations of love.
12. Fear & limitation – Always thinking of worry will hold you back in everything. Your mind will play tricks on you as you begin to recite them in your mind. The more you focus on fear and worry, the better your mind will be at rationalizing the safer option – the very same that’s likely to stunt your growth and success.
    • Tactic: See yourself in a successful moment in your mind. Replay it and feel good about it. Meditate on it. Meditation on success is a trick that you can play on your mind to release fear. Once practiced regularly, you will begin to rewire your mind for success.

How Can I Be Successful In Life? Ask Yourself This Question

I want to be a successful person, and I want better relationships. I want to stop winging it in life, and have better results. Does this sound like you?

Living an exceptional life is more than just possible. You’re in full control of what you get out of it. It’s all in learning what you want from life, then being bold enough to believe you can have anything you set your mind to. After that, you just have to learn what it takes, and commit to going after it!

You weren’t put on this planet to simply be mediocre. You’re meant to build something amazing from your life. To achieve your fullest potential even when it’s hard, you need to be dedicated to doing the work.

Being Successful In Life Is The Journey To Self-Fulfillment

The very idea of being successful in life seems for so many seems to be solely a financial journey. It’s simply not. Get that thought out of your head. Sure, we all need to feel financially secure which in turn should make us feel relaxed about our future but there is so much more to being successful in life.

The journey or better yet, the “art” of self-fulfillment is going to determine your success in life. In the end of days, it will be about whether or not you enjoyed your time here on earth. My advice, don’t chase money. Chase the joy that life gives you.