In this article Harrison discusses how resisting change and not taking necessary and relevant action can be the biggest obstacles to a better career and better life. Resistance is something that prevents most people from ever changing. Resisting change can be highly damaging to your growth in your career and life. Instead of allowing your life to be controlled by external circumstances, choose to take action and bring about a change. Conduct a brutal self analysis if needed, to clear the blocks you have in your mind and to bring about change that is necessary. Most people give up. They do not persist. You need strategies and beliefs that will allow you to persist and persevere, so that you can change. The best strategy is to be focused, and this focus will help you overcome the resistance you face whenever you make an effort to begin changing.
Embrace your individuality, and fight the human instinct for consistency and sameness in your self-image. Appreciate all of your personality’s many facets, as they make you unique and desirable; see your individuality for the strength that it is, and embrace it.
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In this article Harrison discusses why associating with positive people is among the most important things you can do in your life. Positive people reinforce positivity and impregnate the environment with positive energy. Negative people sap your energy and make you feel that nothing is worth doing. Even a single negative person in a group of persons is enough to bring down the energy level of the entire group. In order to be happy and successful it is important to surround yourself with other people who are happy and successful. Positive energy spreads quickly–just as negative energy does. You life is valuable and your time is as well. The last thing you need in your career is to deal with another person’s constant negativity. Your career and life will change for the better when you surround yourself with positive people–and keep the negative ones away
Like everyone else, your employer wants to believe that he or she is a good person who stands for something positive in the world. Therefore, work to ascribe positive motives to your employer when in interviews, and think of in terms of how their work serves a higher purpose. Speaking about your and your employer’s work in these terms will put you on a higher plane than others, and will associate both of you with good and noble qualities.
In the job market or any other venue, getting others to sing your praises will make a huge difference to you as far as getting ahead. The best way to brag about your work is to get someone else to do it for you. When applying for a job, getting someone inside the company to speak well of you will vastly increase your odds of success, making your application much more effective than it would otherwise have been.
I have seen the damage toxic behaviors cause. People with these behaviors have difficulties remaining in relationships, holding onto friends and acquaintances, keeping jobs and even getting jobs.
Your mental toughness and the way in which you organize your mind are the two biggest determinants of everything that happens to you and whether or not you attain your full potential. Mental toughness can prevent any conceivable article from hindering you. Developing mental toughness changes everything for you, and once you have it you will believe in yourself and what you are doing, and you will greatly diminish your risk of failure.
In this article Harrison discusses why your need to feel important should not be controlling you. The need to feel important is so deep and profound that you do whatever it takes to feel important. This need to feel significant controls and governs your life. For most of us, there is nothing more important to our sense of importance than our careers. The best thing you can possibly do for your career is detach from this need to feel significant and realize how this is controlling so much of what happens to you. You need to do the work you love and live the life you want without being controlled by a need to be significant. This will change everything for you and allow you to contribute to the world in a productive way.
One of the most important things you can do in your career is generate value for your employer far in excess of what you receive back. You can talk your way into a high-paying job, but you will not remain there unless you provide more than you take. Organizations thrive when all of their members produce goods and services efficiently. Your career depends on providing more than you take, and surrounding yourself with people who do the same.
In this article Harrison explains how you can ensure success in your career by externalizing your opponents. Your job is like a game; if you work hard, play by the rules of the company and are seen as part of the team you will be viewed as a valuable player for the company. The most significant part of any game is the presence of an opponent. Don’t look for an opponent among your co-workers. Never speak negatively of your team members. Instead, concentrate on the external opponents. External opponents bring you and the team closer as you work towards a common goal. In order for you and your company to succeed it is important to have an external opponent. Harrison advises people to consistently work hard and not participate in the politics. This is a sure way to score big in your career.
True self-esteem comes from within, not from the acceptance of others. When your sense of worth comes from within, you free yourself from comparisons with others and will enjoy a greater sense of internal security. You will no longer be bogged down by the experiences of others and can become much more self-reliant.
Your greatest successes will come from some of the smallest actions in terms of meeting people. You will cause a “stacking effect” the more you meet and connect with people; conversely, people cannot connect with you when you are withdrawn and nothing will happen. You must do everything in your power to connect with as many people as possible.
A powerful sense of self will make all the difference in your life. You must understand that your sense of yourself and your capabilities come from inside of you, not from the external forces that have brought you to your current place in life. What you feel internally might be completely different from what the world is telling you, and you must learn to focus on the former rather than the latter.
Adopting a positive attitude will always bring you closer to success, as nobody wants to be associated with a losing side. Everyone wants to associate with and hire winners, and avoids losers. Nothing is more important than maintaining a positive attitude, as many employers hire people based primarily on attitude; with the right attitude, everything else will fall into place. You must look like you are on the winning team, even if times are tough; nobody wants to hire a loser.
Everyone tries to maintain a certain emotional state, and learning to control your own emotions will have a profound impact on your career. While everyone allows their emotional states to be influenced by outside events, there is no advantage in basing your own emotions on things that you cannot control. Allow yourself to discover happiness and fulfillment naturally, rather than making your emotions dependant on external circumstances. Your outlook will have a tremendous impact on your psychological health, as well as that of those around you.
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