How to know if youll be successful

How to know if youll be successfulHow to know if youll be successfulLife is complex and messy. It can be extremely difficult to get traction, let alone find motivation.But motivation is something you can learn to create at will. Becoming deeply passionate is also within your creative control. As a result, you can completely predict your own success. You canchooseto become as successful as you desire.Follow Ladders on FlipboardFollow Ladders magazines on Flipboard covering Happiness, Productivity, Job Satisfaction, Neuroscience, and moraHeres how1. Turn Success Into A Game, Not AGrindLife is a game, play it. Mother TheresaWe hear a lot about people grinding these days. That sounds awful Grinding day in and out is a path to burnout and misery.The best performers in the world dont grind, theygame For example, Warren Buffett became good at selling because as a child he would go door-to-door selling chewing gum. But he welchesnt focused on making money. Instead, he was fascinated trying t o figure out which flavors sold best. Even back then, he was trying to make predictions. Hes still playing the same games.According to author, Daniel Coyle,If it can be counted, you can turn it into a game.Rather than practicing in a tedious and boring way, youre far better-off turning your practice into a game. This is why CrossFit is so successful. There are objectives where you start and complete new challenges.I recently had this experience learning Spanish on the app,Duolingo. I started seeinghow manyobjectives I could complete in a single day, and how many days I could compete challenges in a row.2. Know That You CanSucceedIgnition (n) The motivational process that occurs when your identity becomes linked to a long-term vorstellung of your future. Triggers significant amounts of unconscious energy usually marked by the realizationThat is who I want to be. Daniel CoyleTheres a moment when you see what you want and a voice organically speaks within you I could be that.This exper ience is pivotalHow could you ever become an Olympic Athlete if you didnt at some point see it and believe it in your mind?Put simply, you need to have an identity shift. No wannabe ever made it big. At some point, they either gave up on their dream or stopped being a wannabe.During my research as a graduate student, I studied the difference between wannabe entrepreneurs and successful entrepreneurs. None of the wannabes actually saw themselvesasentrepreneurs. They hadnt had the shift where they fully identified themselves as entrepreneurs. Conversely, successful entrepreneurs saw being an entrepreneuras who they were.That identity shift happened as they began investing money into their entrepreneurial goals, and as they made the conscious decision this is WHO I AM. Your identity follows your behavior. Therefore, this shift wont happen untilafteryou begin acting into the new role you plan to play. You dont start with faith. You choose to have it. Its a conscious choice, followed by behavior. Then identity and motivation follow.3. Stop HidingItWhat other people think of you is none of your business.If you want to remain mediocre at something forever,keep it to yourself. If you want to become extremely successful, then openly share your dreams with your loved ones.Harmonious passion is about living an integrated, rather than a compartementalized, life. The mora aligned you become on who you are the mora congruent all areas of your life will be. Moreover, the more honest you are with the person you intend to be, the more support and love youll get from friends and family. Theyll also hold you accountable to your dreams and goals if they see you elend making progress.How can you involve key people into this quest?How can you connect this passion with other areas in your life?4. Create A Vision ThatWorksIt doesnt matter what your geistesbild is. It matters what your vision does. Peter M. Senge,The Fifth DiscipleWhats your vision?More interestingly,what does your vi sion cause you to do?Rather than worrying so much about what your visionis,you should be thinking about what your visionis doing. What is it doing to you? What is it doing to your environment? Your behavior? Your relationships? Your aspirations? Your income? Your impact?Are you and your external world transforming in powerful and inspired ways? If so, then your vision is working. If not, then adjust the vision to ensure it focuses on execution and transformation.Thats the fruchtwein important consideration - is your vision working?5. Practice Privately 510X Than You PerformPubliclyPrivate victory always precedes public victory. Stephen CoveyKobe Bryant was always the first person in the gym and the last to leave. He worked harder than anyone else. He had more coaches and trainers. He was always pushing his own limits and perfecting even the smallest facets of his skillsets.When practice becomesthegame for you, thats when youre about to explode in your progress.Why?Because practice i s all about perfecting skills. True practice and learning force you to deeply examine the chinks in your armor. You are only as strong as your weakest link. In a world that tells you to ignore your weaknesses, true practitioners do the opposite.6. Carry A Notepad EverywhereI take notes like some people take drugs. There is an eight-foot stretch of shelves in my house containing nothing but full notebooks. I trust the weakest pen more than the strongest memory, and note taking is in my experience one of the fruchtwein important skills for converting excessive information into precise action and follow-up. Tim Ferriss, in the blogpost,How to Take Notes Like an Alpha-GeekYour mind can be like a well. It takes pumping the well for a while to get the ideas and creativity flowing. However, if you get the well pumping, then all of you have to do is keep it going. You can get to the point where the ideas and insights keep coming coming coming.Your responsibility at that point is to take not es. If you ignore those subconscious promptings, they will stop coming. Taking note, adjusting your mindset, and shifting your behavior is HOW you pump the well. Its how you keep the ideas flowing. You must continually be shifting the connections and model.7. Quickly Address Mistakes, Or Youll StopLearningIt is tempting to think that just because one understands certain principles one has learned about the discipline. This is the familiar trap of confusing intellectual understanding with learning. Learning always involves new understandings and new behaviors, thinking and doing. Peter M. SengeLessons are repeated until learned.According to Brain-scan studies, if you do not address a herausforderung in 0.25 seconds after a mistake is made, then you probably wont do anything about it. Youll shrug your shoulders and keep going. This is really bad for learning. Youre just more deeply engraining the negative behavioral cycle into your brain.Performance experts have found that if you addr ess your mistakes immediately, you can learn more in 5 minutes than most people do in 30 days. If you simply address your problems and the spot, correct them, and learn better ways, then you dont have to continuously repeat the problem.8. Face Your Pain, Or It Will Be Buried And Stunt YourGrowthIf you dont know how to control your emotional reactions and theres a refractory period, and you let that emotional reaction linger for hours or days, it turns into a mood. So you say to someone, Whats wrong with you? The person says, Im in a mood. Then you say, Why are you in a mood? They say, Well, this thing happened to me five days ago and Im having one long emotional reaction. If you keep that refractory period going for weeks and months, youve developed a temperament. If you keep that same refractory period going on for years, its called a personality trait. Dr. Joe DispenzaLearning and growing are emotional and often painful experiences. Sometimes, things happen in life that you didnt plan for nor were you responsible for traumatic experiences.Whether caused by you or someone else, when you go through a painful experience, that experience can only become one of two things to you. Its either going to become a long-term problem, or its going to become a core strength.When you experience a powerfully emotional experience, you experience what is known as a refractory period which is your physiological response to an experience. That period should ideally be short, but often people dont cope well with experiences. Sometimes. the refractory period of a certain experience can lastyears.For example, you have a really intense experience and that experience changes you. Until you directly face and walk-through that issue, it will always be a part of you. In fact, you will remain the same person emotionally until you learn that lesson. I know people who had rough experiences as teenagers who are still subconsciously playing out the same emotional experiencesfrom that episod e. They havent learned or changed since that event.This is a painful and ineffective way to live. This is not to diminish the pain and suffering that people have gone through, or the negative ripple effects that have since been created. Its simply speaking to the truth of the matter the only way out isthrough. You cant avoid it. You must face your deepest fears or youll always be a slave to them.In a recent interview, Josh Waitzkin described an experience where he almost died. He was doing underwater breathing techniques and accidentally passed-out. Rather than allowing a long refractory period to occur, he said that he was back in the water 2 days later.He didnt want that traumatic experience to become a lifelong weakness. He didnt want to train his body to live in the trauma. He walked straight into the trauma and pain and fear and quickly re-established his relationship and control over the situation. Therefore, that experience became an incredible blessing and learning and exper ience.9. Have Fun MilestonesCelebrate small victories often. Mourn failures quickly. Do whats necessary without fanfare. Chris BroganA key component of mastering anything is creating fun, engaging, and relevant milestones throughout the learning process.For example, if youre trying to learn a new language, buy a plane flugticket for 3 months in advance so you can test your new language skills in an immersive way. Plan to eat at fun restaurants and to see interesting things. Reward yourself in a way that links directly to what youre trying to master.10. Invest Big OnYourselfBeyond a certain point there is no return. This point has to be reached. Franz KafkaDreamers invest their money and time into distractions while doers invest their time and money into their dreams.The financial investment willmake it realto you. This is a huge part of ignition (see 2 above). When you start acting in ways that excite you, and in ways that reflect the future identity youre trying to create then you begin identifying with that future self here-and-now. You signal to yourself who you are by the actions you take. Your behavior shapes your personality and identity.This is one of the most important moments you can have. That moment where you say,Whoa, Im actually doing thisThat moment is deeply connected with the moment where you say inside of yourself,I can be one of those.11. IgnoreEveryoneFor the first couple years you make stuff, its just not that good. Its trying to be good, it has potential, but its not.But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer.And your taste is why your work disappoints you. Ira GlassKeep your eyes only on the people whoinspire you. You have good taste.The worst thing you could do is worry about what your peers think. When people begin worrying about what their peers think, their motivation becomes clouded and confused. They stop doing their work for the internal reasons that got them excited and they begin trying to fit in, or to be impressive to the wrong people.12. Focus On Challenges And Quests, NotTimeDeep practice is not measured in minutes or hours, but in the number of high-quality reaches and repetitions you make basically, how many new connections you form in your brain. Daniel CoyleIn his book,Living with a SEAL,Jesse Itzlertells the storyof being inspired by a certain Navy SEAL and consequently inviting him to live at Itzlers home for a month. Itzler admitted being in a personal rut and wanted to shake himself out of his routine.Day 1 SEAL asked Itzler,How many pull-ups can you do?Itzler squeaked out eight shaky pull-ups.Take 30 seconds and do it again,SEAL said.30 seconds later, Itzler got on the bar and did six, struggling.Take 30 seconds and do it one more time,SEAL said. 30 seconds later, Itzler got on the bar and did three, at which point his arms were exhausted.Alright, were not leaving here until you do 100 more,SEAL stated. Itzler was puzzled.Alright, were gonna be here a long-time. Cause theres no way I could do 100.However, Itzler ended-up completing the challenge, doing one pull-up at a time. Thus, SEAL convinced Itzler that he could do way more than he thought he could.Like Itzler who shattered a mental barrier by completing 100 pull-ups, you too can get out of your rut by pursuing tangible objectives.The concept isDo something and dont stop until its complete, no matter how long it takes.If it doesnt suck, we dont do it.You can apply this principle to anything. You can do a homework assignment and just do it until its complete. You can write an article and stick-to-it until its published. You can do 100 pull-ups, or run 5 miles, and go until youre done.Who cares how long it takes?The best practice is objective-based. Not time based. In fact, you want to eliminate your sense of time as much as you possibly can.Living in the dimensions oftimeis a 95 mindset. Living in FLOW is about dissolving into timelessness. Its about enjoying what youre doing for the sake of it. One of the fastest ways into flow is by pushing yourself to achieve certain things, daily. If youre weightlifting, your reps or objectives could be to do a certain lift perfectly a number of times. If youre a musician, it could be playing a certain song or part of a song 510 times perfectly in a row.Make it a game. But more than anything, focus it on successfully completing a certain objective. Dont build your practice around time and effort. We live in the results economy where results are what matter more than anything now.13. See How Much You Can Do In A SingleDayOnly those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go. T. S. EliotEzra Taft Benson was a religious leader who simultaneously served as the 15th United States Secretary of Agriculture during both presidential terms of Dwight D. Eisenhower.Benson grew up on a farm in Whitney, Idaho. One day in 1915 at the age of 16, he was hired by a neighboring farmer to thin a field of sugar beets. He took h is short-handled hoe in hand and looked out over the sugar beet field. Here was the thought that came into his mindIf I work as hard as I can, I wonder how much I can do in a day?He started just as the sun came up and worked almost without stopping until sun down. Then he realized how much he could do. He had thinned a full acre of beets in just one day Which was an insane amount for one person. When the farmer saw what Benson had done, he was shocked. He dropped two silver dollars and two five-dollar gold coins into Bensons hand. Benson could hardly believe his eyes 12 dollars at that time, and for a 16 year old farm boy, was a small fortune.As he walked home he was walking on air and he felt like the richest man in town.The question Benson asked himself is a question YOU need to ask yourself.How much can you get done in a single day?How much can you get donetoday?This isnt about being busy, but rather, about being productive. Its also about pushing your own limits, and seeing how far you can actually go. Most people are trying to see howlittlethey can do. If youre one of those people who can seehow muchyou can do, yeah14. See How Much You Can Give In Your RelationshipsYou can have everything in life you want, if you will just help other people get what they want. Zig ZiglarWhen youre driven to give and to serve, you become more empathetic and relevant. Because its aboutthemand not you, you can actually listen and discern what they need. Youre not calculating your next move. Youre not thinking about what youre going to say next. Instead, youre actually listening. Youre actually discovering what other people need.15. Deep Focus, Then Deep ReflectionI think of the learning process of an undulation of deep learning and periods of surfacing and reflection. Josh WaitzkinSuccess is not a marathon. Instead, success is a series of sprints. You push yourself beyond your limits and then you rest/recover.Some sprints may be a week. Other sprints may be a few years. What ever the case, you need periods where you surface from the intensity and reflect on what the heck just happened. You get feedback. You open yourself up to trusted friends and mentors. You re-adjust your path if you need to based on what youve learned and based on the post-reflection process.Recovery, resting, and reflection are essential to becoming brilliant at what you do. If youre not prioritizing these, then youre on a path to burnout. Moreover, if youre not taking time to reflect and recover, theres a good chance youre going the wrong direction without even knowing it.16. Never StopLearningDont believe your own press. Joe PolishWayne Gretzky is considered the greatest hockey player to ever live. Yet, he was known by his teammates to continually look like a fool. He was always trying new things in practice and falling all over the ice. He failed a lot more than his teammates.The problem with success is dull your motivational edge and drive. In order to keep yourself sharp, you n eed tonever stoppushing your boundaries, not matter how good you become.The moment you stop learning, testing, and trying is the moment you go backwards. If you dont use it, youll quickly lose it.17. Avoid Luxury Like ThePlagueWe love comfort. We love state-of-the-art practice facilities, oak-paneled corner offices, spotless locker rooms, and fluffy towels. Which is a shame, because luxury is a motivational narcotic It signals our unconscious minds to give less effort. It whispers,Relax, youve made it.The talent hotbeds are not luxurious. In fact, they are so much the opposite that they are sometimes called chicken-wire Harvards. Top music camps especially ones that can afford better consist mainly of rundown cabins. The North Baltimore Aquatic Club, which produced Michael Phelps and four other Olympic medalists, could pass for an underfunded YMCA. The worlds highest-performing schools those in Finland and South Korea, which perennially score at the top of the Program for Internatio nal Student Assessment rankings feature austere classrooms that look as if they havent changed since the 1950s. Daniel CoyleFor most people, success is not really about the work itself, but about the luxuries success can give you.World-class performers keep things simple. They arent afraid to enjoy luxuries and make good money. However, when it comes to their work, they are simplistic. They maintain the scrappiness and drive as they had when they were first starting out.ConclusionWhat does success actually look like to you?How much are you investing in your dreams?Can you see yourself where you want to be?Are you going to get there?Ready toupgrade?Ive created a cheat sheet for putting yourself into a PEAK-STATE, immediately. You follow this daily, your life will change very quickly.Get the cheat sheet hereThis article first appeared on Medium.

How to (painlessly) reinvent yourself when life demands it

How to (painlessly) reinvent yourself when life demands itHow to (painlessly) reinvent yourself when life demands itIn these fast-paced times, it seems like change is the only constant we have. Some people accept change gracefully, while others hold on kicking and screaming. But today its more important than ever to embrace change and be able to reinvent yourself. Why? Because innovation is changing markets daily, because our global economy has leveled the playing field and introduced more competition than ever before, and because life occasionally compels us to move in a new direction - like it or not.Whether youre switching jobs in a competitive market, starting a new career, or experiencing a transition in your personal life, upheaval can be really frightening. But its also a priceless opportunity to reinvent yourself.When you face a setback in your life, you have two choices. Remain stuck or move forward its that simple. Life is too short to spend it stuck and miserable. Take ac tion now to change your life or get ready to watch life pass you by.Reinventing yourself demands change. No matter how dire your circumstances, you can make changes today that will prepare you for a better tomorrow. You may have to find a new way to make a living, or start over in a new city, or take a big risk that terrifies you. Still, you have to be willing to change. It may not always be easy, but it sure beats staying stuck for the rest of your life.Realize its never too lateDuring the course of your lifetime, you will be called upon to reinvent yourself, time and time again. Dont let yourself stay stuck in what you know. Make the fruchtwein of the resilience you now have under your belt with overcoming previous challenges and strive for new horizons. As you envision this new version of yourself, what are some steps you can take today to put that new self into action?Take an honest look at your lifeMuster the courage to look at your life and figure out where youve gone wrong, a nd the changes you need to make to get back on track. Own up to the mistakes you have made and take responsibility for the part you played in getting yourself stuck. Krasnow points out that this kind of brutal honesty is not for the faint of heart. It requires courage to take full responsibility for your life and most importantly for the failures in your wake. But if you can sit down and face your own mistakes, you will free yourself up to learn from the painful consequences you are facing today.Move forward just do itChange is not rocket science. We all have a tendency to make life so complicated when it doesnt have to be. Simply make a decision to move forward. Dont try just do it. People say theyre going to try to change. Try? There is no such thing. Theres doing it or not doing it. Try is a word that you should eliminate from your vocabulary right now.Dream bigThe only real challenge in creating the life youve always wanted is your inability or unwillingness to free up your fant asie to envision your dream in all of its glory. In other words, you are only as successful as your perceived limitations. How often do you limit yourself when envisioning the success you are capable of achieving? Dont settle for the limited vista of your present-day life. Instead, allow yourself to be willing to travel well beyond the bounds of the landscapes you may not be able to imagine today.Stay focusedOnce you decide to make a change in your life, its time to get serious and focus on your goals. Think of life as a journey in a train that travels on a track. Each track leads to a specific destination. Make a point of staying on the track of your choice, without getting distracted and switching tracks. If you stay focused, you will certainly reach your desired destination.Pace yourselfMaking a major life change requires a steady pace. You work at it each day and keep at it (and then keep at it some more). Remember that extraordinary creations are not built in a day through occa sional bursts of effort, but rather are crafted over long periods of time with daily, steady tasks. Its a marathon stop exhausting yourself by sprinting from place to place. Instead, stay on course with your goals and remain consistent.Know that failure is not an optionWhen you realize that failure is not an option, it becomes clear that there is no stopping at the first obstacle you encounter along the way. There is an opening, even in the most stubborn of barricades. Where is the opening in your current wall of obstacles?Is there a secret passage you had overlooked but is now emerging in front of you? Take that hidden path and forge ahead. Just keep your eye on where you want to go and you might find that a setback along the way was actually a shortcut to your desired destinationWe all know that change is not the most comfortable part of our lives. But know that the process of transformation is a gratifying experience, providing you find the courage to do it. You can adapt. You ca n take a new path in your life. And you will undoubtedly be better for it in the long run.Paul G. Krasnowis the author ofThe Success Code A Guide for Achieving Your Personal Best in Business and Life.He is a financial representative at Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company, where he has been a top producer for 40 years.

Positive 3 ways to stay positive and be happy in life

Positive 3 ways to stay positive and be happy in lifePositive 3 ways to stay positive and be happy in lifeWeve all received the well-meaning advice to stay positive. The greater the challenge, the more this glass-half-full wisdom can come across as Pollyannaish and unrealistic. Its hard to find the motivation to focus on the positive when positivity seems like bedrngnishing more than wishful thinking.The real obstacle to positivity is that ur brains are hard-wired to look for and focus on threats. This survival mechanism served humankind well back when we were hunters and gatherers, living each day with the very real threat of being killed by someone or something in our immediate surroundings.That was eons ago. Today, this mechanism breeds pessimism and negativity through the minds tendency to wander until it finds a threat. These threats magnify the perceived likelihood that things are going - and/or are going to go - poorly.When the threat is real and lurking in the bushes down t he path, this mechanism serves you well. When the threat is imagined and you spend two months convinced the project youre working on is going to flop, this mechanism leaves you with a soured view of reality that wreaks havoc in your life.Maintaining positivity is a daily challenge that requires focus and attention. You must be intentional about staying positive if youre going to overcome the brains tendency to focus on threats. It wont happen by accident.Positivity and your healthPessimism is trouble because its bad for your health. Numerous studies have shown that optimists are physically and psychologically healthier than pessimists.Martin Seligman at the University of Pennsylvania has conducted extensive research on the topic. Seligman worked with researchers from Dartmouth and the University of Michigan on a study that followed people from age 25 to 65 to see how their levels of pessimism or optimism influenced their overall health. The researchers found that pessimists health d eteriorated far more rapidly as they aged.Seligmans findings are similar to research conducted by the Mayo Clinic that found optimists have lower levels of cardiovascular disease and longer life-spans. Although the exact mechanism through which pessimism affects health hasnt been identified, researchers at Yale and the University of Colorado found that pessimism is associated with a weakened immune response to tumors and infection.Researchers from the University of Kentucky went so far as to inject optimists and pessimists with a virus to measure their immune response. The researchers found optimists had a much stronger immune response than pessimists.Positivity and performanceKeeping a positive attitude isnt just good for your health. Martin Seligman has also studied the connection between positivity and performance. In one study in particular, he measured the degree to which insurance salespeople were optimistic or pessimistic in their work. Optimistic salespeople sold 37% more po licies than pessimists, who were twice as likely to leave the company during their first year of employment.Seligman has studied positivity more than anyone, and he believes in the ability to turn pessimistic thoughts and tendencies around with simple effort and know-how. But Seligman doesnt just believe this. His research shows that people can transform a tendency toward pessimistic thinking into positive thinking through simple techniques that create lasting changes in behavior long after they are discovered.Here are three things that Ill be doing this year to stay positive.1.Separate fact from fictionThe first step in learning to focus on the positive requires knowing how to stop negative self-talk in its tracks. The more you ruminate on negative thoughts, the more power you give them. Most of our negative thoughts are just that - thoughts, not facts.When you find yourself believing the negative and pessimistic things your inner voice says, its time to stop and write them down. Literally stop what youre doing and write down what youre thinking. Once youve taken a moment to slow down the negative momentum of your thoughts, you will be more rational and clear-headed in evaluating their veracity.Evaluate these statements to see if theyre factual. You can bet the statements arent true any time you see words likenever, always, worst, ever,etc.Do you reallyalwayslose your keys? Of course not. Perhaps you forget them frequently, but most days you do remember them. Are younevergoing to find a solution to your problem? If you really are that stuck, maybe youve been resisting asking for help. Or if it really is an intractable problem, then why are you wasting your time beating your head against the wall?If your statements still look like facts once theyre on paper, take them to a friend or colleague you can trust, and see if he or she agrees with you. Then the truth will surely come out.When it feels like somethingalwaysorneverhappens, this is just your brains natur al threat tendency inflating the perceived frequency or severity of an event. Identifying and labeling your thoughts asthoughtsby separating them from the facts will help you escape the cycle of negativity and move toward a positive new outlook.2. Identify a positiveOnce you snap yourself out of self-defeating, negative thoughts, its time to help your brain learn what you want it to focus on - the positive.This will come naturally after some practice, but first you have to give your wandering brain a little help by consciously selecting something positive to think about. Any positive thought will do to refocus your brains attention.When things are going well, and your mood is good, this is relatively easy. When things are going poorly, and your mind is flooded with negative thoughts, this can be a challenge. In these moments, think about your day and identify one positive thing that happened, no matter how small.If you cant think of something from the current day, reflect on the pr evious day or even the previous week. Or perhaps there is an exciting event you are looking forward to that you can focus your attention on.The point here is you must have something positive that youre ready to shift your attention to when your thoughts turn negative. Step one stripped the power from negative thoughts by separating fact from fiction. Step two is to replace the negative with a positive.Once you have identified a positive thought, draw your attention to that thought each time you find yourself dwelling on the negative. If that proves difficult, you can repeat the process of writing down the negative thoughts to discredit their validity, and then allow yourself to freely enjoy positive thoughts.3. Cultivate an attitude of gratitudeTaking time to contemplate what youre grateful for isnt merely the right thing to do it reduces the stress hormone cortisol by 23%. Research conducted at the University of California, Davis, found that people who worked daily to cultivate an attitude of gratitude experienced improved mood, energy and substantially less anxiety due to lower cortisol levels.You cultivate an attitude of gratitude by taking time out every day to focus on the positive. Any time you experience negative or pessimistic thoughts, use this as a cue to shift gears and think about something positive. In time, a positive attitude will become a way of life.Bringing it all togetherI realize these three tips sound incredibly basic, but they have tremendous power because they train your brain to have a positive focus. They break old habits, if you force yourself to use them. Given the minds natural tendency to wander toward negative thoughts, we can all use a little help with staying positive.This article originally appeared on LinkedIn.