Success is defined as a “degree or measure of attaining some desired object or end; a favorable or desired outcome; or the attainment of wealth, favor or eminence.” So why don’t you have it already?
You must live a life where you cross lines and push limits — that’s what living a 10X life is about. You must commit to and demand to create success in your personal life and business. If you aren’t committing to success and going for 10X goals with 10 times the action you feel is reasonably required — you are failing. You may not be failing compared to others, but you are failing compared to your own full potential.
Failure is defined as “an omission of occurrence or performance of something; a state of inability to perform a normal function; a lack of success; failing in business; falling short; or deficiency.”
Humankind acts as if it has a built-in calculator with the sole purpose to reason and explain away failure. The problem is that the first calculations made always seem to target something other than the activity level required to accomplish a goal. This kind of calculating tends to be more emotional than logical. It judges the project, the client, the economy or the individual to be “deficient” as a means of justifying why things are not working out.
Excuses such as “the market isn’t ready” or “the economy is bad” are the false content that has been loaded into these calculations by media, politicians, the education system and the way we were raised. More often than not it’s simply that you just have not correctly estimated the amount of action necessary to succeed.
After 30 years of building companies and bringing new products and ideas to market I assure you there will be some things you will never foresee regardless of how detailed your business plan is. It doesn’t matter if your product costs nothing to create and is far superior to its closest competitor, you will still have to apply 10 times more effort to push through the noise just to get people to even know about it.
In my book, The 10X Rule, I talk about the four degrees of action:
1. “Doing nothing”
At this level you are not taking actions that move yourself forward in order to learn, achieve success or control some area of your life. Despite what it may sound like, do not assume “doing nothing” requires no effort, energy or work. Regardless of which degree of action you operate at, they all require work in their own way.
2. “Retreaters”
If you operate at this level you are taking actions in reverse. People who retreat are probably trying to avoid the negative experience they imagine will come from the results of taking action and possibly failing. This level personifies the “fear of success” phenomenon. Like doing nothing, this level of action requires hard work and effort to maintain.
3. “Normal”
This is the biggest group today. From the outside and on the surface this level of action is accepted as normal, but it is this level of action that created the trap of the middle class and maintains that dangerous mentality.
Although some members of this group may occasionally attempt to generate exceptional levels of action, they almost never create anything in exceptional quantities. As long as average works, people at this level are fine with it — they are comfortable with the status quo.
4. “Massive”
Until adults told me otherwise I didn’t know anything other than massive action. People would frown and hint that maybe I should calm down. Did that happen to you as a kid?
This fourth degree of action, as far-fetched as it may sound, is the most natural state of action there is for us. I have been called a lot of things because of my commitment to action: workaholic, obsessive, greedy, never satisfied, driven. Every time I have been labeled like this I have noticed that person is operating at less than the fourth degree of action. I have never had someone more successful than me consider my levels of action excessive or bad.
What actions are you taking today? How do you set your mind to success? Let me know in the comment section below.