Qualities Among Successful People

 

I have met and interacted with some exceedingly successful people in my life across verticals and industries.

This includes people that are just extremely successful in being happy or managing their homes/kids.

I love to observe them. Identify patterns in their behaviors.

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Based on those observations, and contrasting it with traits that I’ve observed in unsuccessful (unhappy) people, I’ve come up with the following distinguishing factors:

Quality of Association

Misery loves company. Unsuccessful people love to band together with people that are at the same level or lower level than them. It makes them feel secure and knowledgeable. Ah the joy of being the one-eyed king of the blind (translation of a Hindi proverb)

Successful people tend to drift towards people that are as or more successful than them. This provides them an opportunity to constantly learn and evolve.

Mindset

Let’s say you see someone more famous than you. You are 100% sure that you’re more talented than them but still can’t rival their fame. What do you do? Badmouth them? Envy them? Complain about life being unfair?

Successful people tend to appreciate their competitors and respect their methodology. Not everything needs to be fair. Not every success is well-deserved. But there is always something that sets apart an “un-deserving” successful person from a “deserving” unsuccessful person. Learn, get inspired, it’s not a race! There is plenty of space for all the big fish in the ocean.

Mind your own business

Unsuccessful people tend to look for the failures of others. It gives them pleasure. It makes them feel accomplished. Instead of nurturing their own growth, they criticize and follow everyone while wearing glasses of cynicism.

Successful people tend to not give a cr*p about what others are doing. They mind their own business and reach out only to learn, seek inspiration or mentor others.

Sheep vs lion

Unsuccessful people take the safe way. They do exactly what others around them are doing. Their definition of success is defined by their peers. They love to blame society and the rest of the world for holding them back. No wonder, as they stayed within those same bounds to seek safety.

Successful people tend to make their own way. They know their goals, or at least have a faint idea of it. These goals are not inspired by surroundings but are tailor-made for their own selves. They lack any concern for the opinion of the masses.

Whine vs Improve

Unsuccessful people tend to marinate themselves in their failures and everything bad that happened to them. They love being the victim in every scenario. The victim-complex starts feeling like a safe-zone. An excuse for everything that they couldn’t achieve. It is so easy to blame everyone else without doing an introspection.

Successful people fail too, but they make it a learning experience. Instead of whining, they identify the errors leading to that failure and improve that in the next cycle.

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There are a lot of factors that make one successful vs not.

Some of them are beyond our control.

We don’t decide the class and surroundings in which we are born.

But our attitude can set us apart.

And what’s there to lose by cultivating a “successful people mentality”?

At the very least, you’ll fail with a smile on your face :)

-Srishti Kotiyal