10 Bad Habits the successful give up to reach success

What separates the highly successful from most ordinary people is their immense willpower. It helps them to tackle their tasks, even when they don’t feel like it and it also enables them to rigorously identify and break unproductive habits. They are more than willing to give up whatever prevents them from reaching out for their dreams.

In order to live to your fullest potential, discipline is essential. After all, success does not happen by accident. It’s the result of the accumulation of all your efforts. Hence, here are 10 bad habits successful people have to give up to get to the top.

1. They do not make excuses

Successful people don’t default to making excuses. They don’t allow excuses to discourage them from pursuing their goals. Instead, they accept the situation as it is and make things happen despite the circumstances they find themselves in.

2. They are not seeking absolute perfection

Most successful people are far from being perfectionists. They may be striving for greatness, but they have also realized that perfectionism might not lead them there. Perfectionism could be keeping you from effectively accomplishing your goals. After all, reaching absolute perfection is nearly impossible in most circumstances. It can be beneficial to strive for perfection, but at the same time it can also drastically keep you from making any progress.

3. They do not try to please others

Seeking other people’s approval is not limited to our private lives. It can also greatly affect what we do with our life. The unquestionable key to failure lies in the attempt to please everybody. Successful people have realized that they simply won’t be able to please everyone, no matter what they do. They also understand that it is time and resource wasting. Instead of hoping to evade criticism, they actively seek to understand other people’s opinion about what they do. But, other people’s opinion will not lead them astray when they truly believe in what they do.

4. They do not seek to remain in their comfort zone

Living within the confines of one’s comfort zone is very joyful. There is nothing that frightens you and they are absolutely no risks you need to take. Everything feels familiar and you are in total control. The downside of remaining in your comfort zone, however, is that it will prohibit your growth.

Successful people challenge themselves to stretch outside their comfort zone. They actively seek new experiences that help them to expand their horizons. Even if this means that they are confronted with the unknown or that they have to take risks. Whatever helps them to expand their consciousness motivates them to leave the pleasant comfort that living in the comfort zone promises.

5. They do not feel entitled to anything

Far too many people grow up having a certain sense of entitlement. They believe that the world owes them all sorts of things. Consequently, this is how they approach life. It makes them less willing to work hard on the accomplishment of their goals.

Highly successful understand that success is not an entitlement. Everyone is entitled to pursue success, but success itself is not something that happens by accident. They understand that nobody owes them anything. As a result, they rid themselves of the impression that they deserve to succeed because they worked hard.

6. They have not stopped learning

One negative habit that can severely influence your life is to develop the impression that one no longer needs to learn anything. As soon as we are no longer willing to learn, we start settling for what we already know. We leave no longer room for development, growth and expansion.

Successful people have not stopped learning. Instead of trying to convince themselves that they know everything there is to know, successful people continuously seek to learn something new. Their striving for knowledge helps them to adapt to the changes that manifest in the world around them. It’s crucial for their progress.

7. They do not let their egos stand in the way

Successful people don’t allow their egos to get in the way of success. They have learned the hard way how important it is to correctly assess their strengths and weaknesses. As a result, they are less likely to fall prey to the cognitive bias that illusory superiority represents.

8. They have given up worrying about failure

Failing is an essential part of life. No one likes it, but everyone does it. The problem with worrying about failure is that fear limits us. It stops us from pursuing our dreams and makes us settle for less.

Successful people have the courage to stop worrying about failure. They perceive failure not as something that punishes them, but as something that teaches them important lessons. With each failure they get a better understanding on what not to do on their quest for success.

9. They have stopped lying to themselves

Far too often we are deluding ourselves. And in some severe situations it might be quite necessary to avoid a mental breakdown. But in most cases we are simply lying to ourselves because it’s more comfortable than facing the truth. We are scared of having to face harsh reality so we come up with all kinds of lies. When it comes to the pursuit of success, plain self-honesty is essential. Successful people know that lying to themselves may make life easier for them, but it won’t help them to achieve success.

10. They do not blame others

It’s a human tendency to seek the fault for one’s own mistakes in others.  If you are not capable of identifying the reason for a given mistake, you might repeat the same mistake over and over again. Consequently, blaming other people for your own faults will lead you absolutely nowhere.

Once you have the courage to seek first within yourself for a potential explanation to what happened to you, you open yourself up to the discovery of potential solutions. Instead of continuously blaming others for your mistakes you will stop playing the blame game. It’s the essential step that will help you to actually start doing something about your situation, instead of just complaining about it.