In this article I am going to make an analysis / reflection on one of the last books that I have read: « Learning from the best», by Francisco Alcaide. One of Francisco's central ideas is that to achieve your goals or be successful, you can look at what other successful people have achieved. And what better way than to look at the books, conferences or reflections of those people who have come so far.
If you know the phrases of these people, you will know their way of thinking and their beliefs, and if you know their beliefs and internalize them, you will adopt their habits and ways of acting, which will positively influence your results.
Do you think this is entirely true? In my opinion yes, I think Francisco is right. I believe that having positive or "winning" beliefs will always positively influence and help you achieve positive results in your life.
In my opinion, the results you get in your life depend on:
- The environment in which you live and life experiences (this is partly in your control and partly not. For example, being born into a poor and uneducated family will take away your opportunities).
- Your beliefs, personality, habits (this is totally in your control).
- Good luck (this is not in your control). The random exists, although sometimes we perceive it as a consequence.
One of the people Francisco Alcaide is talking about is Tony Robbins. This author, probably the world's leading authority on personal development, claims that if you want to be successful, do what successful people have done.
And do not look only at their behavior, but at the way of thinking of those people. In their beliefs. Beliefs lead to interpretations of reality and interpretations of reality lead to actions.
The following example is based on real people, although I have made up their names to respect privacy. Maria and Julia, both 26 years old, are facing the current unemployment situation in Spain:
- María: Belief (difficult situations are opportunities)> Interpretation of reality in today's Spain (it is a good time to go abroad to learn languages> Action (to learn English in the UK).
Maria's result: she is currently working in the UK.
- Julia: Belief (difficult situations are misfortunes)> Interpretation of reality (it is difficult to find a job)> Action (does not look for a job or at most makes resumes online).
Julia's result: She is currently unemployed.
In my opinion you can see this in hundreds of areas of life. Logically there is room for error, although by observing their actions, you can know the beliefs of a person. And vice versa.
And can you change those beliefs? Surely yes. I summarize three ways:
- Francisco affirms that by repeating them and internalizing them: "a thought repeated over and over again ends up becoming part of you."
- Acting and achieving small achievements. For example, if you train for a year to run a marathon and finish it, you will build the belief that you have the ability to achieve difficult goals.
- Relating to people who have positive beliefs or moving in environments that accept those beliefs. For example, you will have groups of friends who will help your personal growth more and others who will do the opposite.
The 8 reflections or phrases with which I stay from the book
Something that Francisco Alcaide mentions is that you stay with those ways of thinking / beliefs that adapt to you and that you think are convenient to adopt.
Logically you will have your values and some beliefs will adapt more to you, while you will not agree so much with others.
In my case, the beliefs that most adapt to my values, that have influenced me the most and that have resonated with me the most from the authors mentioned in the book are:
1- « Complacency is the worst if you want to do something important « - Amancio Ortega.
How many movie stars, sports stars or businessmen "have hit it" after reaching the top?
Among average people, like you and me, we also can't hit them after reaching certain goals for relaxing too much.
The idea is that you have to keep working after your successes if you want to achieve really important goals.
Think of Elon Musk: he founded Paypal, made millions of dollars, and later founded SpaceX, Tesla Motors, and SolarCity.
2- " When you lose, don't lose the lesson. " Tenzin Gyatso (Dalai Lama).
Unless you win the lottery, which is unlikely, I think it is impossible to reach a high goal if you do not risk it.
And when you take risks, you have a good chance of failing. However, failing doesn't have to be bad. For example, Google often fails, for example with Google Voice, Dodgeball or Google+.
Its founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin believe that you have to fail fast, learn and apply what you have learned.
When you fail, don't let anger or negative emotions guide you. That will make you think worse and kill creativity. Think that it is progress, that you have learned and that you already know more than what they did not even try.
3- " Man is rich in proportion to the amount of things he can do without ".- David Henry Thoreau.
In the West, with consumerism, capitalism and marketing to which we are exposed, it is difficult to be happy with very little, although you can.
The happiest person I have ever met in my life was a man from Nicaragua, with 3 children, a wooden house with a room and a small kiosk with which he made a living. I had no bathroom, car, sofa…
In my opinion it is good to be ambitious, although I think that time is money and it is better to enjoy the life you have, while you pursue the one you want.
4- You will never be able to know what results are obtained from your actions, but if you do nothing, there will be no results. -Gandhi.
What if you gave everything to reach your goal?
It is not about throwing yourself into an empty pool, however sometimes we can always do much more.
In any case, regret usually hurts more than mistakes or failures. Therefore, I am clear that it is worth acting and risking failure. If not, you may reach the end of your life and regret everything you could do.
5- Most people spend more time and energy talking about problems than trying to solve them. -Henry Ford.
Think what the world would be like if we didn't focus so much on the negative and the problems. If the energy of the whole world were to solve world problems - water, renewable energy, wars, disease, hunger - I am sure that we would be much closer to solving them.
The tendency to focus on the negative is caused by the amygdala and humans have it by natural selection; If thousands of years ago you did not fear anything you would probably die.
However, today's world is totally different, you yourself have more luxuries than a king or businessman of the last century.
6- " Successful people have large libraries: the rest, large televisions." -Jim Rohn
I am more and more convinced of the importance of reading books.
If you are informed and you have knowledge, you have much more capacity to act on the world and to know what you have to do.
I recently read in Abundance (Peter Diamandis) that the English wikipedia took 100-300 million hours to write. That same amount of hours is what Americans spend a day watching TV.
How much could you personally grow and help the world if you spent the hours you spend watching TV reading?
7- « You have to decide what your highest priority is and have the courage to say <
This phrase is related to sacrifice. If it is difficult to get what you want, you will probably have to make sacrifices.
If you want to lose weight, you have to say "no" to alcohol or unhealthy food. If you want to take the exams, you will have to say "no" to leaving many times. And many more examples.
If you focus on where you want to go, you are more likely to get there. If you accept everything, you will get lost along the way.
8- « If you totally believe in yourself, there will be nothing that is beyond your possibilities. We are what we believe in. «-Wayne Dyer.
How can you be successful in your life if you don't believe in yourself?
Self-confidence or self-esteem is perhaps one of the most important traits if you want to be happy, develop personally and have the life you want.
If you don't trust yourself, you don't act. If you don't act, you have no results. And the less you believe in yourself, the more opportunities you lose, because you can never know where you could have gone.
Conclusions
Learning from the best is definitely worth reading because you will learn beliefs and get advice from some of the smartest and most successful people in the world and in history.