Success and Freedom

50 Ways Happier, Healthier and More Successful People Live on Their Own Terms- part 3

21. Decide where you’ll be in five years and get there in two.

“How can you achieve your 10-year plan in the next six months?”  —Peter Thiel

There is always a faster way than you originally conceived. Actually, goal-setting can slow your progress and diminish your potential if you rely too heavily upon it.

In an interview with SUCCESS, Tim Ferriss said he doesn’t have five- or 10-year goals. Instead, he works on “experiments” or projects for a six- to 12-week period. If they do extremely well, the possible doors are endless. Tim would rather play to the best possibilities than get stuck on one track. He says this approach allows him to go drastically farther than he could ever plan.

22. Remove all nonessentials from your life. 

“You cannot overestimate the unimportance of practically everything.” —Greg McKeown

Most of the possessions you own, you don’t use. Most of the clothes in your closet, you don’t wear. Get rid of them. They are sucking energy from your life. They are dormant value waiting to be exchanged for dollars. Getting rid of underutilized resources is like injecting motivation and clarity into your bloodstream. When all of that untapped energy gets removed, a new wave of positive energy enters your life. You can use that energy in more useful and productive ways.

23. Consume a tablespoon of coconut oil once per day.

Coconut oil is one of the healthiest foods on the planet. Here are seven reasons you should eat coconut oil every single day:

• It boosts HDL (good) cholesterol and simultaneously blocks LDL (bad) cholesterol buildup.
• It has special fats that help you burn more fat, have more energy and maintain healthy weight.
• It fights aging and keeps you looking and feeling young.
• It reduces fever and acts as an anti-inflammatory.
• It is antibacterial and thus wards off possible illnesses.
• It improves memory and cognitive functioning (even for people with Alzheimer’s).
• It can boost testosterone for men and balance healthy hormone levels for both men and women.

Coconut oil is a healthy alternative to caffeine. Eating a small amount will give you a shot of energy. without the negative side-effects.

24. Buy a juicer and juice a few times per week.

Juicing is an incredible way to get loads of vitamins and nutrients from fruits and vegetables. These nutrients can:

• Help protect against cardiovascular disease, cancer and various inflammatory diseases
• Guard against oxidative cellular damage from daily cellular maintenance and exposure to chemicals and pollution

There are several approaches you can take to juicing. You can reset your body by doing a three- to 10-day juice “cleanse.” Or, you could simply incorporate juice into your regular diet. I do both from time to time. I always feel enormously better after juicing. Especially when I get many intense greens such as kale into my system.

25. Choose to have faith in something bigger than yourself—skepticism is easy.

In the timeless book Think and Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill explains that a fundamental principle of wealth creation is having faith, which he defines as visualization and belief in the attainment of desire. “Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, the mind can achieve,” Hill said.

If you don’t believe in your dreams, the chances of them happening are slim to none. But if you can come to fully know the things you seek will occur, the universe will conspire to make it happen.

According to Hill, here’s how that works:

• “Faith is the starting point of all accumulation of riches!”
• “Faith is the basis of all ‘miracles’ and mysteries that cannot be analyzed by the rules of science!”
• “Faith is the element that transforms the ordinary vibration of thought, created by the finite mind of man, into the spiritual equivalent.”
• “Faith is the only agency through which the cosmic force of Infinite Intelligence can be harnessed and used.”
• “Faith is the element, the ‘chemical’ which, when mixed with prayer, gives one direct communication with Infinite Intelligence.”
• Like expressing love, in our culture, many are uncomfortable with ideas like faith. Yet to all of the best business minds in recent history, faith was fundamental to their success.

26. Stop obsessing about the outcome.

Research has found that expectations in one’s own ability serves as a better predictor of high performance than expectations about a specific outcome. In his book The Personal MBA, Josh Kaufman explains that when setting goals, your locus of control should target what you can control (i.e., your efforts) instead of results you can’t control (e.g., whether you get the part).

Expect optimal performance from yourself and let the chips fall where they may. The organic output will be your highest-quality work. Put most simply: Do what is right, let the consequence follow.

27. Schedule at least one guilt-free hour to relaxation per day.

In our quest for success, many of us have become workaholics. But relaxation is crucial for success. It is akin to resting between sets at the gym. Without resting, your workout will be far less than it could have been.

Foolishly, people approach their lives like a workout without rest breaks. Instead, they take stimulants to keep themselves going longer and longer. But this isn’t sustainable or healthy. It’s also bad for productivity and creativity in the short- and long-term.

28. Genuinely apologize to people you’ve mistreated.

People make mistakes several times every single day. Sadly—and hilariously—much of the time we act like kids and blame our mistakes on external factors. Research has found that people who don’t often and openly apologize experience higher levels of stress and anxiety.

You don’t need that pent-up energy in your life. Make amends and let it go. It’s not your decision whether people choose to forgive you.

29. Make friends with five people who inspire you.

“You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.”  —Jim Rohn

Who you spend time with is incredibly important. Even more fundamental is what types of people are you comfortable around. Your comfort level is one of the clearest indicators of your character. Are the people you enjoy being around inspiring or degrading, hard-working or lazy?

• What kinds of beliefs do your friends have?
• What kinds of goals are they pursuing?
• How much money do they make?
• What does their health look like?

All of these things dramatically impact you. It can be one of the most painful experiences in the world to become uncomfortable around people who have long been your friends. When you grow and evolve and long for more, you’ll begin seeking a different crowd to surround yourself with.

Misery loves company. Don’t let them hold you back. Move on but never detach from the love you have for those people.

30. Save 10 percent or more of your income.

“I would have saved 10 percent automatically from my paycheck by direct deposit into a savings account earning the best possible interest compounded daily. I would have also disciplined myself to deposit 10 percent of any additional money from gifts, refunds or other earned income. I would have bought a small house outright with the money I had saved (instead of renting an apartment for over 30 years). I would have found a job that I loved and devoted my life to it. At least you could be happy even if you were not where you wanted to be financially. Hope this helps someone out there.”  —D. Lorinser

Tithing yourself is a core principle of wealth creation. Most people pay other people first. Most people live above their means.

In total, American consumers owe:

• $11.85 trillion in debt
• An increase of 1.4 percent from last year
• $918.5 billion in credit card debt
• $8.09 trillion in mortgages
• $1.19 trillion in student loans
• An increase of 5.9 percent from last year

The 2010 U.S. Census reported that there were 234.56 million people over the age of 18 years old, suggesting the average adult owes $3,761 in revolving credit to lenders. Across the average household, American adults also owe $11,244 in student loans, $8,163 on their autos and $70,322 on their mortgage.

Simply switching to home-brewed coffee will save you an average of $64.48 per month (or $2 per day) or $773.80 per year. By putting the savings into a mutual fund with average earnings of 6.5 percent interest and reinvesting the dividends into more mutual funds over a decade, the $64.48 saved every month would grow into $10,981.93.

My wife once took an accounting class from a world-renowned accountant. His words on the first day of class: “The most important thing you’ll learn in this class, which most people will never learn: Spend less than you earn. If you do this, you’ll be financially free.”