How to Succeed on the Job and During a Search? It's What You Think, Stupid!

Your future success is determined by what you think about yourself right now. Your tomorrows are defined by your today's and what you think about all day long. So your future cannot be any more satisfying than the current opinions you hold of yourself.

By way of example, let's say that during grammar school one of your classmates said that you were a loser. You would hold on to that opinion of yourself to this very day. A negative byproduct of what you think about yourself is that you would be afraid to try new things for fear of failing.

And take the characteristics of poor people who become big lottery winners. They often lose it all. That's because they hold poverty opinions about themselves and are unable to invest their millions wisely. No matter how huge the jackpot they win, their reality is still one of being needy and of hardship. As a result of their thinking, they behave as poor people do.

You can change your mind

"If you believe that your current reality is fixed," said motivational author Louis C. Tice quoted on the Internet, "You get trapped in your own mistaken sense of ""This is the way it is."" You tend to think things are always going to be this way. But Tice says "the present is not permanent. You can change your mind."

What you think is how you'll act

When you possess a negative self-image, you'll act like the schlump you believe you are and always have been. So there's a need to change the image you have of you.

Happy talk

Self-image is a result of what we tell ourselves. If your self-talk is limiting, you are building limitation into your belief system. Always tell yourself who you want to be and what you want to have

Bloody Mary, a character in the Broadway play and movie South Pacific, knew this well when she sang:

"Happy talk, keep talking happy talk,Talk about things you'd like to do,
You gotta have a dream, if you don't have a dream,
How you gonna have a dream come true?"

You always act in line with the daydreams you've created for yourself

When you're able to visualize yourself as successful in your field of work, your subconscious will take over and change how and what you think and therefore act. This happens over a period of time as you work to match the new image of yourself that you hold in your head.

Tice sums it up nicely when he writes, "What you achieve is largely a matter of what you believe; in fact, you might say: believe equals achieve."

How to give yourself an attitude adjustment

So what's an attitude anyway? It's the stance you take and the outlook you have towards something or someone. You aren't born with the attitudes you hold. You've created them by habitual ways you think about a person, place, or situation. This thinking is habitual because attitudes have been programmed into you psyche..

An attitude you hold is positive when someone or something attracts you. The reverse is true when you retreat from something. In that case, you'll have a negative outlook.

Has someone ever accused you of having a bad attitude? If so, it meant you had a negative outlook because that person or situation repulsed you. On the other hand, if someone has complemented you by saying, "I like your attitude," it meant that person attracted you and you had a positive attitude towards her.

Attitude is neither good or bad until you have a goal. If your goal is to get a job in sales but are confronted with an established attitude about hating to ask for something in sales situations, you have a bad attitude. To succeed in a sales job you need to change your mind from fearing to ask for something-the order-to wanting to help customers achieve their goals by using and enjoying the wonderful product or service you provide.

Similarly, if you fear going on job interviews for the same reason, you must change your mind to wanting to show prospective employers how you can help them achieve their hiring goals.

You can eliminate lots of stress by changing your self-image from a person who fails to achieve, to one who deserves and seeks the goal he's after. This kind of visualization can help you to change your mind and your life by changing the picture you hold of yourself.

Two nice takeaways from this article

First, learn to control the way you talk to yourself or think about yourself. As an editor edits his copy, learn to edit your thoughts by substituting negative self-talk to positive and affirming "happy talk."

And second, visualize the end result you want to achieve in any area of life-from business and romance, to the job you want, the salary you deserve, and the kind work environment you desire.
Take it from Bloody Marty:

"You gotta have a dream, if you don't have a dream,

How you gonna have a dream come true?"

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