Habit is the secret and power of true success

One of the best resolutions is to decide you will be doing little things to hit the jackpot of success. FILE 

By Seraphine Ruligirwa-Kamara

In Summary

• Many people keep buying ‘success’ materials that disappoint.

Many people want good results — fast. This is how short-cuts attract and tempt a big constituency. A short-cut to get there faster, easier and in as painless a way as possible.

If only someone could tell you the trick to losing weight, waking up early, beating deadlines, motivating your team or getting to the top of your game overnight.

Majority want to go from good to better to great in a flash and we could pay any price to rise that fast. Well, almost. Is this how you are hoping to start the new year?

While I agree that there maybe several quick fixes presented to you everyday, kindly note that those blow away as quickly as our new year resolutions, leaving an avalanche of incomplete projects.

This is why most “secrets to success” books, movies, programmes, seminars and whatever else are hyped up. And we quickly buy.

Soon after unravelling the so-called secret, you ask yourself if that’s it. Really? After all that noise? Wow. What an anti-climax! If you’d know that was it, you wouldn’t have bought into it, right? Wrong. You would have and will buy into more “success secrets”.

Stop buying, dear. The secret is that there is no secret. This isn’t something most of us want to start the year chewing on but that doesn’t stop me from saying it; there is no secret. What you have is the power of doing tiny little things daily.

After a week, increase your speed a little. And doing that for another week. Repeat this process adding on little actions weekly until you have several. This is called habit construction.

Beware that this is certainly NOT a quick-fix way of realising all those resolutions you must have listed last week — even if just mentally.

Note that little is immediately altered using this method. You probably won’t even notice an iota of change in the first couple of weeks or months. And if you’re a quick-fix hunter, that’s when you throw in the towel and resume the never-ending hunt for magic.

Stick with it. Keep at those seemingly little insignificant actions. This is better than waiting to experience the magic. This is when people will want your “secret”.

“How did you manage that?” they will ask. You smile proudly and start to tell them your story. The longer you keep talking, the more disbelief you see in their eyes.

They think you’re lying. You must be jealous of them — yes, that’s right, you don’t want them to enjoy the same success.

Unfortunately, most people who ask the question aren’t interested in the truth. And that has less to do with the experience you’ll be sharing with them and more to do with their conditioning.

The conditioning that encourages action is a monumental feat. The conditioning that makes it almost impossible to develop the habits that bring about the changes and improvements we truly want. Wants? Yes, “wants”. Herein lies the real issue.