The Secret of Success

Today we are going over the secret of success, in one word. Yes, one word, and that’s a guarantee.

Since 1971, here at The Pacific Institute, we have been studying success. Some of the most successful people in the world have been our students, and we, in turn, have learned a great deal from them. We have also spent a lot of time in the company of some of the world’s most respected research psychologists, talking about what makes some people succeed and others collapse – the difference, in short, between the cans and the can-nots, the do’s and the do-nots.

And after all these years of study and research, there is one thing we can state, with the utmost confidence: the secret of success is “Attitude.” That’s it. And it is really not a secret. People who succeed do not have fewer problems than others. They do not always start out with the most brainpower or better parents or more money, either.

As a matter of fact, sometimes they start out working against incredible odds. But they have a way of looking at things, a way of seeing obstacles as possibilities, a way of hanging in there and making the most of every opportunity that almost guarantees success. If you are running up against an unexpected challenge, it just might help to do an attitude check. Ask yourself, “Am I not seeing the way around, because of an attitude?” “Am I getting in my own way, because of my attitudes?”

You are successful – and flexible, optimistic and hardworking. When you change your attitude, you change your perspective on what you perceive, what your senses tell you. Situations and opportunities have new meanings, allowing for different outcomes. A whole, previously unseen world opens up, with a change in attitude.