Everything in your life exists because you first made a choice about something. Choice is at the center of all success and failure. It is what we choose that makes the biggest difference.
Too often we sleepwalk through our choices. We default to choices that our society and culture tells us we should do. And it's not big choices, but ones that you think don't matter or count for much that derail us.

Choices Shape Your Destiny

<ul>
<li>Identify your triggers: Look at your list of bad habits. Figure out the “who,” the “what,” the “where,” and the “when” underlying each bad behavior.</li>
<li>Clean the house. Get rid of whatever enables your bad habits.</li>
<li>Look again at your list of bad habits. How can you alter them so that they’re not as harmful? Can you replace them with healthier habits or drop-kick them altogether?</li>
<li>Ease in. For some of your old habits, it may be more effective to take small steps to ease into unwinding them.</li>
<li>Or jump in. We are all different and some researchers have found that it can be paradoxically easier for people to make lifestyle changes if they change a great many bad habits at once.</li>
</ul>

Strategies for Eliminating Bad Habits

<ul>
<li>When you define your goals, you give your brain something new to look for and focus on.</li>
<li>Top people have very clear goals. They know who they are and they know what they want. They write it down and they make plans for its accomplishment. Unsuccessful people carry their goals around in their head like marbles rattling around in a can.</li>
<li>Make a list of your most important goals. Go for whole-life success: balance in all the aspects of life that are important to you: business, finances, health and well-being, spirituality, family and relationships, and lifestyle.</li>
</ul>

Setting Goals

<ul>
<li>Your core values are your internal compass. They act as the filter through which you run all of life’s requests, requests, and temptations, making sure they’re leading you toward your intended destination.</li>
<li>Getting your core values defined and adjusted is one of the most important steps in redirecting your life toward your own definition of success.</li>
<li>Decision-making is also easier when you are certain of your core values.</li>
</ul>

Core Values: Your Personal GPS

<ul>
<li>The most motivating choices are ones that align with your “why” and your purpose.</li>
<li>You need a deep why for doing stuff. With a why that is meaningful enough, you will do almost anything.</li>
<li>The access point to your why-power is through your core values, which define both who you are and what you stand for.</li>
</ul>

Find Your "Why" Power

Preparation (personal growth) + Attitude (belief/mindset) + Opportunity (a good thing coming your way) + Action (doing something about it) = Luck

The Formula for Getting Lucky

SMALL, SMART CHOICES + CONSISTENCY + TIME = RADICAL DIFFERENCE
The Compound Effect is the principle of gathering huge rewards from a series of small, smart choices. Small, seemingly insignificant steps completed consistently over time will create a radical difference.

The Compound Effect

<ul>
<li>Input (what you feed your mind)</li>
<li>Associations (the people with whom you spend time)</li>
<li>Environment (your surroundings).</li>
</ul>

We Are Affected By 3 Kinds Of Influences

<ul>
<li>Set yourself up to succeed. Any new habit has to work inside your life and lifestyle.</li>
<li>Think addition, not subtraction. Think what you can choose to “add in” so you can enrich your life experience.</li>
<li>Go for a Public Display of Accountability. Once you put it out there on the public record, you knows that you'll be held responsible for any action.</li>
<li>Find a success buddy .There are few things as powerful as two people locked arm and arm marching toward the same goal.</li>
<li>Competition & camaraderie. There’s nothing like a friendly contest to whet your competitive spirit and immerse yourself in a new habit with a bang.</li>
<li>Celebrate. There should be a time to celebrate, to enjoy some of the fruits of your victories along the way.</li>
</ul>

Techniques for Installing Good Habits

Repeated choices become habits. The first step toward change is awareness and the best way to become aware is to measure.
<ul>
<li>Track every action that relates to the area of your life you want to improve.</li>
<li>Start off with an easy tempo. Just track one habit for one week.</li>
<li>Pick the habit that has the greatest control over you; that’s where you’ll start.</li>
<li>Once you start tracking your life, your attention will be focused on the smallest things you’re doing right, as well as the smallest things you’re doing wrong.</li>
</ul>

Become Aware Of Your Choices

<ul>
<li>95 percent of everything we feel, think, do, and achieve is a result of a learned habit.</li>
<li>With enough practice and repetition, any behavior, good or bad, becomes automatic over time.</li>
<li>That means that even though we developed most of our habits unconsciously (by modeling our parents, responding to environmental or cultural associations, or creating coping mechanisms), we can consciously decide to change them.</li>
<li>The habits you indulge in could be compounding your life into a repeated disaster.</li>
</ul>

Creatures of Habit

Learning leads to knowledge. Studying a topic means you are invested in it.
The world already has tons of knowledge. You don't need to learn more. What you need is to study, to practice, and to take action on the knowledge you have.

Learning Vs Studying

<ul>
<li>Objects in motion tend to stay in motion.</li>
<li>The hardest part of momentum is the beginning. But once you get moving you can keep going very easily.</li>
<li>With momentum, you can continue succeeding with less work. It's easy to keep things running once you have momentum.</li>
</ul>

Momentum Is Huge

books

Books

problemsolving

Problem Solving

productivity

Productivity

personaldevelopment

Personal Development

7 Books on Habits

The New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller, based on the principle that little, everyday decisions will either take you to the life you desire or to disaster by default. No gimmicks. No Hyperbole. No Magic Bullet. The Compound Effect is a distillation of the fundamental principles that have guided the most phenomenal achievements in business, relationships, and beyond. This easy-to-use, step-by-step operating system allows you to multiply your success, chart your progress, and achieve any desire. If you're serious about living an extraordinary life, use the power of The Compound Effect to create the success you want. You will find strategies including: How to win--every time! The No. 1 strategy to achieve any goal and triumph over any competitor, even if they're smarter, more talented or more experienced. Eradicating your bad habits (some you might be unaware of!) that are derailing your progress. The real, lasting keys to motivation--how to get yourself to do things you don't feel like doing. Capturing the elusive, awesome force of momentum. Catch this, and you'll be unstoppable. The acceleration secrets of superachievers. Do they have an unfair advantage? Yes they do, and now you can too!

The New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller, based on the principle that little, everyday decisions will either take you to the life you desire or to disaster by default. No gimmicks. No Hyperbole. No Magic Bullet. The Compound Effect is a distillation of the fundamental principles that have guided the most phenomenal achievements in business, relationships, and beyond. This easy-to-use, step-by-step operating system allows you to multiply your success, chart your progress, and achieve any desire. If you're serious about living an extraordinary life, use the power of The Compound Effect to create the success you want. You will find strategies including: <ul><li>How to win--every time! The No. 1 strategy to achieve any goal and triumph over any competitor, even if they're smarter, more talented or more experienced.</li><li>Eradicating your bad habits (some you might be unaware of!) that are derailing your progress.</li><li>The real, lasting keys to motivation--how to get yourself to do things you don't feel like doing.</li><li>Capturing the elusive, awesome force of momentum. Catch this, and you'll be unstoppable.</li><li>The acceleration secrets of superachievers. Do they have an unfair advantage? Yes they do, and now you can too! </li></ul>

Darren Hardy is an American author, keynote speaker, advisor, and former publisher of SUCCESS magazine. Hardy is a New York Times best-selling author, who wrote The Entrepreneur Roller Coaster, Living Your Best Year Ever and The Compound Effect. 

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