The True Secret Of Success - You Are The Average Of Your Five Closest Friends

If you could do only one thing for success what would it be? There are many things that you can do from goal setting , to regular feedback, to visualisation but perhaps one of the most important, if not the most important of all is the people you hang around with.

Hubert  Howe Bancroft  spent his life studying  how and why people were successful and became rich. He summarised his work in his book 'The book of Wealth' (written in 1896). This was an inquiry into the  nature and distribution of the world's resources and riches. He found the one thing that showed if you would be successful was the company you keep.

The Elastic Band Effect

The reason for this is sometimes described as an elastic band effect.
If you are surrounded by negative people who are in a bad way , when you try and improve, they will act like an elastic band and 'snap' you back to their level.

If you are surrounded by positive, successful people, and you begin to be negative, they will 'snap' you back to  their level. This will be because of the sort of conversations they are having, the places they go, to topics they discuss, the businesses they work on, etc.

The Fastest Way to Success

The fastest way to change yourself is to hang out with people who are already the way you want to be......Reid Hoffman (founder of Linked In)

Reid Hoffman hit the nail on the head with his quote. If you are surrounded by people who have already got to where you want to be, they will be talking , doing, acting in a way to continue their success. If you are in that environment you will carried along with them.

Reasons for success

So  apart from the general flow what other advantages are there with the people you hang out with.

1. Support
• Your network gives you support. If you are in a positive, action oriented, goal focused environment, you will get positive suggestions and help.
2. Ideas
• You will have better quality ideas.
3. Resources and Connections
• They say your network = your net worth. A good network will give you good resources and connections.
4. Accountability
• A good network will hold you accountable and force you to succeed in the goals you have said and shared with them.

Actions

So what should you do?

1. Review the people you hang around

• One way is to give a red mark to everyone who is negative and  give a green mark to everyone who is positive.and make sure that you have more green marks then red marks ( and you remove as many of the red marks as possible)
• Another way is to score everyone. If they are energy neutral they have a score of zero. If they give you energy they are +1. If they give you a lot of energy they are +2. If they take your energy away they are -1 and if they take a lot of energy away they are -2 Then calculate your net score with the people you spend the most time with.

Whatever you find, you need to spend more time with positive people who have done what you  want to do already.

2.Start a Mastermind
There is  a Japanese proverb ' none of us is as smart as all of us'
Another thing to do is to start a mastermind. A group of people who meet regularly. Each person will talk about his problem and then everyone will give advice. The idea is that the mastermind (the sum of all the minds) is greater than the individual minds.

Remember - Whoever you surround yourself with determines your destiny. so choose wisely.

The Secret To Organisation - The 5S model of Lean Six Sigma

Do you get frustrated by not being able to find something? Do you spend more time in trying to remember where that note was or trying to get back to the thoughts on a specific topic?

The 5S model of lean six sigma could be the solution  to your problems.

It is an organisation method to  ensure efficiency and effectiveness by identifying and storing items used and thinking about standardization  to increase productivity.

The 5S model is great for the workplace and fantastic for getting your personal world in order.

It comes from Japan and was one of the  techniques that enabled just in Time manufacturing.

So what does the 5S model say? Well there are 5 stages.:




1.Sort (Seiri)
2.Set in  order (Seiton)
3.Shine (Seiso)
4.Standardise (Seiketsu)
5.Sustain (Shitsuke)

The names are shown above (with the original Japanese names in  brackets).

So lets dive in to the detail. This is how I see the 5S model.

1.Sort

Everything in your environment needs to be considered. The items that are not necessary (or haven't been used in a while)  need to be thrown/given away. If you really can't throw it away put it in a storage for a couple of weeks and if it hasn't been used throw it away.
Also make work easier by removing obstacles to work.
Remove anything that is unnecessary.
Clear your workspace and desktop and this should make your world a bit clearer, less stressful and more relaxed.

2.Set in order

When anything comes in, into your world , you should think of the following questions:

   i) How will I use this?
  ii) When will I use this?
  iii) What else will I need when I am using this?
  iv) Who else will be using this/ Who else will be involved when I am using it?
  v) Where will I be using  this?
  v) What parts of this will I need/ do I not need

Once you know the answers to these questions, you can allocate in the correct place (e.g on your workspace or in your folders , etc.)
Make sure that all necessary items are correctly placed/stored so they can be easily selected for use.
For reports/work think how will users want to  see this and prepare the work in the format that will answer their predicted questions, efficiently and effectively.
Make it easy to select often used items/ files (Tools such as Workflowy.com or Microsoft OneNote or GoogleDrive are good to keep everything organised and easily accessible (on your computer or mobile)).
Place/file/store items based on their use and frequency of use, with the most often used items, placed in  the easiest to access areas.

3)Shine

Clean your workspace daily
Keep your workspace/filing/storage/documents clean and tidy and pleasing to be/work in.
This means that when you finish anything you should put things away.
This also means that when you finish your work on your computer, you close anything and reboot next morning. This should clear resources and refresh systems.

4)Standardise

Once you have a process that works, establish procedures and schedules to ensure consistency. This should be replicated by other people in your team or in other things that you do.
Ensure that your personal/work routine supports these new practices.
Make these new practices part of your daily routine.

5)Sustain

Make sure that once you have an improved system, this is maintained.
Ensure you track how you are doing to ensure that you do not fall back into bad practices.
Review regularly.

Questions Not Answers Will Bring You Success

Judge a man by his questions not his answers.

Your questions dictate the direction you focus and therefore the direction of your destiny.
People don't realise this and wonder why they have failed again and they don't even realise that their life was decided in a subconscious question.

So what can you do? You need to be aware of the questions you ask.

1)When you ask bad questions you need to replace them with good ones. i.e.

      a) Catch yourself when you ask yourself bad questions and notice them.
      b) Replace them with a better question.

2) Ask good questions in the morning to set you up for the day

3) During the day you need to ask good questions to direct your focus

4) Before going  to sleep you need to ask good questions to let your subconscious focus on  overnight and to prepare for the following day.

So lets see that in more detail

1.Bad questions and their good replacements

Why does this always happen to me? Replace this What can I learn from this or  How can I improve for next time?

Saying why does this happen to me has a assumption that  you are a victim and powerless and your thoughts and destiny are focused on being a poor victim. When you change this to what can I learn or how I can I improve for next time you are immediately transformed into a positive action world where you are in  control and can make your world better.

I'm useless. Replace this with what 3 things can I do to get better or  who can I learn from. When you say you are useless you are deleting  part of the sentence, i.e, useless compared to what - an olympic athlete, a professional? Again replacing with an action phrase make you feel better and gives you more options.

2.Morning questions

What am I most grateful for?
You can't be grateful and angry/fearful at the same time. Numerous studies have shown that being grateful makes you feel better. It is an easy way to feel great.

Who can I send a thank you note to?
The first email you send should always be a thank you or I think you are great email. This makes you feel great (as you are the sort of person who would do something like this and make other people feel great) and you build your social network which makes you feel more secure and makes you feel better.

3.During the day questions

What am I most proud of?
Thinking of this reminds you of what you have achieved.

What am I most excited about in my life right now?
This makes you feels more energized and action oriented.

4.Evening questions

What have I learned today?
You should always learn something every day, otherwise you are missing an opportunity to progress.

What are my 3 things to do tomorrow
This lets your subconscious focus on the tasks at hand. One trick is to see these 3 tasks as already done and experience the feelings you have after they have been completed.

The secret to success - A Rubber Band?

If I were to tell you that you could change your life and be successful and all you needed was a rubber band, you would probably think I was crazy but it's an experiment lots of people have done and found to be truly empowering.

So what is this about? This is based on the original 21 day no complaint challenge by Will Bowen, popularised by Tim Ferriss.


The 21 Day No Complaint Challenge

The original challenge from (Will Bowen) is to go 21 days without complaining. So what do you do?

1) Put your rubber band on your wrist. You have now started and are on day 1 of  the challenge.
2) When you complain you move the rubber band to the other wrist. You are now back to day 1. Every time you complain you have to swap the rubber band and go back to day 1.
3) The goal is to go 21 days without moving the rubber band to the  other wrist (ie not complaining).


Why should you do it ?

Tim Ferriss comments on this in his article 'Real Mind Control: The 21 Day No Complaint Experiment'.

He found the following things happened.

1) Instead of complaining he started thinking what could he do/create to avoid this happening in future.

2) He was able to turn off negative thoughts as he had to give a solution instead of just continuing with the complaining (The complaining  just kept open - loops in GTD (Get things done) talk which just result in you wasting energy). This resulted in better sleep and nicer conversations.

3) He found this attracted people to him as people want to be around action orientated problem solvers.

From my point of view, doing this exercise gives you back control of your life. When something goes wrong and you blame the weather, your boss, the other guy, it means that you have given away your power. Not complaining means you have to think of a solution. You also have to accept that it is your responsibility to do something about it.

You have the power and suddenly the world has changed.

What Is Life? 10 Secrets For A Successful Life

What is Life? Why are we here? What is the purpose? What is the reason?

In the east they talk of the purpose of life being Moksa or release/escape from the bondage of samsara (birth /death /rebirth).

Purpose

In my view it is about finding a purpose. This has been eloquently phrased by both  Steve Jobs and Benjamin Franklin,

"Make a dent" in the universe"....Steve Jobs

"If you would not be forgotten
  before you are old and rotten.
  Then write something worth reading
  or live something worth writing".........Benjamin Franklin.

I.e. you should try to do something worthwhile that will be remembered in 200 to 400 years.
So how do we go about it. Try these 10 secrets to have a successful life.

1. Remember Life is Short

In 49AD (almost 2000 years ago), Lucius Seneca (known as Seneca the Younger) wrote on the shortness of time. He says that time is the  most valuable currency not money.
He finds it strange that people are so stingy with their money and free with their time when their time is more important.
He also finds it crazy that people work all their lives and then retire when they are too old to enjoy the time they have. You should really take mini-retirements when you are younger.

So as we realize that life is short and we are looking for a purpose, how should we act?
Try these strategies...

2.Learn the rules

"Learn the rules like a pro, so you can  break them like an artist"....Picasso

You need to learn the  rules of life and  what you can and can't do.

3.Enjoy Life

"Life is not about waiting for the storm to pass, it is about learning to dance in  the  rain"

Before you know it, your time will be up. So learn to enjoy every moment of life.

4.Create your vision

"Everything you can imagine is real"....Pablo Picasso.

People often think that certain things are impossible but if you can imagine you can create it so go and do it. Everyone thought that running a mile under 4 minutes was impossible for a human but as soon as Roger Banister broke this record, many people did it.

5.Collaborate

There is a great fable called Stone soup. It talks about the secret to get anything is to create something together. People want to be part of something good.

6.Expect change.

"You can't step into the  same river twice"....Heraclitus (as the river would have changed and you would have changed).

Everything changes so you should expect change.
In 1894 there was a big horse manure problem in New York. There were so many carriages with so many horses and their manure was acidic. It was piling up on the streets and dissolving buildings.
Everyone thought it would be a disaster but then the car was invented and this problem disappeared.
Things will always  change.

7.Focus on what you want

"Your current conditions do not reflect your innate potential, rather the size and quality of the goals you are currently focusing on " ......Tony Robbins.

As William Whitecloud says in his excellent book , The Magician's Way,  your thoughts create your reality so make sure you focus on a compelling, exciting, positive vision.

8.Make your Goals bigger than your problems

People focus on their problems and then wonder why they are feeling depressed, negative and anxious.
From an evolutionary point of view we are hard wired to focus and prioritize dangers. This was great for stone age man as he was ready for any attacking animals. It is however not so good for us now as we focus on the negative still. This is why bad news sells more than good news.
So we need to counteract this and focus on the positive.
The best cure I know for anxiety is to make your goals so much bigger than your problems that your problems become insignificant.

9.Learn to Negotiate

In life you get what you negotiate, not what you deserve so learn to negotiate.

10.Fake it 

The brain processes information.When you see your your hand and when you imagine your hand the brain processes both of these. It doesn't really notice the difference (they both occur in area 17 of the visual cortex).
So if you focus on acting as if you are already where you want to be, your reality will match your vision.

Students rise to the level of their expectation so if you act as if it were true and truly believe in it and it will become reality.

How Earth Moves, Why are there Seasons, Calendars

This is a great video summarizing, how the earth, moves, why we have the seasons, why we have the Julian and Gregorian calendars and why we lost 11 days in 1752.

• Earth spins - The earth spins counterclockwise.  A way to remember  this is to think of the US as an animal running with its head leading.
• Meridians - Earth is split into lines
• Longitude (vertical)
• Latitude (horizontal)
• Tropic cancer(top) -due to tile of the earth.
•  most northerly circle of latitude on earth at which the sun can be directly overhead (ie it turns )
• Occurs on June solstice (when northern hemisphere is tilted towards the sun to its maximum effect).
• Tropic of capricorn(bottom)
• Most southerly circle of latitude on earth at which the sun can be directly overhead
• Sun is highest to you (your noon ) when it is on your median (all shadows point to either north or south pole)
• Subsolar point
• This is when the sun is directly overhead so there are no shadows -shadows fall straight down so they disappear
• In Hawaii this is called Lahaina noon
• It occurs twice year,
• Local apparent solar noon: This is when the sun is overhead on your meridian
• Sidereal day (pertaining to the stars): It takes 23.9 hours for the earth (eg a meridian to spin) relative to a far away star.
•  (eg This is live driving a car and looking at a far away mountain, which doesn't seem to  move)
• This is a day relative to a far away stars
• Solar day :Earth moves counterclockwise around sun - more than sidereal day is required for a meridian to point back at  the sun.
• Solar day varies.
• Solargraph - picture of sun's path across the sky (normal distribution tall to shallow)
• Should be straight line at noon local apparent solar noon but is 8 (top small, bottom long)
• So your clock appears slow and fast relative to this
• Equation of time - compare clock time to solar time
• Why is there difference between our clocks and solar time? 
• Earth on an eliptical orbit around the sun so speed changes - close and faster in January so a solar day is longer (turn more) compared to further away
• Earth is tilted so the subsolar point goes  up and down
• Sep 18 solar day - shortest 1min less
• Dec 22 solar day- longest 1min more
• Tilt causes seasons
• More heat energy laid down per area.
• Also tilted half spends more time receiving sunlight
• Solar year - The solar year  365.25 solar days 
• Julian Calendar-
• This calendar added a leap day every 4 years (Feb 29)
• Introduced in 46 BC by Julius Ceaser
• Leap days move calendar too far. Its not  365.25 but 365.2421 and it fluctuates year to year
• so in 1582 - The calendar was 10 days behind the season compared to where they used to be.
• Gregorian   calendar 

• Created by Pope Gregory the 13th.
• Catholic church wanted Easter to occur exactly when it occurred centuries ago.
• This makes 3 fewer leap days every 400 years. There is a leap day added every 4 years leap except if divisible by 100 unless if it also evenly divisible by 400
• In 1582 the calender went from oct 4 to 15 for countries who listened to the Pope  (i.e. they lost 10 days)
• England and her colonies (including the US) followed in  Sep 1752. They went from the 2nd to the 14th (ie lost 3-13) so they lost 11 days. They also changed the 1st day of the year from March to Jan 1st.
• This calendar still causes a difference every 3216 years.
• However the oceans, internal  liquids and celestial bodies are all affecting the Earth's movement.
• Speeds
• Earth spins 1670 km/hour around its axis.
• Earth spins sun 108k km/hour around sun.
• Solar system moves 70k km/h in direction of vega
• Solar system is part of galaxy milky way. It is at a  60% tilt and moving clockwise at 792k km/hour
• Galaxy moving through universe at 2.1million km/hour towards the great attractor

Productivity Tips from Elon Musk to Supercharge Your Success

Elon Musk is a super high achiever. He has multiple companies.

Tesla - electric car company
SpaceX - Spaceflight company
Boring company- Tunneling company
SolarCity - Solar panel and rechargeable lithium ion battery company
Neuralink - Neuroscience company

A recently email from him to his 37, 000 Tesla employees shows his  productivity tips for success.


1. Get rid of all large meetings (unless they provide value to the whole audience, in which case, keep them very short) and  all frequent meetings.

2. Meetings should be infrequent unless a matter is urgent.

3.Drop off a call/meeting as soon as it is obvious you aren't adding value.
It is not rude to leave. It is rude to make someone stay and waste their time.

4.Avoid acronyms or jargon.
Anything that requires explanation inhibits communication.

5. Don't let hierarchical structures make things less efficient - Cut out the middle-man.
Communication should follow the shortest path. Bypass the managers and go straight to the person doing the work.

6.Don't follow rules, follow logic.

How many of these do you do? How many of these can  you start to implement today?