8 Habits of People With Amazing Determination and Willpower

How successful people resist temptation, stay
focused and determined, and remain resolute
in pursuit of their goals.

Here are ways you can develop those qualities
too--and as a result be even more successful:

1. Let your past inform your future--and
nothing more.
The past is valuable. Learn from your
mistakes. Learn from the mistakes of others.
Then let it go.
Easier said than done? It depends on your
perspective. When something bad happens to
you, see it as an opportunity to learn
something you didn't know. When another
person makes a mistake, don't just learn from
it--see it as an opportunity to be kind,
forgiving, and understanding.
The past is just training; it doesn't define you.
Think about what went wrong but only in
terms of how you will make sure that next
time, you and the people around you will know
how to make sure it goes right.

2. See your life--and future--as totally within
your control.
There's a quote often credited to Ignatius:
"Pray as if God will take care of all; act as if
all is up to you." (Cool quote.)
The same premise applies to luck. Many
people feel luck has a lot to do with success
or failure. If they succeed, luck favored them,
and if they fail, luck was against them.
Most successful people do feel good luck
played some role in their success. But they
don't wait for good luck or worry about bad
luck. They act as if success or failure is
totally within their control. If they succeed,
they caused it. If they fail, they caused it.
By not wasting mental energy worrying about
what might happen to you, you can put all
your effort into making things happen. (And
then, if you get lucky, hey, you're even better
off.)
You can't control luck, but you can definitely
control you.

3. Learn to ignore the things you can have no
control over.
Mental strength is like muscle strength--no
one has an unlimited supply. So why waste
your power on things you can't control?
For some people, it's politics. For others, it's
family. For others, it's global warming.
Whatever it is, you care, and you want others
to care.
Fine. Do what you can do: Vote. Lend a
listening ear. Recycle, and reduce your carbon
footprint. Do what you can do. Be your own
change--but don't try to make everyone else
change.
(They won't.)

4. Don't resent but instead celebrate the
success of others.
Many people--I guarantee you know at least a
few--see success as a zero-sum game:
There's only so much to go around. When
someone else shines, they think that
diminishes the light from their stars.
Resentment sucks up a massive amount of
mental energy--energy better applied
elsewhere.
When a friend does something awesome, that
doesn't preclude you from doing something
awesome. In fact, where success is
concerned, birds of a feather tend to flock
together--so draw your successful friends even
closer.
Don't resent awesomeness. Create and
celebrate awesomeness, wherever you find it,
and in time you'll find even more of it in
yourself.

5. Never stoop to complaining, criticizing, or
whining.
Your words have power, especially over you.
Whining about your problems always makes
you feel worse, not better.
So if something is wrong, don't waste time
complaining. Put that mental energy into
making the situation better. (Unless you want
to whine about it forever, eventually you'll
have to make it better.)
So why waste time? Fix it now. Don't talk
about what's wrong. Talk about how you'll
make things better, even if that conversation
is only with yourself.
And do the same with your friends or
colleagues. Don't just serve as a shoulder they
can cry on. Friends don't let friends whine;
friends help friends make their lives better.

6. Don't focus on others; only try to impress
yourself.
No one likes you for your clothes, your car,
your possessions, your title, or your
accomplishments. Those are all things. People
may like your things--but that doesn't mean
they like you .
(Sure, superficially they might seem to like
you, but what's superficial is also
insubstantial, and a relationship not based on
substance is not a real relationship.)
Genuine relationships make you happier, and
you'll only form genuine relationships when
you stop trying to impress and start trying to
just be yourself.
And you'll have a lot more mental energy to
spend on the people who really do matter in
your life.

7. Constantly revisit your long-term goals.
Say you want to build a bigger company; when
you're mentally tired, it's easy to rationalize
doing less than your best. Say you want to
lose weight; when you're mentally tired, it's
easy to rationalize that you'll start changing
your eating and exercise habits tomorrow. Say
you want to better engage with your
employees; when you're mentally tired, it's
easy to rationalize that you really need to
work on that report instead.
Mental fatigue makes us take the easy way
out -- even though the easy way takes us the
wrong way.
The key is to create tangible reminders that
pull you back from the impulse brink. A friend
has a copy of his bank note taped to his
computer monitor as a constant reminder of
an obligation he must meet. Another keeps a
photo of himself on his refrigerator taken
when he weighed 50 pounds more to serve as
a constant reminder of the person he never
wants to be again. Another fills his desk with
family photos, both because he loves looking
at them and to remind himself of the people
he is ultimately working for.
Think of moments when you are most likely to
give in to impulses that take you farther away
from your long-term goals. Then use tangible
reminders of those long-term goals to
interrupt the impulse and keep you on track.
Or better yet, rework your environment so you
eliminate your ability to be impulsive. Then
you don't have to exercise any willpower at
all. If you can't say no to checking your social
media accounts every few minutes, turn them
off and put them away for a couple of hours
at a time so you don't have to be strong
enough to say no.

8. Count your blessings.
Before you turn out the light every night, take
a moment to quit worrying about what you
don't have. Quit worrying about what others
have that you don't.
Think about what you do have. You have a lot
to be thankful for. Feels pretty good, doesn't
it?
Feeling better about yourself is the best way
of all to recharge your mental batteries.