Think and Grow Rich — Reasons Why People Fail To Achieve Their Goals
Before success comes in any man’s life, he’s sure to meet with much temporary defeat and, perhaps some failures. When defeat overtakes a man, the easiest and the most logical thing to do is to quit. That’s exactly what the majority of men do.
— Napoleon Hill
In his book Think and Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill lays out thirty one (quite a specific number, huh?) major reasons why people fail in achieving their goals.
While all thirty one reasons are useful, I thought it would be helpful to share a few rules that most resonated with me.
1. Lack Of A Well-Defined Purpose in Life
“There is no hope of success for the person who does not have a central purpose, or definite goal at which to aim. Ninety-eight out of every hundred of those whom I have analyzed had no such aim. Perhaps this was the major cause of their failure”
What are you exactly aiming for? Why are you aiming for the goal you’ve set for yourself?
Without answering these questions with precision and conviction, you will not have a strong foundation to stand your ground when the world tests you.
At the first sign of potential rejection and failure, you will be tempted to abandon the path that could have led to you achieving your wildest dreams. You will not have the determination and belief to struggle through the beginning, where practically no one will believe in your vision.
Perhaps you have to be brutally honest here. Maybe you avoid defining a definite goal and laying out what constitutes success and failure because then you will be responsible for your life.
You will know precisely when you’ve failed, and you will know that there is no one who you can blame but yourself. So you’d rather keep the goal and criterion vague. Maybe you like it vague so that you can continue to live the life you’re currently living — without sacrifice, without self discipline, without direction.
But the only person you hurt with this stagnation is yourself.
You say you want something but what have you done to get closer to acquiring it?
Have you sat down and defined what you want for yourself, your friends, and your family in this life?
Have you drilled that belief into your brain enough to truly believe that, with a proper plan, you can get what you desire?
Have you created a strategy to deal with the potential obstacles that may get in the way of achieving your goals?
Without a clear and well-thought out plan with deadlines and regular self evaluations to analyze how you’ve succeed and failed in executing the actions in your plans, you will only continue to procrastinate and dream.
You will feel your soul grow more resentful and weaker each day, as you silence the voice that calls for you to take a step forward and create the dream life that you’ve always wanted.
2. Lack Of Ambition To Aim Above Mediocrity
We offer no hope for the person who is so indifferent as not to want to get ahead in life, and who is not willing to pay the price
The people who become successful beyond our wildest imaginations have a few qualities in common. They were not people who accepted mediocrity.
Mediocrity is encouraged in our society through entertainment. We are fed endless amounts of entertainment that distract us from working on our lives. We spend ungodly hours watching movies, playing games, browsing social media, etc.
We often feel empty after engaging in these activities, but instead of recognizing that these activities are distractions and deciding to remove them from our lives, we double down in these distractions so that we don’t have to pay attention to the dreadful anxiety, the fact of life passing by.
Will we continue to live a life that’s defined as “just getting by”, or will we decide to put in effort to find out what we love to do and figure out a plan that will allow us to do that for the rest of our lives?
Will we decide to live a life dedicated to improving ourselves each day, or watch ourselves fall further from the ideal version of ourselves through our idleness and indifference?
3. Lack Of Self-Discipline
Discipline comes through self-control. This means that one must control all negative qualities. Before you can control conditions, you must first control yourself.
Self mastery is the hardest job you will ever tackle.
If you do not conquer self, you will be conquered by self.
You may see at one and the same time both your best friend and your greatest enemy, by stepping in front of a mirror.
Publilius Syrus once said, “A wise man will be a master of his mind, a fool will be its slave.”
Your mind is both your best friend and greatest enemy because of its dualistic nature.
One moment you’re motivated to go to the gym, eat a healthy diet, and read to nourish the mind.
The next moment you find yourself laying on the couch with Doritos and Thin Mints, rewatching The Office for the 7th time this year.
Discipline means you create a plan that helps you move toward your goal.
Discipline means sticking to the habits that you’ve created for yourself each day, no matter how tired or indifferent you feel.
Discipline means refusing to give up and accept mediocrity when faced of failure.
Discipline means detachment of emotions — it does not matter if you don’t FEEL motivated, FEEL sad, FEEL lazy. You must do what you said you were going to do and you must not half ass anything that contributes to reaching your goal.
You don’t need to adopt a Spartan-esque mentality (although this could be effective for some). You just need to learn how to negotiate with yourself. You can do something difficult/tedious/boring and then treat yourself to some entertainment afterwards. You can reward yourself after hard work, which will help train you to adopt the mindset of work hard, play hard.
You will do what you need to do, and you won’t be tyrannizing and torturing yourself.
4. Procrastination
This is one of the most common causes of failure. “Old Man Procrastination” stands within the shadow of every human being, waiting his opportunity to spoil one’s chances of success. Most of us go through life as failures, because we are waiting for the “time to be right” to start doing something worthwhile. Do not wait. The time will never be “just right.” Start where you stand, and work with whatever tools you may have at your command, and better tools will be found as you go along.
I’ve often found that I procrastinate because I create many excuses for myself. Here are a few when it comes to writing an article:
“I don’t have anything worth saying or writing”
“I need to finish a book and let it marinate in my mind before I can write something valuable”
“I need to watch that episode of The Office where Michael Scott burns his foot on the George Foreman grill because he wanted to wake up to the smell of grilling bacon.”
“I need to go experience things outside so that I have something to write about”
While these are all valid reasons in explaining why I cannot write, I find that when I focus my efforts on my desire to write about something, I will usually find a topic that guides the way.
For example, up until a few hours ago I did not know what I wanted to write about. I decided that I would start reading this book and write something that resonated with me. When I gave my brain this task, it started looking for things in the pages and soon landed on the list of failures, which I immediately focused on since I am curious to know what the major causes of failure for most people are (so that I can avoid it).
I found that as soon as I defined what I wanted and started planning and writing (taking action rather than trying to think of a solution in my mind), the words started to flow onto the page.
The only way to defeat procrastination is to stop waiting, realize that the timing will never be “just right”, and start where you are currently. You will figure out where you are going along the way, and you will find tools during your journey that will help you move forward more quickly and efficiently.
