There are many paths to and definitions of success. The first step to achieving personal success is to define what it means to you in a crystal clear and detailed manner. Make it your mantra, write it down and carry it with you, recite it repeatedly. Make it your mission, learn everything you can about it, obsess over it, then work tirelessly towards it. Broadcast to the universe exactly what you want to achieve. If you haven’t done this first step then you’ll never find success. Your lack of focus will leave you like a rudderless ship hopelessly adrift at sea, wasting years of your life in the process.
This next one is equally as important, it's the key that will unlock almost every door. I’ve noticed, without exception, all “self-made” people have this one core trait in common. By self-made I’m referring to someone who has achieved success as an entrepreneur, an employee, and/or has learned the fundamentals of investing and have become independently wealthy. I’m not referring to those who’ve inherited wealth from some ambitious relative, a legal settlement, or won the lottery.
Also, to be clear, the term self-made is a bit of a misnomer. No one finds success entirely on their own. We all need teachers and mentors. Actively seek out mentors who have achieved goals similar to what you want to achieve and soak up every bit of knowledge you can from them. This can be a face-to-face meeting over coffee or watching a YouTube video while lounging at home. Be humble enough to admit to yourself what you don’t know. Knowing what you don’t know is vital and filling in those gaps and blind spots by educating yourself is a must. For the first time in the entire history of humanity we have vast knowledge available at our fingertips and most of it is free. Use this valuable gift.
Getting back to this one common trait of the successful, it isn’t something most of us are lucky enough to be born with and it’s certainly not going to be taught to us in schools. It must be burned into our brains through trial, error, repetition, and sometimes even pain. It can be taught to us from our parents, a rogue teacher, a mentor, or oftentimes by the universe through a succession of difficult life lessons if we’re perceptive enough to learn.
Here it is -- You, and YOU ALONE, are responsible for your success.
Let that sink in until you feel it on a deep level.
When you experience a failure or a disappointment repeat to yourself...
I, and I ALONE, am responsible for my success.
When you make a mistake, have the strength of character to take ownership of it. Do these things and watch how fast your life begins to change. If something isn’t working for you it is your responsibility to first identify why and then try a different approach. If at any time it feels like you’ve hit a brick wall, if things begin to feel hopelessly difficult then you simply must change your approach.
There are many things in life that keep you from success but blame and self-pity are your number one enemies. In fact, the more you blame others and take pity on yourself for missed opportunities and failures the further you will chase your goals away from you. Adopting a victimhood mentality leaves you powerless.
This point of view may go against the grain popular opinion but you must ask yourself this -- Are the powers that be really rooting for my success or are they trying to make me subservient to and reliant upon a system that teaches me to enslave myself to a life of endless toil and debt?
Define your goals, take 100% ownership for your own life and success, and there’s not one single thing in this world that can stop you. The first, and most important, steps to success begin within.
All for now.
With Gratitude,
Eric Vance Walton
(Gif sourced from Giphy.com)
Poetry should move us, it should change us, it should glitch our brains, shift our moods to another frequency. Poetry should evoke feelings of melancholy, whimsy, it should remind us what it feels like to be in love, or cause us to think about something in a completely different way. I view poetry, and all art really, as a temporary and fragile bridge between our world and a more pure and refined one. This is a world we could bring into creation if enough of us believed in it. This book is ephemera, destined to end up forgotten, lingering on some dusty shelf or tucked away in a dark attic. Yet the words, they will live on in memory. I hope these words become a part of you, bubble up into your memory when you least expect them to and make you feel a little more alive.
Pick up a copy of Ephemera today on Amazon.
Most of us have experienced a moment of perfect peace at least once in our lives. In these moments we lose ourselves and feel connected to everything. I call these mindful moments. Words can’t describe how complete they make us feel.
These moments are usually fragile, evaporating in seconds. What if there was a way to train your mind to experience more of them? It’s deceptively easy and requires nothing more than a subtle shift in mindset. My new book, Mindful Moments, will teach you to be much more content despite the chaos and imperfect circumstances continuing to unfold around you. Upgrade your life experience today for only $15.99 on Amazon.com.
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This is definitely true. I've seen a lot of motivational speakers who are acclaimed "self-made", they tell you they've been successful overtime and it's solely of their own making. This to me makes it feel like one can be successful without any sort of assistance, either intentional or inadvertently. But then practically, attaining successful is even a different ball game and we somehow need like minded people to support and propel one. It's why I chose to move with the right cycle of people because they matter a lot more. At the end of the day, learning new things and being consistent at doing it matters a lot to me.
This was pleasing to read, took my time and wow! I'm educated.
I'm glad you enjoy this. You are so right! Those we choose to surround ourselves with can either drag us down and lift us up. I've become very cognizant of this within the past few years. Success is a lifetime journey that really never stops. To stand still is to be left behind.
Exactly and rightly so as well, truth is, to stop would mean one has attain a height of self actualisation. But then, how many people in the world are self actualised.
I like to happily tell you that that building project I'm working on is 50% done, I'll be showing you some pictures, I'll be done sometimes in may or June next year.
That is great news! I'm really happy to hear that. I'm sure it wasn't an easy thing to achieve. Now there's a light at the end of the tunnel.
Thank you also, I guess my appreciation will come fully when it's totally completed. 😁😁
@tipu curate
Upvoted 👌 (Mana: 80/100) Liquid rewards.
I love that. If you can't imagine what you want to achieve, and imagine it unabashedly, it can never come true for you.
On a larger scale, I believe this is true for all of humankind. When we get wrapped up in false or negative imaginings, those imaginings become our reality. Take a look around now to see what I mean. Glance around, and understand.
Thank you! I believe living life with intention is very important. As much as dislike the term "woke" and connotations that go along with it lately, it really is a process of awakening to the power that we all hold inside of us.
We have so much working against us in popular culture, we really do. The public education system, even universities, deprive us of the basic knowledge we need to really succeed. It's all on us at this point to find our way to freedom.
Our educational system has trained us only how to be the larger system's slaves. It has taught us how to think so that we support the slave system. We are not taught how to listen to ourselves, and so we do not have access to basic knowledge that we need to live outside the slave system. Our path to freedom begins with remembering how to listen to our innate knowledge, such as the natural aversion to allowing our skin to be pierced.
Oh! I also said that in comment! ))
We think alike!
I 100% agree. One thing that makes this glaringly apparent for me is the total absence of personal finance/investing curriculum taught in the schools. Can you imagine what an advantage high school age people would have if they were encouraged to start budgeting, living within their means, and investing in their teens? They need a workforce and it's in their best interest to keep those workers at or near the poverty level and paying for everything on credit. This way people are too busy, tired, and stressed to pay attention to much of anything but how they're going to pay the next month's bills.
One of my nephews was taught, in a college financial course, that for a person to be financially healthy, they should OWE 16% of their annual income! THAT is a slave master talking to a slave.
We are all so busy being good little slaves, supporting the medical, war, technological, food, fuel and construction industries (to name a few), that we have no time to teach our own children well. I taught mine to never borrow any money. Never!!! Fortunately, I have enough to keep them afloat should they need anything. Also fortunately, and because I taught them well, they haven't needed any assistance at all. One of them is managing very well on $25,000 a year, saving quite a bit too, and learning valuable carpentry skills on the job.
That's horrible that they teach that this amount of debt is a good thing. Just look at the importance placed on credit scores now. They encourage people to have a massive amount of available credit because they realize most people won't have the discipline not to use it. It's a great thing that you taught your children not to be reliant upon debt. Our son got into the trades too, he's a plumber. He graduates from his five year program next year and will be making more than I did after 23 years in a white collar corporate job. My parents raised me to use credit responsibly and pay for most things with cash if I could. We were raised in the lower middle class bracket so we knew how to survive with very little.
I am looking to relocate, and I have a problem. My credit score is zero because I have neither borrowed nor paid back any loans for almost ten years. I encourage people to stop caring about their credit score! It's liberating! Recent college graduates are told to borrow, just to develop a credit score. It's crazy!!!! Best to pay cash for everything. But everyone is socking away their money in stocks, for their future, and they have to borrow as a result. I used to do this, then when I needed the money (just over 12 years ago), it was not there. So I stopped that malarkey. I am trying to convince my eldest to stop listening to a financial planner, but I'm not making much headway, except to convince her to reduce her "investment".
Maybe basic knowledge should be sought outside the educational system?
In nature, in conscience (в совести), in the traditions of its people?
I probably should have phrased that a little differently. Not only do they deprive us of the knowledge, they teach us things that work against us and drive us deeper into debt and misery. Materialism/consumerism are destroying us and the planet and they push that hard. I totally agree that we should seek knowledge on our own though. I've learned much more outside of school than I ever learned in classes.
Hello dear friend @ericvancewalton good afternoon
Excellent post, you say things very true, your words invite a reflection. Undoubtedly, we are the bearers of success or failure, if we do not visualize what we want in life.
I take this opportunity to wish you a happy start to the week that you enjoy it a lot
Thank you my friend. I'm glad you enjoyed it! I hope you enjoyed the weekend with your family. It's been HOT here but I'll never complain about heat since we have to suffer so much below zero weather in the winter. Have a wonderful week!
Yes, we are the only one to make our life the way we want. Planning, visualising, focusing and chanting a mantra all work as does determination and never giving up. But I also know that this is also called manifesting #ericvancewalton. Whatever our approach it is powerful and does work. Thank you for the read, it makes for a good read.
You are absolutely right. We are so extremely powerful but even when we realize it it's easy to forget. I'm happy you enjoyed it! Thank you!
Thank you for a great blog - really enjoyed reading this. Have followed you.
So happy you enjoyed it! Thank you for the comment and the follow Christine!
You're so welcome
Great advice! Thanks for sharing this! I think there are several aspects of my life that I could probably apply some of these concepts to. I especially like the part about figuring out what you can do differently to make things less difficult. It feels like that could be applied to many parts of our lives.
You're welcome my friend, I thank you for reading it! It's so easy to blame other people or situations, I find myself still slipping into this pattern too. It always paralyzes me when I do. As soon as I take ownership things begin to improve.
Yeah, I think I have a tendency to do that as well. Although many times it is because we work with idiots and it really is their fault! :) I heard a speaker one time talk about how being successful in a situation is recognizing the fixed things that you can't change and changing the things to you can to get a different outcome. Sounds very 12 stepish doesn't it...
Lol, there is that factor sometimes. That situation sometimes falls under the, "...glance around and understand" quote. We can burn a lot of years wishing for things to change that ultimately won't. It's not always easy to see things as they are instead of how we wish they were. I'm listening to Dostoyevsky's "The Idiot" now. One of my major flaws is seeing only the good in people and overlooking their flaws and, man, has that burned me multiple times in my life.
Still though, we need that attitude. It would be a sad place if everyone were cynical and suspicious of everyone.
I agree. There has to be a happy medium....maybe the old Russian adage, Trust but verify. Lol.
Exactly!
Very good advice Eric. I've learned this from many sources in fairly recent years, one of which being the most excellent book Grow Rich with Peace of Mind written by Napoleon Hill (available for free here: https://www.law-of-attraction-haven.com/support-files/grow-rich-with-peace-of-mind.pdf)
Con amor
Atma
I appreciate that my friend! Napoleon Hill is amazing. Thanks for posting the free link. Hope you are well!
Yes brother, very well thanks, especially having recently returned from a month long Rainbow Gathering in the Macedonian mountains :-)
Here's hoping you are often in the present moment and feeling joyful.
How about no? I mean for "only" $15.99 USD? Nowadays I receive approximately a $250 USD per month pension-like income because of my multiple disabilities. Nowadays sometimes I need to choose between paying rent/bills and buying food because of the financial discrimination I live in. And nowadays I also work in a 4 hours part time job, and my total income still does not reach the local minimum wage. $15.99 USD is a lot of money for me. I can buy approximately 4-5 days of food for that. I would like to upgrade my life experience, but I cannot afford to spend $15.99 on a book. And even if I could, I am still not sure that it would give any practical help to me, other than some poetry. $15.99 USD may be a little money for you, but it can mean a lot to others. Of course I am not from the USA. I live in Hungary.
I am so sorry you are in the situation you're in. I find it interesting that you ignore the entire post, zero in on the ad at the end of the post, and voice your doubt that the book would even be helpful without giving it a chance. I realize that $15.99 is a lot of money for some people but it might surprise you to learn there is probably 80 or so hours of work put into that book. That's just the writing and editing. Add the time it takes to promote, edit, create the art inside (paid an artist to do this), cover/book design (paid a book designer for this as well), etc. and it would easily be several hundreds of hours and several thousands of dollars. After Amazon's cut I get under $4 for each copy I sell. Also, the entire content is available for free on Hive or for $5.99 in eBook form. It takes an immense amount of effort in this business to break even, let alone turn a profit. It's taken half my life (25 years) to build an audience to be able to make that happen.
Just imagine yourself in my position. Living with multiple disabilities, and still working, but without reaching the minimum wage. I tried so much things over the years. It is hard to come out of finacial discrimination. Nowadays I am thinking about leaving Hungary. I mean buying an airplane ticket to Tenerife (instead of paying the rent/bills in Hungary), and joining a cave dwelling community, and using as little money as possible. I had enough of this situation.
I have posts with days of work, and the payout on them is mostly less than $1, because almost no one cares about them.
After the curation rewards cut, I get much less than $1 on my posts. And some people say that this platform is life changing. I would gladly switch positions with you.
Just like on Hive for most people. But you have more than $30 pending payout only on this post. Let's say $15, because the half goes to the curators. Still very good. And most of your posts earn much more. I am sure that your total income is much more than enough for a simple living. I cannot say the same about mine.
Not to sound cold or harsh but comparing our lives to the lives of others is a waste of precious time. Yes, some people would like to trade their lives for mine but some people in this world would like to trade their life for yours. It's inconsequential. I sympathize with your situation but it's better to use that time and energy to think about ways to improve your own life.
For example, focus on why your current approach to Hive isn't working for you and how you could change that approach to be more effective. I see your comments on other's posts and they're frequently negative, complaining about the amount of time you put into posts and how little they make, threatening to leave the platform. I can tell you that people are turned off by that attitude. If you could find it within yourself to adopt a more optimistic attitude and be willing to accept feedback you would discover more people would be willing to offer you more support.
My advice would be to brainstorm about what unique thing it is you have to offer to the Hive community that people would enjoy reading about. Ask yourself *How can I be of value to others?” Satisfy people's curiosity. People really like reading about places they've never been and the history and culture of the place and unique personal experiences. Think of every post as "building your personal brand". Blog about steps you're taking to improve your life. Even if it's something small every day. People, including myself, want to see others succeed and would support that. I hope there's a kernel of something in this that's useful for you.
Yes, I start to write and post only for myself. I use Hive as a diary and personal photo storage. If people will care about it, then that is good. If not, then that is fine too. Thank you for the advice.
You're welcome. If you ever want to make it more than a diary and have any questions on how to promote it or build your personal brand feel free to reach out. Take care of yourself @xplosive.
If I were given such wonderful advice (comment below from @ericvancewalton), I would just say "Thank you". I would listen to the advice of a more experienced Hive user.
Complaining about a bad life is the easiest.
We all have our problems! But we have to blame ourselves first. You just have to think hard about what your mistake is, what you’re doing wrong...
Eric, thanks for the advice!
I am neither an entrepreneur nor a businessman, so I do not seek success in business.
But for the ordinary life of the people, these tips will come in handy!
The words that have been most touched upon are that we must take the blame for our mistakes.
I think mistakes should be used as lessons, as life experiences!
You are welcome! That's how I try to view mistakes, as opportunities to fine-tune and become better. That's not always easy, especially if they're big mistakes, but it beats the alternative. Thanks for the comment!
Excelent advice Eric! When I first got the idea of a bnb post retirement, I did exactly what you said; spoke to as many people in the business to get advice, and worked tirelessly till late into the night planning and looking at every aspect. A friend gave me the best advice when he told me that I must remember one thing; if I do not advertise / market my bnb enough and it doesn't succeed, I will only have myself to blame. No good crying afterwards. The hard work continues but it is so satisfying meeting people from all walks of life; some arrive excitedly and some whose companies booked for them arrive very hesitantly, not knowing what to expect, but by the time they leave, they're relaxed and cannot wait to return next time; which happens often, and that's when we know we've done our job.
Hard work and passion for what you're doing, certainly pays off, just like here on Hive!
I thank you for the encouragement always and for the newbies you so often help! I was one of them a long time ago.
Thanks Lizelle! You were smart to do as much information gathering as you could. It certainly seems like you've found your passion and are making a good go of it! We have a good friend who runs an Airbnb in St. Thomas and she has a story similar to yours. She is absolutely awesome at hosting, as I'm sure you are. Your book should be arriving very, very soon by the way! : )
If one enjoys people, this is the best business to be in, it's great that you have this 'escape' to such as awesome host who has become a friend!
I can't wait for my book, you are too kind Eric!
I bet it's rewarding! Yes, last year was the first year since 2015 that we missed our St. Thomas trip. We were hoping to make it down at some point this year but now with the Delta variant running rampant we're not sure it'll be possible.