Things That Can Ruin Your Life and How to Avoid Them

2022-04-06 ~ adminlife

No person ever sets out to ruin their lives. It’s impossible to find someone that will make a New Year’s resolution to ruin their life.

Children don’t daydream about how much they’d love to become alcoholics in the future. Students don’t attend classes on how to go bankrupt.

Couples don’t dress up, spend so much money on a wedding, and show up at the altar while planning to get a divorce a few years later.

The point is, nobody plans to fail. But failure happens whether we like it or not.

And our failures are the result of our choices. We often don’t willingly make choices that we know will cause us to fail.

So, how can we avoid making poor decisions that will end up ruining our lives? These ideas can help:

Stop entertaining the idea that your actions don’t have consequences. You may think you’re doing it for fun, but your actions have consequences.
- For example, if you fail to pay your bills, you may get chased down by a debt collector. If you tell a lie, you may upset others. If you smoke, you may eventually develop emphysema.
- Whatever happens, every action you take has a consequence. And you can’t change the consequences or pick and choose what will happen.

- Your actions either lead you to your goals or lead you away from your dreams. It’s the difference between winning and losing.

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Live within your means. It is always better to plan and make smart financial decisions. Today, many people have no problem living beyond their means because they believe that it’s okay.

- Unfortunately, this will only lead to a difficult financial situation in the future. The social media lifestyle causes a lot of people to get carried away with the allure of a lifestyle they know they can’t afford.

- To avoid this trap, focus on what matters the most in your life. Many older people today are paying for things they accepted years ago. They still have mortgages, kids, and day-to-day costs that they have trouble covering.

- They scrimp on health care and end up sick for a long time.

Break any forms of addiction, including drugs, pornography, or shopping. Habits like these have a very negative impact on your life. The sad reality is, many people suffer some form of addiction today.

- Addictions lead to feelings of loneliness, and they don’t fill your life with good things. Some even cost your life. People find it challenging to break addictions because they feed them.

- It doesn’t take a single day to form a habit – it usually requires repetition to develop one. An alcoholic doesn’t become one by drinking one beer. The more he drinks, the stronger the addiction becomes.

- Eventually, he has no choice but to keep drinking. That’s the case with most addictions. Anything that is a drug or habit-forming has the potential to ruin your life.
- The solution? Stop feeding them.

Avoid assuming that you’re the only one going through your painful situation. Sometimes we gravitate towards others who share our problems, but it’s all too easy to think no one else exists out there who’s struggling like us.

- The truth is, you’re not alone. And thinking you’re alone is usually just an excuse you give yourself.

- Instead of making such assumptions, why not reach out? Talk to others and tell them what’s going through your mind. You might discover that they’re going through something similar. Once you’ve connected with those around you, you’ll be able to realize you’re not alone.

There are so many things that can ruin our lives. And sometimes, we only need to look at the path others ahead of us have set to realize what a mistake we make to live a certain way. And that’s okay, because this isn’t the end. We haven’t given up. We’re only getting started.

To work together to help you get moving in the right direction in your life, click on the blue button below to book a 15-minute, no obligation “Get to know you” call.

Going alone on creating a better life is difficult. Find out how working with a Life Coach can make the journey to success and a better life easier.

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To your success

Michael

P.S. you know that living a life that is in balance is important. When you can balance your work, family, health, relationships, fitness and money, you feel better and can achieve your goals. You have the support of your family and friends which makes life worth living.

Check out my programs at Confidence and Life Coaching by clicking on the logo below:

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5 Excuses That Derail Success

2021-10-03 ~ adminlife

No matter how impossible you might think something is to accomplish, there’s someone out there getting it done anyway. Most often, excuses are a way to justify fear of failure, fear of success, or a lack of resolve. Excuses get in the way of success and living fully.

By overcoming your excuses, success becomes much more likely!

Avoid letting these excuses sabotage the life you desire:

I don’t have the right education. A surprising percentage of the most successful people never completed high school. It’s true that education is required to be a doctor, lawyer, or engineer, but education isn’t required in many situations.

- Our society places a high emphasis on education, but it’s not always necessary. Motivation and commitment are far more valuable than education in most cases. How committed are you?

I don’t have enough money. Many of those wealthy in the present were poor in the past. Some of the biggest companies were started in a one-car garage. Money certainly makes things easier, but it’s not always necessary to get started.

- A lack of financial resources is a convenient excuse to stay stuck in your current situation. The world is full of money. If you don’t have enough money to move forward, find a way to acquire more.

I don’t have enough time. With careful planning, you can find time in your schedule for your priorities. How much extra time do you need to achieve your goals?

- You might need to eliminate some of the activities that aren’t as crucial to making your dreams come true, such as club meetings.
- If you regularly overextend yourself by saying Yes every time someone asks you to do something, practice politely saying No until you can sometimes make that your answer.
- Delegate some of your responsibilities.
- Cut down on watching television. You’d be surprised how much you can get done during the time you usually spend watching shows on TV or the internet!

It’s too late to get started. Do you think life has passed you by? An 80 year-old man climbed Mount Everest successfully. People over the age of 60 have graduated from medical school. Is it really too late? It’s possible that your age or life circumstances can make success more challenging, but it’s unlikely that it’s too late.

- What can you do today to take that first step?

I don’t know how to get started. There was a time when Tiger Woods didn’t know how to play golf and Warren Buffett couldn’t even spell “stock.” It might be true that you don’t know how to get started. That just means you require some education.

- There’s never been a time in history when more free information was available. You can find anything you need to get started online or at the local library. And there’s no law that states you can’t sit in the bookstore all day and read to your heart’s content.

If you feel that success is eluding you, thoughtfully consider the possibility that you might be making excuses. You might discover that what you thought was stopping you all along was really you! Now that you know, you can get past your excuses and on the path to success.

You can book your 15-minute “Get to know you” call by clicking on the blue button below

and we can talk about how we can work together to help you overcome your excuses so that you can be more successful.

To your success

Michael

Check out my programs at Confidence and Life Coaching by clicking on the logo below:

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8 Reasons That Explain Why You Fail

2021-08-01 ~ adminlife

Everyone that’s ever tried to accomplish anything knows what it’s like to fail. While there are numerous reasons for failure, most of them can be boiled down to just a few possibilities.

Understanding why you failed is important, because it educates you on how to improve your odds for success in the future.

See if you can identify the cause of your most significant failures in this list of common reasons.

These reasons may help you to understand why you failed:

Failing to learn from past experiences. You have the opportunity to be a little bit better at life each day. Every day you’re on this planet, you’re learning new things.
- Each success, failure, neutral result, and interaction with others is a learning moment that you can apply to the future.
- Analyze each day. What did you do well? Where did you go wrong? If you don’t evaluate your day and your results, you won’t recognize what you’ve learned.
Not acquiring the necessary knowledge. The more you know about what you’re trying to accomplish, the better your approach can be. When you first begin any new task, your knowledge is likely to be insufficient to ensure success.
- Spend some time learning a little more each day. However, it’s important to avoid the common tendency to spend too much time learning and not enough time doing. This is just another form of procrastination in many cases.
Avoiding commitment. Determination and regular effort are important components of success. Many failures are due to a lack of commitment.
Distractions. Life is full of appealing distractions today. It’s never been easier or less expensive to find mesmerizing distractions than it is right now. Eliminating unnecessary distractions will do a lot to enhance the odds of your success.
- Ideally, your objective will be the most interesting option available to you – more interesting than social media, cat videos, or mindlessly watching the TV.
Fear of failing. The fear of failure might be the most common fear. We fear wasting our time, embarrassing ourselves, and failure in general.
- Ironically, failure is one of the primary ways in which humans learn. And the more you learn, the more successful you can be.
Not believing that you can succeed. If we don’t think we can succeed, we won’t waste our time trying. Unfortunately, we’re not very good at predicting how well we can perform over the long term.
- This one is tricky, because you don’t know what you don’t know. The only reasonable course of action is to give it your best shot.
Giving up too soon. Persistence is one of the most powerful traits to have at your disposal. With small and consistent improvements, nearly any objective is achievable. Most people give up too soon to be successful.
Wanting to avoid the spotlight. Significant success draws attention, and many of us prefer the comfort of obscurity.
- If this reason is stopping you, realize that much of this concern only exists in your head. A few people might admire your success. A few people might be annoyed with your success. However, there are already people that admire you and people that are annoyed with you.

We all hate failure, but failure is educational. What’s most important is to keep trying and to understand why you failed.

A little more commitment and perseverance are often all you require to be much more successful than you’ve demonstrated in the past. Determine the most common cause of your past failures and vow to yourself that you’ll never fail again for that reason.

If you can eliminate all of these common causes of failure, you’ll be nearly unstoppable. Fail aggressively, but never fail to learn from your failures.

Book a 15-minute “Get to know you” call by clicking on the blue button below

and we can talk about how accepting failure and developing your goals from the lessons of your failure can help you achieve success in your life.

To your success

Michael

P.S. if you have always thought that you should have a Life Coach on your personal team to help you create the best year of your life but were put off by the cost and the time requirement, I have created a Self-paced course that covers what we would do when working together.

While not the same as working one-on-one with a Life Coach, this self-paced course can help you to understand your present situation, how you got there and how to set goals that will move you forwards to success.

Click on the logo below to find out more about the course

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How to Use Failure to Strengthen Belief in Yourself

2018-12-292018-12-29 ~ adminlife

Do you try to avoid failure? Most people do. It makes sense, too. Failing is no fun. It would be great if we could leap right to success. However, it doesn’t work that way. But, you can use tools to help you believe in yourself, and find that success. One of the best tools to help you is failure itself.

When you fail, you can use the experience to figure out what went wrong. You can evaluate the steps you took and try to find the point of failure. You can then choose alternative steps based on this information.

You do need to be honest in your assessment of why the failure happened. If you go around blaming everyone else for your failures, this will mask the true reasons, and you will never move on. It’s easier to blame others rather than admit mistakes. However, you aren’t doing yourself any favors when you do this.

Recognizing your failure is important, but don’t be overly critical. If you get to the point where you are putting yourself down because you failed, this won’t help your cause. You need to recognize that you failed, but know that it is going to happen and embrace it. Then, you can take a step back and figure out how to continue.

You can get inspiration from the failure of others. People write about their trials and tribulations in books or record videos about their experiences. Their experiences can help you by giving you tips on how to avoid the mistakes they made. Understanding this can help succeed at a much faster rate than if you make the same mistakes. Using other peoples’ experiences to your advantage is crucial. If you don’t do this already, it’s time to start.

Drawing from the experiences of others also shows you that you aren’t alone. If you read about how a successful person overcame obstacles, you can feel better about making mistakes. In other words, if they did it, so can you. That too is a powerful benefit of using failure to your advantage.

Is there ever a time when you should try to avoid failure? If you are repeating the same mistakes over and over, it’s time to take a hard look at what you are doing. If you can’t break that cycle, you may want to find a coach that can help you. Sometimes, that extra push can be all that is needed to get you to move on from that cycle.

To your success

Michael W

P.S. If you are looking for a confidence program that can help you with your self development. Send me an email at michael@youaresuccesslifecoach.com to request a copy of my “Maximum Confidence Transformation Package”. Afterwards we can arrange a discovery telephone call to discuss the package and how you can benefit further from developing your confidence level.

Feature photo used under CCO and available at https://pixabay.com/en/success-planning-strategy-draw-pen-620300/

Learn How to Make Mistakes

2018-12-222018-12-22 ~ adminlife

A big reason why you don’t trust yourself is you are afraid to make mistakes. It’s a common situation for many people. However, it could be holding you back in your success. When you learn how to make mistakes, you will be ready to start trusting yourself.

You may have heard people say that nobody is perfect. You should make it a rule to live by because it’s a true statement. When you make mistakes, you learn from them. That is what makes them so valuable. Of course, if you don’t learn from them, you will be doomed to making the same mistakes repeatedly. That’s why you have to do a post-mortem of your actions and evaluate where you made your mistakes.

If you try too hard to avoid mistakes, you end up making more of them. That is because no one is perfect. You simply cannot avoid mistakes and you shouldn’t.

Sometimes, the mistakes that you make will make people angry with you. It’s a part of life. If this happens, you first have to determine if your mistakes truly affected those people. If it didn’t, they have no right to call you out on them. If it turns out that your actions did affect them, do what you can to rectify the situation. A simple apology may be all that is needed.

Just as you would like others to forgive you when you make mistakes, be forgiving of others when they make mistakes, and it affects you. It’s not fair to expect others to forgive you if you aren’t willing to do the same. It’s okay to get angry in certain situations. But, open your heart and let them make amends.

Once you give in to making mistakes, you will find it a freeing experience. You will no longer need to put too much pressure on yourself to avoid them. Another factor to consider is that mistakes can lead to positive unintended circumstances. Just look at sticky notes by 3M. The researchers at the company set out to create a strong adhesive that resulted in a weak one. Someone at the company took the idea and used it to create the sticky notes product. There have been many instances of mistakes that lead to alternative solutions. These would not have happened if they were trying to avoid the mistakes.

Permit yourself to make mistakes which will help you to trust yourself.

To your success

Michael W

Feature photo used under CCO and available at https://pixabay.com/en/mistakes-failures-opportunity-2460733/