Becoming the best in your field!

There is no magic formula to success. We need to work harder and smarter and then there is luck/chance/right place right time. We can not do much about luck but we can surely work on everything else. There are many people who want to be successful in a certain field, but for some reason cant get themselves to be the best. What can we do? Well, as always I believe it is all about convincing ourselves of various truths and realities that we usually ignore.

Step 1-Know what you want

The first step to being good at something is to know convince yourself that this is something you want to be good at. I once wanted to do a PhD, but my proposal was never accepted. After getting rejected several times I realized that as much as I wanted to be 'known' as a good academic, it is not something that I really wanted to do. I believe I might not have even finished my PhD as I probably would have gotten depressed in between. 

To be good at something, we need to give a lot of effort and have staying power (more on that later), as we usually need to go through a lot of difficult times before we end up where we want to. Its like learning to drive, you do not get good in one day and unless you really want it, perhaps you cannot stick with it for too long, or perhaps you should simply not aim to high for your particular field of interest. Review periodically and ask yourself is this is what you really want or want it for the right reasons? are you simply wanting to impress a parent? perhaps you may simply want to enjoy swimming and not really want to be the best?

Step 2-Have Patience Staying power and realize set backs

Good things take time. You need to be able to stick to your efforts and the path to your goal will never be a straight line. You will fall, you will make mistakes, you may have a bad day, week or month, but you need to keep your eye on the ball and keep moving. It is important to convince ourselves that Rome was not built in a day and as bad as we would want to be good at something quickly, it is this impatience that makes most people give up. It is this impatience that differentiates the long term winners from everyone else. You fall, you learn, you get help, you try to stand up again and keep moving forward. There is no mystery to it. The longer you stay in the game, the better your chances of being better. 

Keep reviewing your efforts, and convince yourself how far you have come and how this is a process and not an event.Enjoy the journey, as much as the aim. This is really important as life is about living and becoming and not only about having or achieving (saying inspired by Tony Robbins)

Step 3-Strategy and knowledge

Not everything is about psychology. You need to ensure you have sufficient knowledge about a topic and a particular path to your goal. You know the techniques and have the tools to get moving. This may require asking a help from a friend, getting a coach, reading, training, whatever the case. You need information and a path to get to the goal. Constant review of your plan and end goal will also help tremendously. You must convince yourself that real work is needed and it will add 100% to the game you are playing. 

Once again, keep reviewing, learning and upping your game. There is no easy answer and there are no easy ways to do this. Everyone else will take advantage of new knowledge and so should you. 

Conclusion

Once we convince ourselves we can do anything, we know the answers already, we have the resources to get going, we can truly start working in the right direction. Knowing your goal, realizing the work that is needed and having the facts and figures to get it together, [and constant review of these] can help us achieve our full potential in a given field.