How To Be Smart (Part 2)

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Developing good habits is one sure way of maintaining a healthy life. It improves your emotional intelligence. It’s another phase in learning the art of being smart. Here are some suggested practical steps to continually take to cultivate and sustain good habits:

1.  Always ask questions. Asking questions and questioning everything around us constantly is what makes us smarter. There's nothing wrong with not knowing the whys or the hows! Everybody has something that they don't know. But by developing a healthy habit about asking politely when you don't know something, you'll find yourself getting smarter and smarter.

2.     Set goals once a week. Ask yourself during each goal-setting session, how many of last week's goals did I achieve? Why didn't I accomplish some of my goals and what can I do to give myself a greater chance of success?

- Constantly work hard to achieve each of your goals. Without goals, you would have nothing to hope for. Reward yourself after accomplishing your goal.

- Be organized. You don't need to be a total neat freak, but wasting time is not smart. Of course, there are many geniuses who are completely disorganized (think of the absent-minded professor) but if you're making an active effort to be smart, taking a conscious approach to how you spend your time is a big step in the right direction.

3.     Devote time to education. Educating yourself takes time, and if you want to get smarter it is going to require effort. Education doesn’t just mean attending school and coming out on top of the class. School is just one source of information. If you have straight A's, that doesn't mean that you are smart (though that could mean brilliance). There are many sources of information out there. For example: books, documentaries, and the almost boundless Internet. Exercising an open mind will make you more intelligent and constantly learning will help you achieve your dream of being smart. Don’t expect it to happen overnight. You need to spend a lot of time actively thinking and learning if you want to really be smart.

Source: Wikihow

KEEP MOVING ON

Never stop learning. Strive to move on. There's no neutral ground in life. No one sits on d fence and gets to anywhere important in life.
After breaking the world's fastest record (which he was holding at the time), Usain Bolt has gone on to steadily win several races in different competitions against fierce opponents. You can always break new ground. He attributed his success to focus, determination, hard work and several other virtues.
The Koch brothers (Charles and David) in d Forbes top ten billionaire list are still making definite marks to increase their investments.
There are no limits for those who desire to move on to greater heights. There's a level beyond you. You simply need to use the eyes of the mind to see more opportunities around you and most importantly take advantage of it. As long as we are breathing, there's room at the top of the ladder. No success is ever enough.

Lessons from Bill Gates

Bill Gates, Microsoft Founder and Philanthropist

When questioned about his incredible success, Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, now turned Philanthropist with Bill and Melinda Gates foundation, offered these ten insights to anyone starting out and desiring success. They are worth considering:

1. Life isn't fair, get used to it;

2. The world doesn't care about your self-esteem; it expects you to accomplish something before feeling good about yourself;

3. You won't make $60k (about N9m) a year out of school, or be a vice president with a cell phone. You have to earn it!

4. Do you think your teachers/lecturers are tough? Wait till you have a boss; he is not tenured!

5. Flipping burgers isn't beneath you; your grandparents called it opportunity

6. Your parents weren't always boring; it came from feeding you, cleaning your clothes and paying your bills. So before you rush out to save the rain forest from the 'parasites' of your parents' generation, try delousing your own closet

7. Some schools may have abolished winners and losers, but life hasn't. They may have eradicated 'failing grades' and given you as long as you want to get the right answer. This bears no resemblance to reality;

8. Life isn't divided into semesters. You don't get summers off! Employers aren't interested in helping you 'finding yourself'; you do that on your own time!

9. Unlike television, real people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to work

10. Be nice to nerds; chances are, you'll end up working for one someday!

Think deep about how you want your life. Plan and prepare towards IT!
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ARE YOU GOING WITH THE FLOW?

“Only dead fish go with the flow.” Dead fishes simply go with the direction of flow of the water body. They have no life in them to go otherwise. How do we differ from dead fishes if we allow our lives to be patterned with what’s the norm?

Image Courtesy: contrarian.ca/2009/07/04/going-with-the-flow

Most of us like to take the path of least resistance. We don’t want to be termed the odd one out. We don’t want to be seen as been ‘different’ even though we’d like to be different but not ready to pay the price of being different: Courage.

How do you know if you are going with the flow?

A very simple way to know if you are going with the flow or not is the decisions you take on a daily basis. For instance, if you just resumed in an office where you resume by 8am and you decide to resume one hour earlier to get started with your day, you will be noticed and possibly mocked (I have seen that happen too many times); that’s not a problem. But when you drop your guard to go with the flow of prompt resumption or late resumption, you will notice one thing: your productivity will drop. You are down with the flow; struggling for survival. One mark of truly successful people is continually doing the inconvenient but necessary things without losing enthusiasm.

How do you deal with this: decide everyday you breathe to be different. Don’t take the path of losers. Don’t just do the convenient; do the necessary.

(A word of caution: By any means, being different does not mean you should neglect sound principles or good examples from mentors or role models.)

Dead fishes don’t swim. The water body carries them and sooner than later drops them on dry land. You have life in you, a great opportunity to be different and an example unto others in every good works. You’ve got no business going with the flow. Only those who stand out are outstanding.

Share and inspire a friend. Have a great working week.

GROWTH is NOT automatic!

You’re only young once, but you can be immature indefinitely. Each year the Lobster is forced to shed its shell; it’s a pity we aren’t! If you don’t make personal growth your responsibility it’ll never happen. The road to anything worthwhile is always uphill, so the sooner you start climbing the closer you are to reaching your potential.

Growth is your responsibility. When you were a child, your parents were responsible for your growth; now YOU are! Robert Browning wrote, “Why stay here on earth except to grow?” Yet not very many people dedicate themselves to the process of growing. Why? Because growth requires change and most of us are quite uncomfortable with change. Gail Sheehy writes, “if we don’t change, we won’t grow, and if we don’t grow, we’re not really living. Growth demands the temporary surrender of security. It means a giving up of familiar but limiting patterns, safe but unrewarding work, values no longer believed in, relationships that have lost their meaning. Taking a new step is what we fear most, yet our real fear should be the opposite.”

How do you grow? Physically, we all grow by eating well, sleeping well, exercising well. Mentally, we grow by reading, studying, learning and applying. Spiritually, by reading The Word, praying and applying the principles.

What you sow today determines what you reap tomorrow. Oliver Wendell Holmes noted, “Once stretched by a new idea, a man’s mind never regains its original dimensions.” So what are you doing today to become MORE successful tomorrow? Can you think of anything worse than living a life devoid of growth and improvement?

Using Effective Planning

An idea is a thought to be presented as a suggestion in an organized environment.

Team planning helps gather several ideas for better productivity. No man is an island!

Discussion is an exchange of knowledge while argument is an expression of foolishness. Discussion facilitates adequate planning and enhances faster implementation of projects or tasks. Avoid arguments as much as you can in any project, program or events planning.

Intuition, in philosophy, is a form of knowledge or cognition independent of experience or reason. The intuitive faculty and knowledge are generally regarded as inherent qualities of the mind. Intuition helps improve systematic planning.

To get better output in terms of executing a certain task or project, basic behaviors are important to put to mind to achieve desired result. Detailed list of goals to be accomplished should be made; deadline should be set for team members; appropriate logistics should be recommended; financing procedures and budgeting should be prepared. All these encourage appropriate decision-making for quick task completion.

If you have a small project, you will be tried in a small way; if you have a big project, you will be tried in a big way. Get started today to begin planning for smaller projects. Get into a team and prove yourself and you will find yourself handling bigger project soon enough.

Take A Step

It's always frightening when we want to do something new; get a new job, start a business, join a group/community. There's no best way to avoid such circumstances in life, except we don't really want to move forward.
Accomplishing new things demands sacrifices. It demands patience in the planning process, endurance in the delivery process. But in the long run, we experience a fresh breath of satisfaction when the goal is met.
Look before you leap is a common saying in our world. But how much do we really practice this?
In the course of life, some leap before they look. While some look, look and look and never leap. Both courses are not good. The proverb must be practiced: look then leap.
For a child growing up, the parents will tell him/her when crossing the streets that look right, look left and then right before you cross the road. The same is applicable to taking practical steps in life's journey. The road needs to be crossed.
Everyday we are faced with choices to make; either voluntarily or involuntarily. There's no middle ground. Indecision is in itself a decision not to make a decision.
How are you sure that the decision you are about to make is a good one?
Simply calculate with all resources at your disposal; researching, planning, preparation,
interactions and then pray. There are no guarantees.
But a step forward is better than being stagnant. Pool water stinks over time, and that's why they are constantly piped out and re-filled.
Sit down, plan and take that positive step today!