It was 1989 Europe - a five year old was playing war in the courtyard of his building with the neighborhood kids - and time was rough under the Socialist regime. There were no hard rules, no guidelines, and only the oppressors had plastic weapons. One thing was clear though, everyone wanted to be a winner.
Fast forward - 2008 USA, now 23 years old, our kid has grown up to a young adult. Some things have not changed; everyone still wants to be a winner. The stakes are higher in the adult world: big kids play war with real weapons, lives are on the line, and everything is a matter of consequence.
With everything being so gosh darn important we set about to create lofty goals. We realize that in order to achieve we must be a certain type of person to perform the actions necessary to succeed.
The person we must be is a winner. "If you don't see yourself as a winner, then you cannot perform as a winner." ~Zig Ziglar
Type A (Winner) Personalities Winner, we will define as, a type A, get-it-done, care about other people, type of personality. This is the type of person that everyone wants to be around, the type of person that everyone wants to be. Here are 10 traits that I would define as necessary to being a
winner.
- Exhibit Integrity
- Do Not Speak Badly of Others
- Stay Optimistic
- Help Others When You Can
- High Ambitions
- Kind and compassionate
- Believe in and respect yourself
- Persist until you succeed
- Open mindedness
- Take responsibility
Fast Track To Being A Winner You know you have some huge goals and you've been wanting to be a winner since you were 5 years old; you're just like me. You realize that there are 10 important traits to being a winner and many other traits that you would like to adopt as your very own in order to live a happier, more successful, more productive, and more rewarding life. Here's what you can do...
Act as if' you are a public figure! What does this mean? It means that you must understand that people are watching you at all times. Act as if it matters that people are watching you, and that you have a reputation to uphold, and you must act in such a manner so that people do not discover that you are anything different than what you appear to be.
This creates a sense of obligation in yourself to uphold the characteristics that you set out to identify yourself with. This way, no matter where you are, you are always thinking about how you are being a winner, and what kind of example you are setting for the people around you.
Whether you are at work, happy hour, with your family, or at any public place -- be a winner. Life is nothing but a series of habits, good or bad, that we have set up for ourselves. By being very consistent with being a winner and performing the actions of a winner, we are making 'winner' a habitual quality for ourselves.
With time it won't be 'acting as if' and it will be 'going about your ways'.
"Regardless of how you feel inside, always try to look like a winner. Even if you are behind, a sustained look of control and confidence can give you a mental edge that results in victory." ~Arthur Ashe