Persistence Keeps Us Great
By Rick Pitino
- Thrive on Pressure: Stress robs us of our focus and inhibits our performance. Pressure is negative only when we are ill-prepared. In fact, pressure can bring out extraordinary accomplishments.
- Establish Good Habits: A bad habit is any habit that does not serve you in a positive way. Here is an example- Coming to work on time is a Bad Habit. An athlete wouldn't show up for an 8:00 game at 7:55 and go out and play without warming up. Why should someone who is arriving at work at the appointed hour think he or she is prepared for the day? You should arrive early and get your socializing out of the way.
- Master the Art of Communication: In four words LISTEN more talk less.
- Build Self-Esteem: You have to feel good about yourself to succeed.
- Always Be Positive: The rule is simple: the more trying the times, the more positive you have to be. Look at change as a chance to be more successful.
- Learn from Adversity: At one time or another we all encounter adversity that threatens our will to go on. (I had a son die in 1987)
- Learn from Role Models: The keys: Emulate traits you admire, and learn from others' mistakes.
- Be Ferociously Persistent: Persistence, more than anything else keeps us great. Anyone can be great for a day, a week, a month. But the people who ultimately succeed are the ones who understand that success is a long-term commitment.
- Set Demanding Goals: Most people, when presented with the fact that it takes hard work to be successful, will begin working harder. The difficult part is getting them to understand their weaknesses so they can frame their goals around fixing them. (This is not just for players, but everyone.)
- Survive Success: Today's success is often tomorrow's failure. A failure to maintain discipline cause it to evaporate immediately. It's that fragile. So never forget what you did right. Write down your own secrets to success. Study them. If nothing else, they'll remind you it wasn't good fortune that caused your success, but an entire lifestyle of achievement.