1.      SWOT Analysis:

And some became entrepreneurs, others dedicated employees. Some grew into the wave-making stars that we tune our TVs to, yet others fantastic stay-at-home moms or dads. Are they all successful? Of course they are; based on our SWOT analysis.  What is SWOT anyway?

S- Strengths (Your talents, unique qualities, etc.)

W- Weakness (Personality drawbacks, things you’re not good at)

O- Opportunities (Nature, Nurture- Environmental factors)

T- Threats (Power of your thoughts) (Modification of interpretation all mine)

One can only be true to oneself when an objective SWOT analysis has been carried out. You’ve possibly failed because you aren’t honest with yourself. If you keep butting your head against that wall, trying to achieve the same measure of success as someone else, when you aren’t endowed with qualities needed for that role, then your efforts would be near futile.  Note my use of the words ‘near futile’. I’m a firm believer of you getting whatever you desire and work hard for. Faith, determination and willingness to learn get you to the corridors of success. But why remain in the corridors, when you can get the ‘chief office’ and call the shots by doing what you absolutely love and gifted for, so you can be paid for it?

Everyone has his/her unique strengths, weaknesses and opportunities. An extrovert’s strengths probably lie in being a social butterfly, a talker/spokesperson, a convincing salesperson, a great care giver, one who makes a gloomy day seem like the sun just came out, from his/her attitude. If you, an introvert decide to go talking, acting and living like an extrovert (mouth first), you’d definitely end up miserable because you’re portraying what you aren’t. There’s absolutely nothing wrong in admiring characteristics that you don’t have and emulating some. Changing your personality, vision and aspirations to adopt someone else’s though is an absolute ‘no-no!’ What’s the guarantee that, years down the line, you won’t need to change to suit a new project, idol or spouse. It definitely isn’t worth it. We’re quick to say ‘why be a second-class imitation of someone else, when you can be a first class creation of yourself?’ Well, now’s the time to act it.

While we’re at it, weaknesses, opportunities and threats are part of the components that make you who you are and you should have no apologies about them. It’s sad to see people destroy their self-esteem due to their perceived weaknesses. It is a great thing to acknowledge your areas of weakness and seek to be a better person by working to minimize them. Would you ever be totally free of them?  No!  Should you be ashamed of them? Definitely not! But you can get to that stage where you control them and not vice versa.

I’d illustrate with this: Let’s say you have an anger management problem. Anger on its own isn’t necessarily a bad thing, (one can even have holy anger et al), but it becomes a real challenge when it flies into the realm of destructive/violent/uncontrollable rage. So you have an anger management problem, attend anger management classes and seek other ways of taming this wild beast. Finally, you’re on the path to living anger-free. Suddenly, one of your buttons is pushed. You’re about to explode! Still very angry, you move out of the culpable environment. It takes say 10 – 30 minutes to calm down. Do you still have the ability to get angry? Oh, yes! But now, you’re able to control your actions and reactions. That indeed deserves a pat on the back. Out of the blue, a personality that has minimal anger issues begins proselytizing on the need to live anger free and you feel you’ve failed yourself by having any trace of anger in your life. You should look back and be proud of how far you’ve come, from being a hellcat to being a master of your emotions.

Taking cognizance of your opportunities and how you can use them on your climb to success also determine how true to yourself you’d be. I see a lot of people who just sit back and do nothing but complain about their seemingly lack of opportunities, yet, they’re even better endowed than their contemporaries who’ve become successful. Truth is, if you wait for everything in life to be perfect, you’d never make headway, because life never gives you perfect conditions. Everywhere and every resource you meet is a great opportunity for you to write your own success story. Good thing the world has become a global village with a lot of resources at the disposal of those who are willing to tap into them. Never wait for the perfect moment. The ‘perfect moment’ is now and you have all it takes to be that new ‘You’ that you’ve always wanted to be.

I decided to put the power of thinking in the threats category. Why? You wonder aloud. The major challenge human beings have is their inability to order their thoughts, yet we are the only mammals who have been given that ability to make sane decisions and co-ordinate our thought patterns. If we go back to the early centuries, you’d discover that every inventor, great scholar or successful person was able to co-ordinate his/her thoughts. Ask the guys who constructed the ‘wonders of the world’, the telephone, the television, film/motion picture, the light bulb, the airplane, etc. They thought about these things long and hard. Even when they failed to succeed initially, they kept trying, until they were able to exclaim ‘Eureka!’ Our thought life would determine how far we would get on the ladder to success. This is because you get whatever you think about. If you entertain evil thoughts, evil/negative circumstances would attend your upcoming pity party. If you attend positive, happy and good thoughts, those are the circumstances that would grace your dinner party. If you truly want to be ‘You’, you have to think YOUR OWN thoughts. No one should think for you or tell you what to think. You are the master of your fate; your life so far shows what thoughts you’ve entertained. It’s never too late to change though if they’ve been all negative. You can begin right now and be all the great things you’ve always wanted to be!