Rich or Poor?

These Daily Habits Determine Your Success

 

Author Thomas Corley spent 5 years studying the daily activities of 233 rich and 128 poor people. He discovered there was an immense difference between the habits of the rich and the poor. “Daily habits dictate how successful or unsuccessful you will be in life,” the author writes in his just released new book ‘Change Your Habits, Change Your Life’.

 

Corley understands the difference between being rich and poor not only based on his research but from personal experience: at age 9, his family went from being multi-millionaires to broke in just one night, due to a catastrophic fire that destroyed his father’s business. For 14 years they struggled with poverty.

 

Don’t expect getting rich instantly and, as always on this site, no prediction can guarantee success – but if you want to build up your wealth, it won’t hurt to start by slashing the following 11 common, yet costly, habits:

 

Gambling

“There is no such thing as getting rich quick,” Corley writes. “Financial success takes time, takes initiative, and requires relentless effort. Those who gamble are deluded into thinking there is a shortcut to success.” In his study, 52% of poor people gambled on sports at least once a week and 77% played the lottery every week. Conversely, 84% of rich people did not bet on sports and 94% did not play the lottery. “Self-made millionaires don’t pursue any get-rich quick schemes. Instead, they make a habit of pursuing their dreams and their goals.”

 

Eating unhealthy

Poor health habits create detrimental luck. 97% of poor people ate over three hundred junk food calories each day, 69% ate fast food three or more times a week, 69% ate candy more than twice a week, and 66% were overweight by more than 10 kg pounds. Wealthy people value their health. In addition to eating healthy, they exercise consistently and sleep 7 or more hours every night.

 

Alcohol

While the occasional glass of wine or beer is fine, drinking too much could impede your chances of financial success. 54% of the poor drink more than two glasses of beer, wine, or alcohol each day, 84% of the self-made millionaires drink less than that. Drinking too much could affect your memory and ability to think clearly. Plus, it’s a lot of extra calories and isn’t part of a healthy diet.

 

Toxic friends

86% of the rich people in Corley’s study made a habit out of associating with other success-minded individuals. “They also make a point to limit their exposure to toxic, negative people.” On the flip side, just 4% of the poor associated with success-minded individuals, 96% associated with negative, toxic individuals. You are only going to succeed in life if you surround yourself with the right type of people.

 

Watching too much TV 

77% of the poor watched more than an hour of TV every day, Corley writes, while 67% of the self-made millionaires watched less than an hour of TV every day.” They replace TV time with reading, thinking, exercising, or any other form of self-education. Making productive use of time is a hallmark of self-made millionaires, wasting time is a hallmark of poor people.

 

Negative thinking

Long-term success is only possible when you have a positive mental outlook. The problem for most people is that they’re completely unaware of their thoughts, positive or negative. Corely explains: “If you stop to listen to your thoughts, to be aware of them, you’d find most of them are negative. But you only realize you are having these negative thoughts when you force yourself to be aware of them. Awareness is the 

key.”

 

I’ll do it tomorrow

Procrastination prevents even the most talented individuals from realizing success in life. This goes hand-in-hand with author Napoleon Hill’s assertion that the wealthiest people are also the most decisive people. Whether you realize it or not, procrastination is a big reason why you are struggling financially in life. It damages your credibility with employers and fellow colleagues at work. It also affects the quality of your work and this affects the business you or your employer receives from customers, clients, and business relationships.

 

Avoiding Feedback

Bad criticism is the reason we do not seek feedback from others, but feedback is essential to learning what is working and what isn’t working. Feedback helps you understand if you are on the right track. Seeking criticism, good or bad, is a crucial element for learning and growth. Additionally, it allows you to change course and experiment with a new career or business. As Corley says, “Feedback provides you with the information you will need in order to succeed in any venture.”

 

Overspending

Spending more than you make is a surefire road to financial stress.

95% of the poor did not save and most accumulated debt to subsidize their standard of living. Consequently, they have no money for retirement, for their kids’ college, or for pursuing opportunities that present themselves. Spending more than you make and putting saving on the back burner creates long-term poverty, with no hope of escape.

 

Keeping a Job you hate

Toiling away at a job you hate will not only leave you stressed out and dissatisfied with life, it could affect your chances at getting rich.

The wealthiest, most successful people pursue their passions. Passion trumps education, intelligence, skills, and any other advantage those who lack passion might have in life. Passion makes work fun. Passion gives the energy, persistence, and focus needed to overcome failures, mistakes, and rejection. It infuses you with a fanatical tenacity that makes it possible to overcome obstacles and pitfalls that block your path.

 

Sticking to your comfort zone

“We so desire to blend in, to acclimate to society, to be a part of the herd, that we will do almost anything to avoid standing out in a crowd,” Corley writes. Yet failure to separate yourself from the herd is why most people never achieve success. While the average person finds peace of mind in familiarity, and hesitates to leave their comfort zone, rich people find comfort in uncertainty. The pursuit of wealth requires that you take risks. Most don’t, and that’s why most are not wealthy.

 

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Via ‘Business Insider’

 

*Corley; Change Your Habits, Change Your Life: Strategies that Transformed 177 Average People into Self-Made Millionaires (April 2016) available via amazon.com

 

 

A change of habits will lead to a change of wealth