Striving Towards Excellence

-Karthik Gurumurthy

1) Change Your Perspective Try to see the bright side of things. Your mind will want to drag you into negativity and focus on problems—don’t let it. Train yourself to find the good in every situation.

2) Think Solutions, Not Problems Stop dwelling on what’s wrong and start thinking about how to fix it.

3) Listen to Self-Improvement Stuff Find some good self-improvement CDs or audiobooks that help you spot your blind spots and grow.

4) Read Something Uplifting Daily Spend 30 minutes to an hour each day reading a self-improvement book. It’ll literally reprogram how your mind works.

5) Catch Your Negative Thoughts Pay attention to what you’re thinking. When you notice yourself going negative, stop and redirect to something pleasant instead.

6) Focus on What You DID, Not What You Didn’t Stop beating yourself up at the end of the day because you didn’t get everything done. Instead, look at what you actually accomplished. You might have crushed most of your day, but then you fixate on the one or two things you missed and feel like crap. That’s not fair to yourself.

Figure out how to prioritize better so you’re knocking out the most important stuff first. Then celebrate what you got done instead of dwelling on what didn’t happen.

7) Make Someone Happy Every Day Do at least one thing daily to brighten someone else’s day. Say something kind. Help a coworker. Let someone merge in traffic. Give up your seat on the bus. Buy your partner a small gift. The options are endless. When you make others happy, you become happier too.

8) Decide to Be Happy Just make the decision. Choose happiness every single day.

9) Don’t Envy Happy People When you see someone who’s happy, don’t be jealous. Be happy for them instead.

10) Hang Out with Happy People Be around people who are happy and learn from them. Happiness is contagious—catch it.

11) Stay Detached When Things Go Wrong When stuff doesn’t go as planned, do your best to not get all worked up about it. Staying detached helps you stay calm and in control of your emotions. (And no, detachment isn’t the same as not caring—it’s about inner peace, which leads to happiness.)

12) Smile More Seriously, just smile more. It’s that simple.