Few days back, when I read this quote which is by the way written by a very successful US plastic surgeon, motivational author, and creator of the Psycho-Cybernetics self-help book, Maxwell Maltz, I thought it must be so easy for him to churn out such motivational lines. Obviously, for a guy who has tasted success in multiple roles as a plastic surgeon and then as an author with a bestseller self help book, quoting on success and the power of self-image must be easy. But, isn’t this quote profoundly inspiring? You bet it is.

Have you ever come across a situation when it becomes difficult to keep your bicycle steady due to some problems in the tire? You are trying hard to keep the bicycle steady, but it continues to veer to the left or right. The same thing happens when we try to attain a goal without aligning our self image to the goal. No matter how hard you push, you would not achieve the goal unless you readjust the tire.

This is what Psycho-Cybernetics, a classic self-help book, talks about. According to the author of the book, most of us fail to succeed in our goals due to the mental picture we have of ourselves.  Each of us has a mental image of ourselves that defines our perception of what we think we are. These perceptions are based on our belief that we have developed through our past experiences. May be in your childhood you developed a belief on others reaction to some particular situation. These beliefs of what sort of person we are stays with us forever and we don’t bother to question much on these.

Escaping your self-image is not possible. If you believe that you hate public speaking, you won’t be able to enjoy it and if you think exercising is beyond your capabilities, you will not be able to lose weight and keep yourself fit. Likewise, if you nurture a self-image of being a failure, you would unconsciously find an approach to turn an opportunity into a failure. To achieve your goals, there is no other way but to modify your self- image. According to Maltz,

• Self-image determines your personality and behavior
• It controls your action
• It defines the boundaries of what you can do and cannot do
• Modifying and expanding your self-image means expanding your limits of capability

Once you are able to get rid of your negative self-image, you will be able to hold up an image of the intended target. Your behavior and personality will automatically adjust in a course of time to attain the target.  It is obvious that change of our self-image cannot be done overnight, as stated earlier, experiences has the power to mould your self-image. That means if you consciously picture yourself as a success, your brain as well as nervous system will guide you to the process automatically for all events in the future.

Therefore, if you want to achieve success in your goals, visualize the right self-image.

L. Ron Hubbard defines reasonableness as “faulty explanations.” When you agree with faulty explanations, you are too reasonable.

Examples of faulty explanations:

“I can’t repair your furnace today as it might rain.” The truth is, the repairman is going to a basketball game.

“None of the staff will work past 5:00.” The truth is, the manager does not want to work past 5:00.

“I can’t pay you as I promised as my wife is sick and can’t fix our meals.” The truth is, he is spending the money elsewhere.

“We’ll never get this project done today as we’ve never done it in one day before.” The truth is, they’ve never tried to get it done in one day.

Why Agree?

If you agree with faulty explanations, you agree to fail. Excuses, justifications and reasonableness produce nothing.

Yet disagreeing often helps you succeed.

“If you can’t fix the furnace today because of the rain, no problem. I’ll see if I can find someone who repairs furnaces, despite the rain.”

“I believe lots of people will work past 5:00. You are the manager and need to handle the schedules. Do you need me to show you how to do it?”

“Well, I’m sorry about your wife, but don’t see how that’s related. You agreed to pay me today, so I’ll have to get the money from you right now as you promised.”

“So what if we’ve never done a project like this in one day. We are better at this than ever before and I think we can get it done if we get going right now!”

The sun shines, the birds sing and everything improves when you disagree with faulty explanations. The lies disappear, the truth comes out and the solutions are obvious.

As well as being unreasonable about problems with others, you must be unreasonable with yourself. For example, “I’m tired and want to go home early. Too bad! I need to disagree and WAKE UP! I’ll take a brisk walk. Today should be a day I can be proud of.”

The most important thing you must be unreasonable about is DOWN STATISTICS.

“The one big god-awful mistake an executive can make in reading and managing by graph is being reasonable about graphs. This is called JUSTIFYING A STATISTIC.”

“One sees a graph down and says `Oh well, of course, that’s———–’ and at that moment you’ve had it.”

“Never JUSTIFY why a graph continues to be down and never be reasonable about it. A down graph is simply a down graph and somebody is goofing.” — L. Ron Hubbard

At some point, we have all given or received excuses for stagnant or shrinking statistics. Because these are faulty explanations, no solutions are possible.

“Reading skills are getting worse in the United States because we have too many television channels.”

“No one buys cars from Pete because he’s too old.”

However, when you disagree with explanations and find the truth, the solutions are OBVIOUS. Examples:

“Television has nothing to do with reading skills. What else could it be? Oh! Are children taught to use a dictionary?”

“People do buy cars from older sales people. Was Pete working every day? Has anyone trained him to sell?”

Exercises

In the examples below, decide which are reasonable explanations and which are the truthful statements.

“I can’t lose weight because (I’m too busy) (I’m lazy and addicted to chocolate).”

“Company profits are soaring because (I’m very charming) (the new computer system doubled our efficiency).”

“I have no money because (I don’t do financial planning) (of the economy).”

“I’m single and lonely because (I don’t get out and meet people) (no one likes me).”

“I can’t find a good assistant because I (have too many jobs) (am not taking the time to find one).”

“I let people boss me around because (I’m kind and caring) (I don’t stand up to them).”

Copyright © 2009 TipsForSuccess.org. All rights reserved. Grateful acknowledgment is made to L. Ron Hubbard Library for permission to reproduce selections from the copyrighted works of L. Ron Hubbard

I thank Dean Cooley and Prof Marti Subrahmanyam for their kind invitation. I am exhilarated to be part of such a joyous occasion. Congratulations to you, the class of 2007, on completing an important milestone in your life journey.

After some thought, I have decided to share with you some of my life lessons. I learned these lessons in the context of my early career struggles, a life lived under the influence of sometimes unplanned events which were the crucibles that tempered my character and reshaped my future.

I would like first to share some of these key life events with you, in the hope that these may help you understand my struggles and how chance events and unplanned encounters with influential persons shaped my life and career.
Later, I will share the deeper life lessons that I have learned. My sincere hope is that this sharing will help you see your own trials and tribulations for the hidden blessings they can be.

The first event occurred when I was a graduate student in Control Theory at IIT, Kanpur, in India. At breakfast on a bright Sunday morning in 1968, I had a chance encounter with a famous computer scientist on sabbatical from a well-known US university.

He was discussing exciting new developments in the field of computer science with a large group of students and how such developments would alter our future. He was articulate, passionate and quite convincing. I was hooked. I went straight from breakfast to the library, read four or five papers he had suggested, and left the library determined to study computer science.
Friends, when I look back today at that pivotal meeting, I marvel at how one role model can alter for the better the future of a young student. This experience taught me that valuable advice can sometimes come from an unexpected source, and chance events can sometimes open new doors.

The next event that left an indelible mark on me occurred in 1974. The location: Nis, a border town between former Yugoslavia, now Serbia, and Bulgaria. I was hitchhiking from Paris back to Mysore, India, my home town.

By the time a kind driver dropped me at Nis railway station at 9 p.m. on a Saturday night, the restaurant was closed. So was the bank the next morning, and I could not eat because I had no local money. I slept on the railway platform until 8.30 pm in the night when the Sofia Express pulled in.

The only passengers in my compartment were a girl and a boy. I struck a conversation in French with the young girl. She talked about the travails of living in an iron curtain country, until we were roughly interrupted by some policemen who, I later gathered, were summoned by the young man who thought we were criticising the communist government of Bulgaria.
The girl was led away; my backpack and sleeping bag were confiscated. I was dragged along the platform into a small 8×8 foot room with a cold stone floor and a hole in one corner by way of toilet facilities. I was held in that bitterly cold room without food or water for over 72 hours.

I had lost all hope of ever seeing the outside world again, when the door opened. I was again dragged out unceremoniously, locked up in the guard’s compartment on a departing freight train and told that I would be released 20 hours later upon reaching Istanbul. The guard’s final words still ring in my ears — “You are from a friendly country called India and that is why we are letting you go!”

The journey to Istanbul was lonely, and I was starving. This long, lonely, cold journey forced me to deeply rethink my convictions about Communism. Early on a dark Thursday morning, after being hungry for 108 hours, I was purged of any last vestiges of affinity for the Left.

I concluded that entrepreneurship, resulting in large-scale job creation, was the only viable mechanism for eradicating poverty in societies.

Deep in my heart, I always thank the Bulgarian guards for transforming me from a confused Leftist into a determined, compassionate capitalist! Inevitably, this sequence of events led to the eventual founding of Infosys in 1981.

While these first two events were rather fortuitous, the next two, both concerning the Infosys journey, were more planned and profoundly influenced my career trajectory.

On a chilly Saturday morning in winter 1990, five of the seven founders of Infosys met in our small office in a leafy Bangalore suburb. The decision at hand was the possible sale of Infosys for the enticing sum of $1 million. After nine years of toil in the then business-unfriendly India, we were quite happy at the prospect of seeing at least some money.

I let my younger colleagues talk about their future plans. Discussions about the travails of our journey thus far and our future challenges went on for about four hours. I had not yet spoken a word.

Finally, it was my turn. I spoke about our journey from a small Mumbai apartment in 1981 that had been beset with many challenges, but also of how I believed we were at the darkest hour before the dawn. I then took an audacious step. If they were all bent upon selling the company, I said, I would buy out all my colleagues, though I did not have a cent in my pocket.
There was a stunned silence in the room. My colleagues wondered aloud about my foolhardiness. But I remained silent. However, after an hour of my arguments, my colleagues changed their minds to my way of thinking. I urged them that if we wanted to create a great company, we should be optimistic and confident. They have more than lived up to their promise of that day.

In the seventeen years since that day, Infosys has grown to revenues in excess of $3.0 billion, a net income of more than $800 million and a market capitalisation of more than $28 billion, 28,000 times richer than the offer of $1 million on that day.
In the process, Infosys has created more than 70,000 well-paying jobs, 2,000-plus dollar-millionaires and 20,000-plus rupee millionaires.

A final story: On a hot summer morning in 1995, a Fortune-10 corporation had sequestered all their Indian software vendors, including Infosys, in different rooms at the Taj Residency hotel in Bangalore so that the vendors could not communicate with one another. This customer’s propensity for tough negotiations was well-known. Our team was very nervous.

First of all, with revenues of only around $5 million, we were minnows compared to the customer. Second, this customer contributed fully 25% of our revenues. The loss of this business would potentially devastate our recently-listed company.

Third, the customer’s negotiation style was very aggressive. The customer team would go from room to room, get the best terms out of each vendor and then pit one vendor against the other. This went on for several rounds. Our various arguments why a fair price — one that allowed us to invest in good people, R&D, infrastructure, technology and training — was actually in their interest failed to cut any ice with the customer.

By 5 p.m. on the last day, we had to make a decision right on the spot whether to accept the customer’s terms or to walk out.

All eyes were on me as I mulled over the decision. I closed my eyes, and reflected upon our journey until then. Through many a tough call, we had always thought about the long-term interests of Infosys. I communicated clearly to the customer team that we could not accept their terms, since it could well lead us to letting them down later. But I promised a smooth, professional transition to a vendor of customer’s choice.

This was a turning point for Infosys.

Subsequently, we created a Risk Mitigation Council which ensured that we would never again depend too much on any one client, technology, country, application area or key employee. The crisis was a blessing in disguise. Today, Infosys has a sound de-risking strategy that has stabilised its revenues and profits.

I want to share with you, next, the life lessons these events have taught me.

1. I will begin with the importance of learning from experience. It is less important, I believe, where you start. It is more important how and what you learn. If the quality of the learning is high, the development gradient is steep, and, given time, you can find yourself in a previously unattainable place. I believe the Infosys story is living proof of this.
Learning from experience, however, can be complicated. It can be much more difficult to learn from success than from failure. If we fail, we think carefully about the precise cause. Success can indiscriminately reinforce all our prior actions.

2. A second theme concerns the power of chance events. As I think across a wide variety of settings in my life, I am struck by the incredible role played by the interplay of chance events with intentional choices. While the turning points themselves are indeed often fortuitous, how we respond to them is anything but so. It is this very quality of how we respond systematically to chance events that is crucial.

3. Of course, the mindset one works with is also quite critical. As recent work by the psychologist, Carol Dweck, has shown, it matters greatly whether one believes in ability as inherent or that it can be developed. Put simply, the former view, a fixed mindset, creates a tendency to avoid challenges, to ignore useful negative feedback and leads such people to plateau early and not achieve their full potential.

The latter view, a growth mindset, leads to a tendency to embrace challenges, to learn from criticism and such people reach ever higher levels of achievement (Krakovsky, 2007: page 48).

4. The fourth theme is a cornerstone of the Indian spiritual tradition: self-knowledge. Indeed, the highest form of knowledge, it is said, is self-knowledge. I believe this greater awareness and knowledge of oneself is what ultimately helps develop a more grounded belief in oneself, courage, determination, and, above all, humility, all qualities which enable one to wear one’s success with dignity and grace.

Based on my life experiences, I can assert that it is this belief in learning from experience, a growth mindset, the power of chance events, and self-reflection that have helped me grow to the present.

Back in the 1960s, the odds of my being in front of you today would have been zero. Yet here I stand before you! With every successive step, the odds kept changing in my favour, and it is these life lessons that made all the difference.

My young friends, I would like to end with some words of advice. Do you believe that your future is pre-ordained, and is already set? Or, do you believe that your future is yet to be written and that it will depend upon the sometimes fortuitous events?

Do you believe that these events can provide turning points to which you will respond with your energy and enthusiasm? Do you believe that you will learn from these events and that you will reflect on your setbacks? Do you believe that you will examine your successes with even greater care?

I hope you believe that the future will be shaped by several turning points with great learning opportunities. In fact, this is the path I have walked to much advantage.

A final word: When, one day, you have made your mark on the world, remember that, in the ultimate analysis, we are all mere temporary custodians of the wealth we generate, whether it be financial, intellectual, or emotional. The best use of all your wealth is to share it with those less fortunate.

I believe that we have all at some time eaten the fruit from trees that we did not plant. In the fullness of time, when it is our turn to give, it behooves us in turn to plant gardens that we may never eat the fruit of, which will largely benefit generations to come. I believe this is our sacred responsibility, one that I hope you will shoulder in time.
Thank you for your patience. Go forth and embrace your future with open arms, and pursue enthusiastically your own life journey of discovery!

- N.R.Narayana Murthy
Founder & Chief Mentor, Infosys

- Hugh Prather
Notes to Myself, My Struggle to become a person

Charlotte, NC, June 4, 2010 — Rich London will present his personal empowerment “A Handbook for Life” seminars on November 6, 2010. In his seminars, Rich helps others overcome obstacles and set meaningful goals in their lives. Those interested can register for the November event at his website http://www.AHandbookForLife.com .

Parkinson’s patients and other groups can avail of discounts. The companion book “A Handbook for Life”, is designed to provide Rich’s proven principles in an easy to follow format and is available for sale at most of the major booksellers.

London’s first printed copies of his new book “A Handbook for Life” were received in January 2010 and his first seminar was produced March 27, 2010.

“At times, we all wish that life came with an instruction manual. This optimistic approach is based on sound principles, widely applicable, and yet simple enough to follow. It’s certain to make a difference in many lives,” said Dr. Yogesh K. Patel, Chair, Board of Directors, Parkinson’s Association of the Carolinas, who attended the first seminar preview.

London who has survived cancer and continues to battle Parkinson’s has seen his share of adversity. In spite of the challenges, he refuses to let life’s circumstances control him. He has done it by living the concepts and ideas that he shares in the book and the seminar.
Rich London has built several computer companies and is an active real estate investor. He has earned his third degree black belt and his commercial pilot’s license. He has also received numerous awards for his efforts as a volunteer search and rescue pilot for the Civil Air Patrol (USAF Auxiliary), where he holds the rank of Major. He resides in Charlotte, North Carolina with his wife and two children.

such is Rich’s positive approach that he says, “Life is a test. It’s a test of perseverance, a test of faith and a test of will. I’ve Decided to Pass the Test!’

London, was named the Charlotte Volunteer Coordinator for the “Victory Summit” produced by the Davis Phinney Foundation (to benefit and educate about Parkinson’s). He will be on hand for book signings and interviews at the Charlotte Convention Center in Charlotte, NC during the event Saturday, June 5, 2010.
Rich has also been asked to keynote the Southeastern Parkinson’s Disease Conference in Atlanta, Georgia on October 17, 2010.

Media and Potential Sponsors contact: Chuck Robbins, President aro marketing and public relations

Become An Expert
The solution to this problem of work overload is for you to become an expert on time management. There is probably no other skill that you can learn that will give you a “bigger bang for the buck” than to become extremely knowledgeable and experienced in using time management practices.

Be Open to New Ideas
The most foolish manager of all is either the manager who feels that he has no time to learn about time management or, even worse, the manager who, while being overwhelmed with work, feels that he already knows all that he needs to know about the subject.

Never Stop Learning
The fact is that you can study time management and take time management courses for your entire business life and you will still never learn everything you need to know to get the most out of yourself while doing your job in the most efficient way.

The Keys to Time Management
The two indispensable keys to time management are: 1) the ability to set priorities; and 2) the ability to concentrate single-mindedly on one thing at a time.

Since there is never enough time to do everything that needs to be done, you must be continually setting priorities on your activities. Perhaps the very best question that you can memorize and repeat, over and over, is, “what is the most valuable use of my time right now?”

The Best Question of All
This question, “what is the most valuable use of my time right now?” will do more to keep you on track, hour by hour, than any other single question in the list of time management strategies.

Start With Your Top Tasks
The natural tendency for all of us is to major in minors and to give in to the temptation to clear up small things first. After all, small things are easier and they are often more fun than the big, important things that represent the most valuable use of your time.

However, the self-discipline of organizing your work and focusing on your highest value tasks is the starting point of getting your time under control and lowering your stress levels.

Action Exercises
Here are two things you can do immediately to get your time under control.

First, make a decision today to become an expert on time management. Read the books, listen to the audio programs, and take a time management course. Then, practice, practice, practice every day until you master time management skills.

Second, set clear priorities on your work each day, before you begin. Then, discipline yourself to start on your most important task and stay at that until it is complete. This will relieve much of your stress immediately.

Article by Brian Tracy. Chairman and CEO of Brian Tracy International, a company specializing in the training and development of individuals and organizations.

The truth is, a lot of us move through life without any true purpose than merely exist. The act of living is the purpose. How much more fulfilling it will be if each one of us truly found a purpose.

Easier said than done, but this quest for a true purpose is worth the mental turmoil that it is bound to cause. A deep realisation of what it is that you really want out of your life is perhaps the best gift that you can give yourself.