Prosper News: July 2006
Dear Student,
This month we celebrate the independence of the United States. Independence can mean different things to different people. One thing is for certain, most people want to be free to chase their dreams and live up to their potential.
Here at Prosper, we encourage you to seek your own independence so that you are able to celebrate your own independence day. Do what you need to do to be able to fulfill the potential that your dreams afford you.
Your Friends at Prosper, Inc.
Develop Your Winning Attitude
Thinking Your Way to Success
You know them; they find success in everything that they do. They take apparent failure and turn it into a rewarding experience. Regardless of what the cards hold, these people end up with a winning hand. Who are they? They are people that have mastered their winning attitude.
The possession of a winning attitude is not something to be taken lightly. It will affect every aspect of your life. This attribute comes in many forms and with many names. Such names include optimism, luck, faith, etc. In reality, a winning attitude is simply an undying belief that you can accomplish whatever it is that you set out to do.
The development of a winning attitude is not something that happens by chance. A winning attitude takes time and effort to nurture and develop. The benefits, however, are well worth the work it takes in development. This positive outlook on life will provide you with the wisdom to set and accomplish goals that seem beyond our own abilities.
While we cannot develop a winning attitude overnight, there are some simple mindsets that we can adopt to begin to develop a winning attitude. These include:
- Direct Your Focus- in most cases, when we set out in an endeavor, we have preconceived ideas of what the best outcome will be. While these ideas may have validity, often times, there are multiple outcomes that may be very worthwhile for us. When things seem to go wrong, you have a choice to make, you can focus on the problems that you have encountered or you can keep your eye on the goals that you set when you set out. Where you place your focus will go a long way towards determining whether you win or lose.
- Seek Knowledge- often we learn more in defeat than victory. In defeat you can evaluate yourself and find out what you are really made of. From defeat you can learn what you need to do to succeed. Although you can gain the same knowledge from success, the need to evaluate what you have done is often more apparent when you suffer defeat.
- Redefine Failure- the only true failure is failure to try. When you give all that you have in the pursuit of an objective, you gain skills and attributes that will strengthen you throughout your life. Whether you succeed or fail in your objective is irrelevant to your growth. Many times what you may describe as a failure opens doors to great new opportunities.
- Be Positive- the more time that you spend focusing on the positive, the more apparent it becomes. Rarely is any situation totally negative. Take the time to define the positive in every situation. With practice, this skill will become more and more simple to utilize.
There is an adage that says that life is 10 percent aptitude and 90 percent attitude. By constantly developing and using a winning attitude, you cannot lose. You will find the diamonds in the rough and you will further enjoy the experiences this life has to offer.
