I have had the great privilege of traveling this great world of ours for over four decades and teaching people how to live and work successfully. It has been a fantastic opportunity to see firsthand the countless men and women who have decided to become their best and then disciplined themselves until they achieved it. There is nothing like living your dreams!
One of the things I have long taught is that if you want to succeed, you need to work harder on yourself than you do on your job. That is, if you want to move up the ladder, don’t just work harder—though you should do that—but work on yourself so that you as a person become better and of more value to the company. As you get better, those who can promote you will see that you have outgrown your current position and need to move higher!
This is where Keith Harrell’s terrific book comes in: One of the fundamental things that every person who wants to improve his or her life should work on is his or her attitude. Your attitude determines so much about how you will live your life and how far you will go in life.
Your attitude is like the engine that runs the car. The more finely tuned that engine is, the better the car will run. The same is true with your life. If you keep your attitude up—if you make it “super-fantastic,” as Keith says—then you will see so much about your life open right up and flourish. You will see your relationships expand and deepen. Think about it: Who wants to hang around someone with a bad attitude? But people with great attitudes are magnetic. People are drawn to them. They feel better being around them. And they enjoy them.
Your career will grow. All things being the same, the person with the better attitude will always go further. And of course, things won’t be all the same because you are going to have great skills too! When your boss or client is looking at you and sees a tremendously positive attitude, he is going to want to promote you or give you more business. Why? Because people like to do business with people who demonstrate great attitudes.
Your life will be more enjoyable. Of course, having better relationships and a better career will go a long way toward this, but when you have a positive attitude, your outlook on life will be so much better that the person you live with all the time—you—will find that there is much more inner peace and satisfaction with life than you have ever experienced before.
So, as you hold this book in your hands, you are beginning a journey that has the potential to greatly improve your relationships, your work, and your self-satisfaction. Isn’t that amazing?
But you will need to apply the truth in Attitude Is Everything. Just reading it will not change your life. But as you apply it, as you begin to renew your mind and begin to display that attitude to the world around you, then your life will change for the better.
Attitude is a choice. Each and every day that we arise we have a choice on how we will view and interact with the world around us. Keith Harrell has done you a wonderful service by writing this road map on how to choose and live with a “super-fantastic” attitude. Read the stories, apply the truths, and enjoy the journey!
Jim Rohn
October 2004