(The following is the 2nd installment of a series of essays focusing upon achieving success. The previous essay was titled “Your Only Option is Success.)

It simply amazes me just how many people genuinely believe that in order to succeed in life that you must find the right type of scheme, trick, or sneaky underhanded way in order to make it happen. Unfortunately, I see it in the voices and faces of people I encounter almost everyday and it’s a very disheartening experience.

So I’d like to share with you the Key Success Factors which have helped me in my life, brought me growth, peace, and a success that I could not have achieved on my own. I pray that you seriously contemplate, embrace, and incorporate these Key Success Factors into your life.

1. Surrender Your Talents, Do Not Attempt to Drive.

When you learn to surrender your talents, goals, and aspirations to the Universe/God, this is when you will begin to grow and thrive the most. Learn to ask the Creator what your purpose should be and how best you should use your creative talents and gifts in its fulfillment. Allow the Holy Spirit to lead you but please don’t attempt to drive with your personal ambitions and ego at the steering wheel.

Your existence is not about you, but instead it’s about God having it’s/his/her purpose fulfilled through you. Remember that prayer is talking to God and meditation is listening to God. Listen more than you speak. Answers are not always revealed through loud events, but are often quietly seeped in through small thoughts and actions. Be mindful and search for clues and directions, but quit trying drive! Instead be led down your ordained path of success.

2. Examine Your Motives, Intentions, and Attitude.

Why are you seeking your goals? Why do you want to become a business owner, nurse, corporate manager, non-profit director, writer, producer, singer, or actor?

What exactly are your intentions behind your goals? If you were never paid a dime for your spiritual, analytical, physical or creative works would you still do them?

If you still had to work a 9-5 job for the rest of your life, would you pursue your outside goals for more money or just because it is what you were meant to do? If you never achieved fame, fortune, and powerful influence, would you genuinely continue your spiritual and creative works?

Think long and hard before answering. If notoriety, fame, fortune, and influence never came knocking on your door, would you still be pursuing your goals and aspirations 15-20 years from now? If the answer is a slight hesitation or anywhere remotely close to a no, then this is not your passion.

Your passion is something that pursues you, you don’t pursue it. Your passion is something that wakes you up in the morning and starts you on your new day’s journey. Your passion gives you wind beneath your wings. Your passion is something that you would do for free. Your passion is God working through you, in you, for the benefit of mankind.

So how do your current goals and aspirations motivate, inspire, teach, and entertain while accomplishing God’s purpose for your life? Again, your pursuits and your life aren’t about you. It’s about the Universe/God using you for a specific purpose. So if your motives, intentions and attitudes are not focused upon living out your purpose through your passions, then everything you pursue today will pale in comparison to the brilliant blessings you could have accessed.

3. Lean How To Network Not Plunder

Spend the money and join several trade and professional associations and go to their mixers and presentations. Make sure you create business cards that represent your key strengths and what you seek to do more of.

CAUTION: Networking is not about you getting as much information from someone as you possibly can then walking away. Networking is a push-pull, give –take, mutually beneficial existence and exchange between people. Whenever you network, always take a genuine interest in the person. Please do NOT feign interest but instead truly try to understand the other person, not solely for your needs, but for how you can help and assist them as well.

Do not hard-sell yourself to anyone. Do not try and work someone over until you get the goodies of information then take off, not to be heard or seen from again until you need additional assistance. Remember that you’re dealing with other human beings with emotions and feelings. Believe me, people will NOT be as inclined to help and assist you in the future if they feel that they’re being used solely for their potential contacts.

Do NOT ask anyone for their direct contacts; instead ask for their assistance and referrals. The wording makes a major difference. The former infers you’re waiting to feast and coast on someone else’s established relationships and good reputation. The latter infers that you’re appreciative of any assistance provided and that you’re actively working and waiting for an opportunity.

Also remember that the person you initially network with may actually be the bridge to someone else, so please be careful not to ask too much of this one person. In addition, make sure you that you periodically, not sporadically check up on them. A phone call, coffee, or light meal is always nice.

Finally, try and take the time to get to know them not so that you can discuss business but instead so that you can understand what they stand for. Seeing and understanding the values in another person versus the dollar signs that they may potentially have totally changes the entire dynamic of networking into a win-win situation for all.

When in doubt always remember the biblical scripture Micah 6:6-8, which explicitly tells you what the Lord requires of your interrelationship with man; to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with God. So when networking, remember this scripture on how to treat other people and how to act in the pursuits of your goals and aspirations.

4. Use The Internet as Your Primary Tool

Of all the resources that have been beneficial to me, the internet has been THE most valuable. Everything and anything is on the internet. It only takes time and patience to find it. Make a practice to daily type key word combinations into Yahoo or Google which represent your goals and interests.

Go to the web page matches to read and learn then go directly to their web page links. One-by-one, explore each web page link. And within each web page link there are usually more links to other web pages of similar interests. Repeat this process for as long as needed.

Everything from email address, contact names, directions, and personal accounts on how to do this and that are all available mostly for free on the internet. However if you use the following excuses such as: “I’m too tired when I come home from work to look at the computer again” or “I’m too busy on the weekends” or “I just don’t have the time” then guess what? Prepare for continual, never-ending failure.

If you desire the Creator/Universe/God to bless you with more, but you can’t even take the precious time out the very life that he/she gave you to tend to the smaller things before you, then why on earth do you think you would be blessed with more????

Remember, you truly get back what you put into life.

Herndon Davis
http://herndondavis.com