Here at IWT, I’m not going to give you hundreds
of vague platitudes on how you should “wake up
early” or “never quit.” Give me a break.
Instead, I’m going to lay out 3 proven and
actionable steps that’ll help you adopt success
mindsets today. This is my best answer to the
question, “How can I be successful, Ramit?”
These are habits and tactics that I’ve developed
over the years that have helped me find success
in school, business, and relationships.
And I’ll be frank: Success is hard. But it’s not
complicated — and it starts with getting focused.
Step 1: Set a SMART goal
How often have you set a New Year’s
Resolution — and have it completely fail by the
end of the year?
Maybe you set a vague goal like, “I’m going to
get healthy this year!” And at first, it’s exciting!
You buy a new gym membership, dig up your
old gym clothes, and start heading to the gym
every day. For a week too!
But then you miss a day. That’s fine, you’ll just
go tomorrow.
But then tomorrow comes along and you realize
that you actually have some more work you’d
like to get done.
By the end of the week you haven’t gone at all
and your gym shorts are just collecting dust on
your floor.
That’s because the problem with typical goal
setting is that the goals set are too broad — and
you have no idea where to start. So when you
set a goal like, “I want to get healthy,” you end
up spinning your wheels.
That’s why I’m a big proponent of SMART
objectives.
SMART stands for specific, measurable,
attainable, relevant, and time-oriented. And with
each element in SMART objectives, you’re going
to want to ask yourself a set of questions that’ll
help you develop a winning goal.
Specific. What will my goal achieve?
What is the precise outcome I’m looking
for?
Measurable. How will I know when I’ve
accomplished the goal? What does
success look like?
Attainable. Are there resources I need to
achieve the goal? What are those
resources? (eg gym membership, bank
account, new clothes, etc)
Relevant. Why am I doing this? Do I really
WANT to do this? Is it a priority in my life
right now?
Time-oriented. What is the deadline? Will I
know in a few weeks if I’m on the right
track?
Knowing this, we’re going to want to reframe
that “I want to be healthy” goal into something
much mores specific and actionable such as, “I
want to eat 3 healthy meals per week and go to
the gym 2 times a week for 15 minutes.”
Do you see how much better the SMART
objective is than just vague goal setting?
A few years ago, when I was feeling
overwhelmed. I was in the middle of writing my
book, building my business, and was running
around like a chicken with its head cut off.
One of my friends asked me, “What’s your
number one goal?”
The question made me nervous so I didn’t want
to answer. I was afraid if I said my single most
important goal, I’d be closing doors to all of my
other goals — which were many.
So I told him, “I want to be a bestseller, but I
also want to generate $X million in revenue and I
want to do this publicity and blah blah blah —”
He cut me off and said, “Cut the BS. What’s
your number one goal?”
Again, I hedged. But he pushed me and forced
me to get crisp. I said, “I want this book to be a
New York Times bestseller.”
There it was. We hate giving ourselves
constraints because it feels limiting. It feels like
we’re giving something up, and that’s exactly
what it felt like in that moment.
However, it’s also freeing at the same time.
Once I actually said out loud that I wanted to
become a New York Times bestselling author, it
became crystal clear what I needed to do in
order to achieve my goal. I focused all of my
attention on those things.
If you want to become successful — in any area
of your life — you have to have that kind of
focus.
Here’s an excerpt from an interview I did with
my longtime friend Noah Kagan. He’s the one
who called me out.
Noah is a master at helping people (and
himself) get laser-focused on their goals. Pay
special attention at 3:53 where he talks about
the strategy that he learned from Mark
Zuckerberg that has brought him success.
Bonus: If you want to stop making excuses
and break yourself out of a rut, download
my Ultimate Guide to Habits. .
Step 2: Find a mentor
Sometimes, the right path isn’t always clear.
That’s due to the HUGE amount of choice we
have when it comes to our decisions.
Should you choose the well-paying job
with the Fortune 100 company…or work
for that start-up that might not be around
in 18 months?
Should you go back to school for an MBA
or study online?
Should you move to a bigger city or stay
where you are, where you have some
contacts and friends already?
Though the great variety of choices might seem
good — after all, you have more to choose from
— it can actually hinder your ability to make a
decision.
To overcome this “paradox of choice,” you
simply need to find someone who’s been there
already: a mentor.
This is going to be a person who’s going to help
you through the tough decisions and guide you
on the path to success.
A while back, I flew to LA just to visit my mentor
Jay Abraham for advice on strategy.
Years ago, after I bought his book, Getting
Everything You Can Out of All You’ve Got , I heard
he was launching a program for small-business
owners. So I applied. After he checked my
references and read my application, he offered
me a spot.
The program was ~$25,000. And I also had to
fly from NYC to LA every month for 15 months
just to get 45 minutes of his time.
And I would do it again — for TEN TIMES the
price.
That’s because over the years, Jay’s insight and
guidance has helped me:
Make over $100,000 in a single month
Double my business in one year
Gain an AMAZING experience in my
personal life in just a few months
Your mentor doesn’t have to be some all-
knowing guru who lives on top of a mountain
— and you DEFINITELY don’t have to pay
$25,000 to get one.
It can be someone as close to you already as a
friend or family member — you can even find a
mentor in someone you NEVER meet face-to-
face through books or blogs you read.
Do you want to start getting fit? Maybe you
have a buddy who always goes to the gym and
runs marathons.
Do you want to ace that class next semester?
Talk to the professor and schedule office hours
to discuss the material.
Do you want to start a new business? Start by
taking a course and reading a few good books
on the topic.
If you find someone you really admire and
believe can help you on your journey to success,
reach out to them .
“But Ramit, what if I don’t know this person?
Won’t I look like a creep asking them to be my
mentor?”
As a person who receives THOUSANDS of
emails each day, I can say without hesitation
that there is an artform to crafting a message
that’ll pique my attention and won’t alienate me.
Luckily, I’m going to tell you the 3 steps to an
email sure to get your mentor’s attention.
That’s right. It’s steps within steps.This is
stepception.
Step 1: Focus on them. The person you’re trying
to reach is probably very busy — that’s why you
need to give them a reason to open the email.
To this end, you need to make sure your subject
line is engaging and your opening pulls them in.
Check out the opening of this email I got from
one of my readers — it’s one of my favorites!
That’s probably my favorite subject line of all
time. “I want to work for you for free.” That
would be music to anyone’s ears.
But, do you see what he did? Not only did he
give me a genuine compliment but told me
about the results my work had on him. I LOVE
it.
Step 2: Make them care. You need to establish
rapport as quickly as possible. If you can, name
drop someone you have in common with them.
In most cases though, you’ll need to establish
common ground another way.
For this email, my reader already knew I was
looking for talented developers — so he told me
who he is and why I should care.
This means you’re going to have to do your
homework. He knew from reading my site and
my job postings that I was looking for a new
developer, and he knew I liked to work fast and
iterate quickly — all things he addressed in his
email right away.
Get inside your mentor’s head. What can you do
for them that’ll make their lives easier?
Step 3: Make saying “yes” easy. You’ll want to
anticipate and confront any doubts your mentor
might have in receiving your email.
This means proactively asking to set up a
meeting or a Skype call. Be sure to make clear
that you’ll rearrange your schedule for the
conversation — any time works for you. After
all, you’re asking for their help — not the other
way around.
Check out what my reader did. He knew I had a
few projects I wanted to do — but hadn’t made
the time for them yet.
By leveraging my need for a solid web
developer and coupling that with the rapport he
built, the reader was able to put me in a prime
position to say “yes.”
Be sure to acknowledge the value of their time
by ending your email with this script:
“I understand you have tremendous
demands on your time, and if you don’t
have time to respond, no problem. But if
you do, even a sentence would mean a lot
to me.”
This gives them an easy out if they’re too busy
while also boosting your response rate by
showing how empathetic you are.
Before doing this, you should have crystal clear
expectations for what a mentor will provide for
you. Here are a few things to keep in mind:
Don’t focus on getting paid. You want to
optimize for learning, and make sure that
the mentor knows this. If they offer to
pay you for work, that’s fine, but certainly
don’t ask for this up front.
NEVER ask a mentor a question Google
can easily answer for you. Do your
homework before you ask busy people for
answers. If Google could provide the
answer in 20 seconds, don’t waste your
mentor’s time. You want them to help you
solve complex and really meaningful
problems in your life instead.
Put in the work up front. I always say that
if you put in 10x the work that leads to
1000x the results. So don’t slack or half-
ass your way through assignments or
projects. Focus on becoming world class
and absorbing all the knowledge you can
from them.
If you feel like you’re not getting a
valuable experience, don’t feel like you
have to keep the relationship going. Don’t
just disappear and not return their calls
and emails. But certainly don’t waste
either of your valuable time.
Communicate your feelings and move on.
My mentors have helped me make (and save)
millions of dollars over the years. But they’ve
also taught me more about success — and what
it looks like — than I could have ever figured out
on my own. I can’t put a price on that.
Step 3: Take action and work
towards mastery
Remember the “magic bullets” I talked about at
the beginning of the article? Well, mastery is the
antithesis of magic bullets.
A friend of mine is an orthopedic surgeon, and
one day we were talking about our careers and
he said, “You know, Ramit, all these residents
want to be me. They want to be where I am
— but they can’t be me without going through
the same fire I’ve gone through — making the
mistakes, staying the late hours. They all want
to see the result.”
And he had an interesting point. It’s just like
when we pick up a fitness magazine and want
to be the guy with the huge biceps and 12-pack
abs.
That’s because we often focus too much on the
RESULTS rather than the WORK.
And that’s where true success lies: in the work
that you put in. We’d all love to have a nice
body or have a career that we love — but are we
willing to put in the sweat equity for it?
So when we hear about someone who wants a
shortcut or magic bullet for results, you can rest
assured that they won’t be the people who’ll be
succeeding 5 years from now.
But when you see someone who’s willing to
work hard towards their goal the RIGHT way,
you can bet they’ll be successful.
A few years ago I was testing the benefits of
writing guest posts for a few other high traffic
sites.
In one test, I wrote a post quickly — taking about
1.5 hours to write it. It turned out fine and got
me a few hundred visitors.
In another test, I spent 18 hours writing an
awesomely detailed post, including case studies,
a video, and concrete examples.
Result: 100,00+ visitors.
I spent 12x the amount of time writing the good
one — but I got 250x the results.
Imagine being able to systematically focus on
doing just 10 high-impact actions a year. How
do you think your results would compare to
someone doing 100 different things?
This is called disproportionate impact — and it’s
not simple. Most people have an ordinary
impact in the world. They lead ordinary jobs,
spend and save ordinary amounts of money,
and when they work they affect an ordinary
number of people.
Most people are just ordinary.
Let me give you a couple of examples of
disproportionate impact:
Getting an extraordinary raise:
What most people do: Wing it. They make a
list of the reasons why they should get a
raise — why they DESERVE it — and then
they practice what they’re going to say in
their heads a few times. They think the fact
that they’ve done great work will be
enough.
What SUCCESSFUL people do: They study
salary negotiation , the mistakes most
people make when trying to negotiate, and
how to crack the negotiation code. They
make a list of all the reasons they’ve
EARNED a raise and they create a strategy
for addressing the objections their boss
might throw at them. Then they rehearse
their pitch 100 times. They practice in front
of a mirror, with their friends, and with
strangers on the street. And they get
results like Andrew who doubled his salary
to nearly six figures .
Getting in shape for a marathon:
What most people do: Say they’re going to
start training by running 3 miles, 4 days a
week. They accomplish their goal for the
first week or two but soon life gets in the
way. Then they run “whenever they get a
chance.”
What SUCCESSFUL people do: Commit to
running 5 minutes a day EVERY day for the
first week. Then 10 minutes EVERY day the
next week. And so on. At the end of three
months they’re running 60 minutes a day,
in addition to the activity they’re doing
during their work breaks, which could add
up to an additional 6-8 miles a day. At that
point, running has become such a habit
that they can create whatever training plan
they need to get to the finish line.
Sure, it’s easier to do just enough to get by. To
do what you’re used to doing. But if you seek
out opportunities to create phenomenal returns
and ramp up the quality of your work, success
will come easier than you think.
Combine that with relentless focus toward your
primary goal, and you’ll be unstoppable.
Remember…
Success isn’t about being catapulted into the
stratosphere overnight. It’s about taking
consistent action, testing different options, and
seeing the results. I’ve laid out a plan for how
you can be successful, but you have to work on
it every day like The Rock’s muscles.
In fact, you can start implementing some life-
changing tactics in your life TODAY.
Here’s how: I asked 15 of the world’s top
experts — people like Neil Patel, Noah Kagan, BJ
Fogg and Josh Kaufman — to share some of the
best tests they’ve run.
These are the exact tests that’ve helped them
become wildly successful.
