wikipedia

Mark Zuckerberg

On a recent survey on highest rated CEOs conducted by Glassdoor, Mark Zuckerberg, the co-founder and CEO of the social-networking website Facebook, comes first with the best employee approval rating score of 99.3 percent. On the basis of employee feedback score one can argue that Facebook is the best company to work with. It seems employees love him the way he is, casually dressed up, working in the open along with other employees and taking lunch in the common cafeteria. Last year he wasn’t even among top 25.

Time magazine enlisted him among the 100 wealthiest and most influential people in the world and Person of the Year in 2010. He ranked at #35 on Forbes “400″ list. By August 2012, Facebook reached 1 billion active users worldwide users.

computerwoche.de

Bill McDermott & Jim Hagemann Snabe

Jim Hagemann Snabe, who joined SAP back in 1990, is co-CEOs of SAP along with Bill McDermott from February 2010. Jim Hagemann Snabe and Bill McDermott are at number two on the best employee approval rating of a CEO according to the recent Glassdoor Company Review Data survey. Better Work life balance, openness, honesty, immense learning culture, and several other activities make the company second best to work with.

SAP AG is a German multinational software corporation that is better known as the technology leader in business management software, solutions, and services.

money.cnn.com

Dominic Barton

Dominic Barton is a senior partner and managing director of McKinsey & Company since 2009. According the Glassdoor Company Review Data survey, he is the third highest rated CEO. Employees feel that the company has a refined culture for personal as well as professional growth, an intellectually stimulating and friendly atmosphere, and that the colleagues are quite friendly.

McKinsey & Company, Inc. is an international management consulting firm that provides assistance to businesses, governments, and institutions with better advises. Today, McKinsey consultancy has approximately 9,000 consultants in 97 locations across 55 countries in the world.

Jim Turley

American businessman Jim Turley is the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Ernst & Young. He joined Ernst & Young back in 1977 after which he has worked in various leadership positions throughout the organization. He ranks at 4th position in Glassdoor Company survey of Highest Rated CEO of 2013. he has worked for several key issues of the company including the quality, integrity and professionalism, better working culture and many.

London based company Ernst & Young is one of the biggest leading professional service providing firms across the world with 167,000 employees in over 140 countries.

www.forbes.com

John E. Schlifske

Back in 1987, John E. Schlifske joined Northwestern Mutual as an investment specialist and became CEO and Chairman in 2010 after heading various aspects of investment functions of the company. Besides, he is also a director on the corporate boards of Kohl’s Corporation and Russell Investment Co.

Northwestern Mutual is Milwaukee based company that provides consultation and financial services including life insurance, disability insurance, long-term care insurance, mutual funds, and employee benefit services.

Frank D’Souza

Francisco D’Souza is the President and CEO and the member of the Board of Directors of Cognizant Technology Solutions. He is also known to be one of the youngest Chief Executive Officers in the software services sector. He has played the most significant role for the company’s growth and development. In 2005, D’Souza won The Economic Times Entrepreneur Award, in 2009 he was enlisted among “America’s Best CEOs” by Institutional Investor magazine. Besides, he is an independent Director of General Electric board.

Cognizant Technology Solutions is a leading provider of global consulting, information technology, and outsourcing services.

Joe Tucci

Joe Tucci has been chairman of the Board of Directors and chief executive officer of Hopkinton based EMC Corp since January 2006. Later, he joined the company as president and chief operating officer. In 2007, he became the chairman of the board of directors of VMware Corp.

Hopkinton based American multinational corporation EMC Corporation offers services including data storage, information security, cloud computing products and services that enable businesses to store, protect, manage, and analyze huge amount of data. VMware, Inc. is an American software company that offers cloud and virtualization software and services.

Paul E. Jacobs

Paul E. Jacobs has been the Chief Executive Officer of Qualcomm since 2005 and has been working with the same organization for almost 22 years. He has been primarily responsible for some big and successful initiatives of the company that include making the first smartphone based Palm OS, the Brew system that enables over-the-air downloading of applications, GPS capabilities in mobile phones and Qualcomm’s development of gps One position-location technology, a relatively superior reflective display technology called Mirasol and QChat, a Voice over IP, push-to-talk system.

San Diego based company Qualcomm Incorporated is semiconductor company that manufactures, designs, and markets the digital wireless telecommunications products as well as services.

Richard K. Davis

Richard K. Davis has been with US BanCorp for 18 years – the chairman for 5 years since Dec. 11, 2007, CEO for 6 years since December 2006, and president for 8 years since Oct. 19, 2004. Prior to this company, he has served on the Board of Directors of Visa Inc., as a director of the Clearing House and the American Bankers Association, as a member of the International Monetary Conference, and as representative for the Ninth District of the Federal Reserve, as a member of the Board of Directors of Xcel Energy. He has more than 30 years of experience in the banking industry.

U.S. Bancorp is an American company that offers various financial services. It is the parent company of the fifth largest bank of the United States named U.S. Bank.

Pierre Nanterme

French businessman Pierre Nanterme has been working for Accenture for long 30 years since 1983 and he has been in diverse leadership positions across the company’s key parts. He is the current Chief Executive Officer with the company since January 2011. Before becoming CEO, he was a group chief executive of Accenture’s Financial Services operating group and the member of Accenture’s global leadership team,playing a significant role in the planning and execution of Accenture’s long-term business and global expansion strategy.

Accenture is a Dublin based multinational management consulting, outsourcing and technology services company. The company has more than 257,000 employees across 120 countries in the world.

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1. Dare Mighty Things

“Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.” – Theodore Roosevelt

26th President of the United States Theodore Roosevelt was born in New York and belonged to one of the old Dutch families who had settled in America in the seventeenth century. He was an historian, a statesman, a naturalist, an effective orator whose exuberant personality and leadership of the Progressive Movement made him to be most influential person and symbol of strong masculinity. Throughout his life, he wrote twenty-six books, more than a thousand magazine articles, delivered thousands of speeches and letters. In 1906, he received The Nobel Peace Prize. At the age of sixty in 1919, he died in his sleep.

2. Explore, Dream, Discover

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” – Mark Twain, author

Samuel Langhorne Clemens (nick name – Mark Twain) was an American author and humorist who is best known for his widely popular works ‘The Adventures of Tom Sawyer’ in 1876, its sequel ‘Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’ in 1885 and the latter called “the Great American Novel”. His wit, humors and satire earned him worldwide fame, huge appraisal from critics and his readers.

Twain was in deep depression in his later life when in 1896 his daughter Susy died of meningitis, in 1904 his wife Olivia and in 1909 Jean died and in 1909, one of his close friends Henry Rogers died. Finally he died on April 21, 1910 at the age of 74.

3. Ambition and Persistence

“Ambition is the path to success. Persistence is the vehicle you arrive in.” Bill Bradley

William Warren Bill Bradley is a renowned American basketball player and an author of seven non-fiction books and a three-term Democratic U.S. Senator from New Jersey. From the very early age he was very passionate about basketball and excelled in the same through hardwork and perseverance. Besides being an all-county and all-state basketball player, he was academically very sound. He received over 75 college scholarships, and finally attended Princeton University. In 1964, he won a gold medal as a member of the Olympic basketball team and was the NCAA Player of the Year in 1965 but left the NBA draft to continue his MA from Oxford University on a Rhodes Scholarship. In 2008 he was inducted into the New Jersey Hall of Fame.

4. Drudgery and Triumph

“Every worthwhile accomplishment, big or little, has its stages of drudgery and triumph: a beginning, a struggle and a victory.” – Mahatma Gandhi

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi is considered to be the most pioneering leader of the Indian independence movement. He is widely remembered for employing the non-violent civil disobedience that inspired India to protest non-violently for their freedom. He spent twenty years in South Africa during which he worked against discrimination and it was then he made the idea of satyagraha, which is a non-violent way of protesting against injustices. While in India, Gandhi’s obvious virtue, simplistic lifestyle, and minimal dress endeared him to the people. After returning to India, he worked hard to fight against the British rule and strived to improve the lives of the poor and destitute. He became an inspiration of great leaders across the world including Martin Luther King Jr.

5. Do the Job you have in Hand

“I studied the lives of great men and famous women, and I found that the men and women who got to the top were those who did the jobs they had in hand, with everything they had of energy and enthusiasm and hard work.” – Harry Truman

Harry S. Truman was the 33rd President of the United States from 1945 to 1953. On April 12, 1945 Truman succeeded to the presidency after the death of Roosevelt. He successfully led the U.S to conclude World War II. In 1917, at the First World War, he was enlisted in the army and served on the Western Front and achieved the rank of captain. After returning from the war he concisely owned a haberdashery, which was unsuccessful, and later attended the Democratic Party political machine of Tom Pendergast in Kansas City, Missouri. In 1922, he was elected a county judge and remained in the position until 1924. In 1934 he became the U.S. senator.

6. The Man who Thinks He Can

“If you think you are beaten, you are. If you think you dare not, you don’t! If you want to win, but think you can’t, It’s almost a cinch you won’t. If you think you’ll lose, you’re lost; For out in the world, we find success begins with a fellow’s will; it’s all in the state of the mind. Life’s battles don’t always go to the stronger and faster man, but sooner or later, the man who wins is the man who thinks he can.” – Walter D. Wintle

The following quote is taken from a poem called ‘Thinking’, which is also known as “The Man Who Thinks He Can”, written by Walter D. Wintle. Walter D. Wintle is a poet who lived in the late 19th and early 20th century. He is little or least known poet for publishing his poems in pseudonym. The accurate date of the first and original publication of “Thinking” is also unknown.

7. Mistakes are the Best Teachers

A man must be big enough to admit his mistakes, smart enough to profit from them, and strong enough to correct them.” – John C. Maxwell

John Calvin Maxwell is an evangelical Christian priest and The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and BusinessWeek best-selling author who has written over 60 books on leadership and personal success. As of now, more than nineteen million copies of his books have been sold across the world in over fifty languages. Some of his notable books are which were sold more than a million copies each. His current title is Talent Is Never Enough.

8. Happiness is the Key to Success

“Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful.” – Albert Schweitzer

Albert Schweitzer was a German (later French) philosopher, organist, physician, and medical missionary born into an Alsatian family on 14 January 1875. His family had been into religion, music, and education for generations. From early childhood, he showed his talent for playing the organ and became the world’s leading expert on organ building. He excelled in several respects; he was a doctor and surgeon, writer of many reputed scholarly books, commentator on contemporary history, administrator of a village, pastor of a congregation, superintendent of buildings and grounds, and musician. He received many honors that included the Goethe Prize of Frankfurt and honorary doctorates from many universities. In 1952, he received The Nobel Peace Prize.

9. Consistent Growth And Progress

“Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.” – Benjamin Franklin

Benjamin Franklin is notable for being a multi-talented personality. Besides being the Founding Father of the United States, he was a renowned author, political theorist, politician, scientist, inventor, a successful newspaper editor and printer, musician, satirist, statesman, and diplomat among several others. Lightning rod, the glass ‘armonica’, the Franklin stove, bifocals, and a carriage odometer are some his significant inventions. Franklin was also famous as “The First American” for his important role in campaigning for colonial unity.

10. Do what you Love

“When you do what you love, the seemingly impossible becomes simply challenging, the laborious becomes purposeful resistance, the difficult loses its edge and is trampled by your progress.” ― Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth, and Being Free

Dr. Steve Maraboli, the Executive Director of the Michael Thomas Research Center for Social & Behavioral Science, is an accomplished speaker, and bestselling author. He is widely known for his impactful and powerful speeches. He is hugely popular in media for his fun loving nature. His works have been published in over 20 languages across the world. Besides all, he is the creator of original field of breakthrough science, Psycho-Neuro-Actualization.

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“Be like water making its way through cracks. Do not be assertive, but adjust to the object, and you shall find a way round or through it. If nothing within you stays rigid, outward things will disclose themselves. Empty your mind, be formless. Shapeless, like water. If you put water into a cup, it becomes the cup. You put water into a bottle and it becomes the bottle. You put it in a teapot it becomes the teapot. Now, water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend.” ~Bruce Lee

Bruce Lee is considered to be the most influential martial artist and the greatest icon of martial arts cinema of all time. In the early 1946, he appeared in several films as a child actor. Lee received huge popularity across the United States in 1966-1967 with his role in the television series The Green Hornet after which he was starred in numerous movies until he died on 20th July 1973 in Hong Kong at the age of 32. He is also known for changing the way Asians were presented in American films.

2. The Guidance of Virtue

“Just as treasures are uncovered from the earth, so virtue appears from good deeds, and wisdom appears from a pure and peaceful mind. To walk safely through the maze of human life, one needs the light of wisdom and the guidance of virtue.” – Buddha

Gautama Buddha was a spiritual guru who is remembered for his teachings on living an enlightened life. His teachings are known today as ‘Buddhism’. Though the actual date of his birth and death is uncertain but it is known that he was born a prince in the 6th century BC in northern India at a place called Lumbini (presently known as Nepal) at the foot of Mount Palpa in the Himalayan ranges and died in 480 B.C. at age of 80. His father Suddhodana was the king who ruled an Indian tribe Shakyas. His mother Maya died only after seven days of his birth and he was raised by his mother’s sister Mahaprajapati. At the age of 29, he left his home, family and kingdom to seek enlightenment and a way to get rid of universal suffering and pain of humanity.

3. Catch the Spirit of the Great Pioneers

“To win the big stakes in this changed world, you must catch the spirit of the great pioneers of the past, whose dreams have given to civilization all that it has of value, the spirit that serves as the life-blood of our own country – your opportunity and mine, to develop and market our talents.” ― Napoleon Hill

Napoleon Hill is one of the greatest personal-success coaches who is best remembered for his work ‘Think and Grow Rich’ in 1937, which is one of the best-selling books of all time. The book has been read and mentioned by several renowned and successful successful personalities and remains the inspiration for millions of people worldwide. He pioneered and revolutionized ‘New Thoughts’ on personal beliefs and success. By showing some real-life examples on how an average person can accomplish their goals, he brought success in the reach of any person.

4. Every Morning is a New Arrival

“This being human is a guest house. Every morning is a new arrival. A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor…Welcome and entertain them all. Treat each guest honorably. The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in. Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.” ― Rumi

wikipedia.org

Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī, widely known as Rumi was a 13th-century Persian Muslim mystical poet and theologian. His devotional and inspiring poetry are his insightful experience of uplifting our consciousness for living a meaning and liberal life; in a nutshell, they enlighten us about divine life, and relieve the turbulent mind, distressed soul and devastated spirit.

Diwan-e Shams-e Tabrizi and Mathnawi are among his most famous works. Diwan-e Shams-e Tabrizi is a collection of ghazals that has been named in the honor of Rumi’s greatest inspiration dervish Shamsuddin and Mathnawi is a collection of six volumes of poetry that demonstrates the diverse facets of spiritual life.

5. It is Between you and God

“People are often unreasonable and self-centered. Forgive them anyway. If you are kind, people may accuse you of ulterior motives. Be kind anyway. If you are honest, people may cheat you. Be honest anyway. If you find happiness, people may be jealous. Be happy anyway. The good you do today may be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway. Give the world the best you have and it may never be enough. Give your best anyway. For you see, in the end, it is between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway.” ― Mother Teresa

Courtesy:wikipedia

Born as Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu, Mother Teresa dedicated her whole life serving the humanity; she is the symbol of compassion and love. It is known that she was highly fascinated by the lives of missionaries and their selfless services. By the age of 12, she was determined to live a religious life and devote herself to serve the poor and destitute. In 1950, she founded a Roman Catholic religious congregation ‘the Missionaries of Charity’, which is now active in 133 countries and has more than 4,500 sisters. The Missionaries of Charity takes care of the distressed, homeless, refugees, mentally ills, ex-prostitutes, abandoned children and aged, people with AIDS, and convalescent. In 1979, she received the Nobel Peace Prize for her significant contribution in assisting the poor to overcome their daily struggles for living better life.

6. Don’t be Afraid of Experience

“Experience life in all possible ways — good-bad, bitter-sweet, dark-light, summer-winter. Experience all the dualities. Don’t be afraid of experience, because the more experience you have, the more mature you become.” ― Osho

Born as Chandra Mohan Jain and later known as Acharya Rajneesh or Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and later in 1980s as Osho was an Indian spiritual teacher who was internationally famous for his teachings. His concept and definition of ‘Sannyas’ was completely different from the conventional Eastern perspective, he initiated on self-exploration without renouncing the world, and promoted to have an open and better attitude towards sex which all together grabbed international attention.

Osho was a professor at the Sanskrit College in Raipur in 1957, and the Professor of Philosophy at the University of Jabalpur until 1966. Later, he left his profession and traveled across India to awaken the human consciousness about the orthodox religion. His unorthodox and challenging attitude towards studies attracted people across the world.

7. God is Reflection of Human Fraility

“I cannot imagine a God who rewards and punishes the objects of his creation, whose purposes are modeled after our own — a God, in short, who is but a reflection of human frailty. Neither can I believe that the individual survives the death of his body, although feeble souls harbor such thoughts through fear or ridiculous egotism.” ― Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein, a German-born theoretical physicist, is widely known for his significant contribution in developing the general theory of relativity, which proved revolutionary in physics. In 1921, he received the Nobel Prize in Physics for his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect. Throughout his life, he has written countless articles, published dozens of books and worked in several different projects collaborating with other scientists, some of them were the Einstein refrigerator and the Bose–Einstein statistics. On 17 April 1955, he died after experiencing the internal bleeding.

8. Mistakes do not Make us Evil

“We are all mistaken sometimes; sometimes we do wrong things, things that have bad consequences. But it does not mean we are evil, or that we cannot be trusted ever afterward.” – Alison Croggon

Alison Croggon is an Australian poet, fantasy novelist, and playwright who emerged in the 1990s. She was aspired to be a writer and at the initial stage of her career she worked as a journalist for the Sydney Morning Herald. Her very first volume of poetry This is the Stone received worldwide attention, won the Anne Elder Award and the Mary Gilmore Prize. Her novella Navigatio received The Australian/Vogel Literary Award. She was honored as the Geraldine Pascall Critic of the Year in 2009. Besides being a Melbourne theatre critic for the national daily newspaper, The Australian, she maintains her blog.

9. The Brick Walls are there for a Reason

“The brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something. Because the brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want it badly enough. They’re there to stop the other people.” ― Randy Pausch, The Last Lecture

American professor of computer science as well as human-computer interaction and design at Carnegie Mellon University Randolph Frederick Randy Pausch was born in Baltimore, Maryland, and grew up in Columbia, Maryland. He came into limelight after his last lecture “The Last Lecture: Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams” in 2007 at Carnegie Mellon, which led him to other reputed media appearances. In 2008, on July 25th, he died from pancreatic cancer.

10. The Greatest Blessings are Within Us

“True happiness is to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future, not to amuse ourselves with either hopes or fears but to rest satisfied with what we have, which is sufficient, for he that is so wants nothing. The greatest blessings of mankind are within us and within our reach. A wise man is content with his lot, whatever it may be, without wishing for what he has not.” ― Seneca

Roman Stoic philosopher, dramatist and statesman Lucius Annaeus Seneca, who is best known as Seneca, was born in 4 BC in the southern Spanish city of Cordoba. Seneca was tutored to be an orator and lawyer in order to work in the the service of the state but later studied philosophy. He was accused of having a connection in the Pisonian conspiracy to assassinate the last of the Julio-Claudian emperors Nero and was subsequently forced to commit suicide in April 65 AD. Though his involvement was never proved.

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Kung Fu Panda: Image: hdwallpapers.in

Kung Fu Panda is an animated martial art adventure packed with numerous spouts of wisdom, chunks of inspirational dialogues, and abundant interesting life lessons that are implanted in a predictable storyline. The movie shows how an ordinary big fat Panda, who is unexpectedly chosen to be the ‘Dragon Warrior’ by a shrewd old tortoise Oogway, defends the Valley of Peace by defeating the treacherous and villainous yet most powerful snow leopard, Tai Lung who was found, brought up and trained by Master Shifu.

The protagonist is Po, an indolent, flippant slacker panda who is indifferent to his family noodle shop but is an ardent fan of Kung Fu and idolizes the Furious Five – Tigress, Crane, Mantis, Viper and Monkey – apprentice of Master Shifu. Panda spends his whole day and night desiring and dreaming of learning Kung Fu and fighting alongside the Furious Five without being actually ready to accept the challenges on the way to accomplishing it. On the other hand, Master Shifu tries to distract Panda so that he quits the idea of transforming himself from the bumbling Panda to a toughest fighting machine. His lack of skill, nonsensical words and hilarious and stupid activities confirmed master Shifu’s confidence of Oogway’s unjustified decision. Later, however, he is convinced by the wise Oogway to take panda into his serious consideration and prepare him for the forthcoming threat of destruction. The story is full of wise lessons and handful of significant teachings of daily life.

1. Nobody is ORDINARY! It’s Just how you Explore your Talents

Panda is perhaps the most ordinary and simple character with no apparent talents and gifts. His secret passion of learning Kung Fu was harshly rejected by Master Shifu. He is mocked at by the Furious Five whose consistent snide remarks and despicable sight shatters his self-confidence. He is frequently laughed at for being an undeserving candidate for such a majestic title ‘Dragon Warrior’. At the end, after several rounds of rigorous, tough and brutal Kung Fu training, he becomes a true ‘Dragon Warrior’. The journey to the title isn’t an easy one; he has to fight against his low self-esteem and go against his negative belief to discover his awesomeness or attractiveness.

“Anybody who has ever unraveled the power of inner-strength and chosen to be special can become the most extraordinary hero, after all “There is no charge for awesomeness – or attractiveness.”

2. Live in the present

Oogway: “You are too concerned with what was and what will be. There is a saying: Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, but today is a gift. That is why it is called the present.”
We grieve over the stubbornly constant past with reverted eye, stand high on the tiptoe to foresee the shadowy and illusionary future. We consciously or unconsciously, deny the core principles of being at peace – living the graceful and sparkling PRESENT. Soon the present becomes past upon which we stay wedged.

Dejected Panda, after being insulted by Furious Five for dreaming of learning Kung Fu, reached under the peach tree all alone. In the mean time when panda felt afraid of Oogway’s wrong choice as he wasn’t meant to be a Dragon Warrior, Oogway arrived and tried to lighten his despondent heart with the above mentioned old wise proverb. Here Oogway grabs our attention on the most significant fact of life – live your life for today, there is no past or present. Past you have already lived and future hasn’t arrive yet, then why not to live in this very moment, which is at our hand?

3.Explore your special talents and skills

Everybody is blessed with marvelous gifts and talents but you need to believe in yourself and explore them. Extraordinary people visualize their talents and build themselves on it; whereas, ordinary people fail to explore their true potentials. Quite a few reasons are:

1. 1. Trapped in their ordinary self. Panda thought himself to be just a big fat Panda and unworthy contestant even for proper Kung Fu training. Like Panda, ordinary people don’t find themselves fit into pursuing extraordinary dreams and hence they never taste big achievements.

2. Too much concerned about what others think about them. Panda was completely absorbed by the criticism and was hurt for being largely ignored by the Furious Five who he adored for their expertise in Kung Fu. Ordinary people make a firm but delusionary perceptions about their competency upon consideration of what others think and talk about them.

3. Overwhelmed by their false qualms. Panda’s biggest fear was that he might not be able to learn Kung Fu and rescue the Valley of Peace from evil Tai Lung. Having doubts on your ability weaken your strength and keep you from running behind your dreams. “No matter how impossible, out of the universe, unrealistic, and weird your dreams are; someday they are bound to come true if you keep faith in yourself and work on your abilities”

Moreover, ordinary people spend their whole life whirling in the bits and pieces of trivial issues. Panda was ordinary until he discovered his unique talents and skills.

4. Role Models are Just milestones! Don’t try to be their second version

Role models influence our life in an optimistic light, motivate us to put proportionate effort in right direction, initiate to walk the roughest road and accept the greatest challenge and fight against inordinate difficulties to achieve our dream. Acknowledge their role being better precedent and sportive contributor on your way of accomplishment but never ruin your authenticity by becoming the second version of them. They have their own calamity and faults off-stage about which you might be unaware. Moreover, evolving as the first version of yourself by taking inspiration from their lives is the true appreciation of their contribution.

Panda idolized Furious Five and dreams of fighting alongside them but he evolves as the first version of himself and that’s the reason he eventually accomplishes (inner peace), something no members of Furious Five could.

5.The POWER you seek outside lies within you

Do you belief if circumstances worked in your favor, you could have succeeded, or if you had more money you could have improved your disposition and amplified your possessions? If you do then you have given your power away to the external factors who’ll keep controlling you. Circumstances are never as you wish them to be, it is your magical energy, inner strength and unbeatable spirit in deep within that assists you to turn them into your favor- don’t ignore that you are the ultimate source of power.

All Kung Fu fighters including Tai Lung desired to have the ‘Dragon Scroll’, which was supposed to make its owner rich with infinite power. When Tai Lung opened the scroll finally for having it, he found it to be empty. All he could see was his own image, but Panda learnt “To make something special you just have to believe it’s special.”

6. The secret of reaching your destination can be hidden in your biggest weakness

We often defend our weakness by not really confronting it. Our greatest weakness might hold the key to our complete transformation. All we need to do is perceive it, accept it and then consider utilizing it in best possible way. Ask yourself what’s your biggest fear? Why are you running away from it? Is it life-threatening? Have courage to confront it and instead of eliminating it, learn to channelize it in your favor as Panda did.

Food was Panda’s greatest weakness. When Master Shifu discovered that Panda was extremely motivated by food and often ate a lot to alleviate his depressed mind. Master Shifu channelized Panda’s weakness by building mental connection between food and exercises, which ultimately led him to a great Kung Fu master.

7. Be determined enough to stand your dream

Perseverance is instrumental in maintaining your consistency on the way of accomplishing your dreams. Time comes when criticism pinches you to bow down on you knees in front of defeat; it is determination that protects your dream from falling and crushing.

Panda was heavily neglected, ignored, criticized for being so dumb in any Kung Fu move by Furious Five and Master Shifu. He was distressed and depressed but didn’t give up on himself. After initial disbelief he finally stood for his desire and worked hard to win it. Persistence pays back provided you stand stoned against all criticism (sometimes by wise and knowledgeable people). Remember, even the most intelligent or talented people can be beaten by perseverance and patience.

8. To succeed you don’t have to be better than the best

Panda was never was as good as the Furious Five, he even could not think of being equal to them and when he expressed his fear to Master Shifu “They’re five MASTERS, and I’m just ONE me!”, Shifu wisely replied, “But you will have the one thing no one else has.” What makes you a better contender is not comparison but your own distinct way of doing it.

9. Never disguise anybody for their appearance

Don’t misjudge your competitors by appearance or size, the core principle of judging them is their competency. When Tai Lung denied his defeat saying, “You can’t defeat me! You… you’re just a big… fat… panda!” Panda clutching his weak punch by the finger and replied, “I’m not a big fat panda. I’m THE big fat panda.”

10. Make sure you are content in what you are doing

Never pursue others’ dreams! you will end up dedicating your whole life making others happy without any big achievement. Spending time and putting in hard hard work aren’t enough. Happiness and contentment are the key to your evolvement as a better person. Pursue something that enlightens you and encourage thousands of people to follow their passion. Panda was never happy at his family-run noodle shop, he knew it wasn’t his destiny; therefore he never dreamt of making his business big. He always longed to learn Kung Fu and when he pursued his dream he became the greatest.

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Consider giving yourself the following 10 priceless gifts that come for free and stay with you for your lifetime. These gifts can’t be exchanged for money nor can you expect it from others:

1. A Strong Resolve to Keep on Going

Dreams never come true through magic, they come into reality when you put in the best of yourself- unflagging hard work, awful of perseverance, supreme confidence and patience. Together they mow down all your opponents and take you several steps closer to your dreams. Each opportunity has its own tricks and reward and it often appears in disguise of temporary failure, seemingly impossible challenge, and apparent misfortune. However, a strong resolve and contagiously positive attitude will ensure you keep on going and tap the best of the opportunities. A strong resolve will make a big difference in your life.

2. Unrestrained Imagination

Non-sense is what ignites creativity and awakens your intellect, compelling you to take actions upon serious consideration. Successful people are great dreamers who make the world go round with their imagination. Think about those imaginary nonsensical ideas that were worked on and took shape of aircraft, rocket, telephone, television, Computer, mobile devices and almost every useful machine and luxurious thing we use today. If you are not thinking something unreal and weird, you are not actually creating anything innovative things. Remember, the unreal has more potential than the real because the reality today has come through the unreal world.
“I am enough of an artist to draw freely upon my imagination. Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.” ― Albert Einstein

3. An empty heart to embrace

Everyone is ignorant to something! Ignorance can, in fact, be a greatest gift as it also means your heart is open to embracing new things and learning lessons beyond the facts. Sometimes, we miss some of the greatest opportunities for not having an open mind. Having an open mind is not that you are accepting everything of whatever is coming on the way; it means that you are expanding your mind for better things and discovering your true potential.

4. A positive approach- The glass is half-full

Your thoughts, whether positive or negative, are a powerful instrument that impact the way you are perceive the world around. They impact your every move and hence decide your destiny. Negative thoughts are an equally motivating force that take you to a self-destructive path. We often let ourselves fall into the traps of circumstances or get influenced by swerving moods that ultimately beget misconceptions about ourselves. While your mind is overwhelmed and overtaken by your negative thoughts, is there any place left for positive one to give a lift?

External forces or events can’t truly hold you back until you allow yourself to yield to negativity and self-limiting thoughts. Buddha says it best, “a positive thought, no matter how tiny it may seem, has the potential to uproot a negative thought that weighs the size of a mountain.” Optimism is an awesome human-trait, nurture it.

“Man often becomes what he believes himself to be. If I keep on saying to myself that I cannot do a certain thing, it is possible that I may end by really becoming incapable of doing it. On the contrary, if I have the belief that I can do it, I shall surely acquire the capacity to do it even if I may not have it at the beginning.” ~ Mahatma Gandhi

5. A Promise to Make the Best Use of what you Have

Different people have different dreams and different ways of accomplishing them but they share a common mission-SUCCESS. To discover your true potential, you have to apply the best of what you have. We seldom use our true potential or use them half-heartedly and stop trying half way through; as a result, we never get the desired results. If you think you don’t have what it takes to succeed, then think about Dashrath Manjhi, a landless farmer who single-handedly moved a mountain.

6. Give yourself Gratefulness

Appreciating and acknowledging others’ efforts that helped you create opportunity, happiness and hope are the key to getting abundance in life. Showing gratitude will never let you down; rather, it will lead you to some wonderful feelings of love, generosity, and compassion. Gratefulness will help you develop positive aptitude and open your heart to accepting criticism and give you courage to accomplish more beautiful things in life.

“At times our own light goes out and is rekindled by a spark from another person. Each of us has cause to think with deep gratitude of those who have lighted the flame within us.” Albert Schweitzer

7. Admission to the School of Life

“Intellectual growth should commence at birth and cease only at death” Education is a treasure and acquiring it consistently and continuously enlightens you with clear vision and better knowledge on how to shape up the indefinite future. Develop a passion for lifelong learning to find the real meaning of life, and live an enriching life of self-fulfillment.

“The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.” Alvin Toffler

8. The Gift of Spiritual Growth

Knowing yourself and controlling your negative thoughts are the biggest challenge and the most significant task which can only be accomplished by engaging in spiritual practices. Spirituality acts as a motivational force or a filter that heals a depressed or stressed mind and engages you in awakening your enlightened-self. Further, it gives you courage to stay motivated and strong in front of difficulties.

You have little or no control on external events but you can control your mind and chose to be happy in the face of adversities. Mind is a very obedient and constructive servant but an equally arrogant and destructive master; therefore, don’t let it rule you. Once you have mastered over your mind, you will reach closer to your destination called realization of the VASTNESS of you.
“The goal of spiritual practice is full recovery, and the only thing you need to recover from is a fractured sense of self.” – Marianne Williamson

9. Sense of Humor

Sense of humor plays a most significant role when life throws some worst blows towards you. A well-developed and balanced sense of humor relieves your pain, alleviates your distressed mind, initiates a rich and interesting life, lightens the difficult situations, motivates you to accept challenges with a smile, and saves you from being too serious and monotonous.

“A sense of humor… is needed armor. Joy in one’s heart and some laughter on one’s lips is a sign that the person down deep has a pretty good grasp of life.” – Hugh Sidey

10. Your real-self (take the mask off)

If you are pretentious or have kept a false-self within you, then you are frightened of your imperfections and are playing the most foolish and betraying game with yourself. Never try to mold your real-self in any perfect, idealistic and heroic character you have read about, otherwise you will be lost between duel characters and the beauty and simplicity of your soul will be gone for never to return. So gift yourself your real-self.

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Bill Gates
Net worth: $66 billion

Tech billionaire Bill Gates is widely known for co-founding the world’s biggest software company Microsoft. According to Forbes, as of September 2012, he is America’s richest man with $66 billion net worth. Through Microsoft, he has not only played the prime role in the rise of the personal computer by offering an operating system that could run on different machines but also taken Microsoft to the pinnacle of success by extending its reach beyond Operating System including browsers, search, media players, web-based email and variety of software-based applications.

“Technology is just a tool. In terms of getting the kids working together and motivating them, the teacher is the most important.” ~Bill Gates

Larry Ellison
Net worth: $41 billion, September 2012

Larry Ellison is an American business mogul whose fortune comes from his 23.5 percent stake in the world’s largest database company Oracle, 49 percent stake in NetSuite, and interest in educational software maker LeapFrog Enterprises. Oracle is an American multinational computer technology company that he founded in 1977 along with Bob Miner and Ed Oates.

“It’s fascinating as we continue to innovate and lead the way in both the application space and the database space. In the very beginning, people said you couldn’t make relational databases fast enough to be commercially viable. I thought we could, and we were the first to do it. But we took tremendous abuse until IBM said, “Oh yeah, this stuff is good.”~Larry Ellison

money.cnn.com

Jeffrey Preston Bezos is the founder, president, and chief executive officer of the American multinational electronic commerce company Amazon.com which is now the world’s leading online retailer that provides services for lower prices, enabling customers to go for their own selection besides offering wealth of information. Since its inception in 1994, Amazon has become the biggest online bookseller with annual sales of over $48 billion and one of the leading providers of cloud computer services. In 2007, Bezos introduced Amazon’s top-selling item the Kindle electronic book reader.

“I think technology advanced faster than anticipated. In that whirlwind, a lot of companies didn’t survive. The reason we have done well is because, even in that whirlwind, we kept heads-down focused on the customers. All the metrics that we can track about customers have improved every year.”~Jeff Bezos

Larry Page
Net Worth: $20.3 billion, September 2012

Computer scientist and Internet entrepreneur Larry Page is widely known for co-founding the search engine Google in 1998 along with Sergey Brin. Google started as a research project while he was still a student at the Stanford University to organize the immense amount of information available on the web and show them to visitors according to their specific search queries. Page along with Brin own approximately 16 percent of the company and he has sold over $3.5 billion worth of Google stock since 2004.

“It really matters whether people are working on generating clean energy or improving transportation or making the Internet work better and all those things. And small groups of people can have a really huge impact.”~Larry Page

Sergey Brin
Net Worth: $20.3 billion, September 2012

Russian-born American Internet entrepreneur and computer scientist Sergey Brin is the co-founder of search engine Google. Brin was the president of technology until 2011 to take care of company’s special projects and oversee a large investment portfolio. As of September 2012, his personal worth stands at $20.3 billion.

“Obviously everyone wants to be successful, but I want to be looked back on as being very innovative, very trusted and ethical and ultimately making a big difference in the world.”~Sergey Brin

Courtesy: wikipedia

Indian business magnate and philanthropist Azim Premji is the Chairman of one of the largest software companies in India, Wipro Technologies. His largest percentage of fortune comes from Bangalore-based Wipro that he owns about 78 percent of it. Wipro employs over 130,000 people with its presence across 54 countries in the world and has annual revenue of over $7.7 billion. Besides Wipro, Premji has his own private equity fund named PremjiInvest that takes care of his $1 billion personal portfolio.

“We believe this combination of excellence in operations and strong execution of our strategy is critical to achieve our vision. We will continue to focus on both in future as well.”~Azim Premji

Paul Allen: Photo by Paul G Allen Family Foundation

American investor and philanthropist Paul Allen co-founded Microsoft along with Bill Gates in 1975 but left the company in 1983 with his 28 percent stake. He made over $20 billion by selling more than 26 percent of his stake in Microsoft. After leaving Microsoft he founded his Washington based investment company Vulcan in 1986 and the company now has holds in energy, cable, entertainment, technology and real estate.

“In my own work, I’ve tried to anticipate what’s coming over the horizon, to hasten its arrival, and to apply it to people’s lives in a meaningful way.”~ Paul Allen

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American businessman Steve Ballmer became the CEO of Microsoft in January 2000 when Bill Gates stepped down from his position and responsibility of day-to-day management. As of 2012, his personal wealth is approximately $15.9 billion. He has served Microsoft divisions that include operating systems development, and sales and support. He joined Microsoft in 1980, and in July 1998, he became the President and in 2000 the CEO of the company.

“The number one benefit of information technology is that it empowers people to do what they want to do. It lets people be creative. It lets people be productive. It lets people learn things they didn’t think they could learn before, and so in a sense it is all about potential.”~Steve Ballmer

Michael Dell
Net Worth: $14.6 billion, September 2012

American business tycoon and author Michael Dell is the founder and chief executive of the world’s third- largest computer hardware manufacturer by revenue Dell. His fortune comes from Dell, 15 percent of the Texas-based company Round Rock and his New York-based investment firm MSD Capital. As of September 2012, his personal worth is approximately $14.6 billion.

“It’s through curiosity and looking at opportunities in new ways that we’ve always mapped our path at Dell. There’s always an opportunity to make a difference.” Michael Dell

Mark Zuckerberg
Net Worth: $ 10.0 billion, September 2012

American Internet entrepreneur and computer programmer Mark Zuckerberg is known as the co-founder and chief executive officer of the world’s largest social-media platform Facebook. Since the inception of the site, it has grown at faster rate and by August 2012 the site has grabbed over 1 billion monthly users and generated over $3.7 billion in revenue. Despite the company’s downfall (stock prices), as of September 2012 Zuckerberg’s personal worth is about $10 billion. In 2012, The Company has sold shares in an initial public offering which is called to the biggest technology IPO in history.

“The web is at a really important turning point right now. Up until recently, the default on the web has been that most things arent social and most things dont use your real identity. Were building toward a web where the default is social.”~Mark Zuckerberg

Info Source: bloomberg.com, Forbes

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California-based multinational company Apple was founded in 1976 on April 1 by Steve Jobs along with an American computer programmer and engineer Steve Wozniak and an American electronics industry worker Ronald Wayne. The company is widely popular for the Smartphone iPhone, other handheld devices iPod, iPad and Macintosh line of computers. Apple has approximately 393 retail stores across fourteen countries, more than 60,400 full-time employees and several hundred thousand part-time employees worldwide. Apple is the third largest mobile phone makers and one of the most precious customer-facing brands. Fortune magazine called Apple to be the world’s most admired brand from 2008 to 2012.

Microsoft

World’s largest software maker Microsoft Corporation is a Washington-based multinational corporation that was founded on April 4, 1975 by Bill Gates and American investor and philanthropist Paul Allen. The Company started with developing and selling BASIC interpreters for the Altair 8800 but it rose above and extended into developing operating systems for personal computers, phones, servers, and other intelligent devices, desktop and server management tools, productivity applications, software development tools and others. The company’s growth, since its inception, has made three billionaires and 12,000 millionaires. Microsoft is known to be the one of the world’s most valuable companies for which approximately 94,000 employees across the world are working.

Coca-Cola

The history of Coca Cola, a beverage manufacturer dates back to 1885 when Dr. John Stith Pemberton invented a new original recipe for a new cocawine. Coca-Cola became a non-alcoholic soft drink for refreshment after prohibition laws were passed. In 1891, an Atlanta pharmacist and businessman Asa Griggs Candler bought the exclusive right and registered “Coca-Cola” trademark in the US Patent Office in 1893. He made it the most demanding and favorite soft drink of the world with massive advertise campaigns. Some products of Coca-Cola are Cola Turka, RC Cola, Zam Zam Cola, Mecca-Cola, Virgin Cola, Parsi Cola, Breizh Cola, Qibla Cola, Corsica Cola, Evoca Cola, and Afri Cola.

IBM

IBM (International Business Machines) is a New York-based multinational IT consulting corporation and computer manufacturing giant. IBM was founded by an American businessman Charles Ranlett Flint on June 16, 1911. It manufactures and sells computer software, hardware and provides a variety of services that include infrastructure services, consulting services and hosting services. Over the years, the company has invented and developed several hundred things related to computer and information technology. As of 2012, about 433,362 2012 employees work for this company worldwide. Forbes calls IBM to be the 4th most powerful company in the world.

Google

According to Forbes Google is the fifth most powerful company in the world. Google Inc. (Listed on NASDAQ as GOOG) is an American multinational company founded on September 4, 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they were still studying at Stanford University. Google offers Internet-related services that include internet search, advertising, cloud computing and many other. According to report of 2012, 53,546 employees across the world are working for Google.

Intel

California-based multinational a semiconductor and chip-making company Intel was founded in 1968 by two scientists Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore who were first people to introduce microprocessor to the world in 1971. Since its inception, Intel continues to invent and develop technologies and products and improves the lifestyle and work of people. Intel also manufactures network interface controllers and integrated circuits, motherboard chipsets, graphic chips, flash memory, embedded processors and some other devices related to computing. Currently, approximately 100,100 employees are working for Intel.

McDonald’s

The world’s biggest chain of hamburger fast food retailer McDonald’s started in 1940 as a barbecue restaurant initiated by two brothers Richard and Maurice McDonald in San Bernardino, California but in 1948 it became a hamburger stand. It was American businessman Ray Kroc who purchased the chain and took it to the whole world. The company sells chicken, hamburgers, cheeseburgers, soft drinks, french fries, breakfast items, milkshakes and desserts, smoothies and fruit, salads, wraps and more. According to 2011 report, approximately 420,000 employees across the world are working for the company.

General Electric

American multinational corporation General Electric was founded by Edwin Houston, Charles Coffin, Elihu Thomson, and Thomas Edison in 1892 in Schenectady, New York. Company’s products include consumer electronics, electric motors, electrical distribution, aviation, Appliances, energy, healthcare, water, entertainment, finance, gas, oil, software, weapons, wind turbines and more. Approximately 301,000 employees worldwide are currently working for the company. Forbes ranks it as 8th most powerful company in the world and in 2011 Fortune 500 called it to be the 6th largest firm in the U.S. by gross revenue and 14th most profitable company.

BMW

German motorcycle, automobile, and engine manufacturing company BMW is widely popular for its elegant style and gracious design that people generally directly relate to their personality, reputation, taste and aristocracy. The company was founded back on 21 July in 1917 by Franz Josef Popp, a well-known German engineer of an aircraft company. The company’s headquarter is in Munich, Bavaria, Germany and as of 2011, 102,007 employees worked for the company.

Cisco

California-based Multinational Corporation Cisco Systems, Inc. was founded in 1984 by a married couple Leonard Bosack and Sandy Lerner who faced trouble in preparing their computers communicate with each other while working as a staff member in two different departments at Stanford University. Cisco develops, manufactures, and sells networking equipment and its products include Network Management, Networking Device, Cisco IOS and NX-OS, VOIP, Optical networking, Interface and Module, Storage area networks, Wireless, and many more. According to 2012 report 66,639 employees are working in the company.

Info Source: forbes.com

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“Excuses are the tools with which persons with no purpose in view build for themselves great monuments of nothing.” ~Steven Grayhm

We are capable of accomplishing anything and everything our minds can imagine! Then what is holding us back? What prevents us from taking our first step? What we consider to be the CAUSE of failure or BARRIER to the destination is nothing but various masquerades of EXCUSE. Excuse convinces you to accept failure over success. It justifies your inaction and fear of failure, makes you arrogant to mark error and cocky to identify the opportunity, finds impossibility in anything and discourages you from transforming your dreams into reality.

Excuses might relieve you with the temporary satisfaction but frustration occurs in the subconscious mind frequently and exacerbates your disposition when you see others to be overcoming their excuses, emerging through failures and accomplishing their dreams. In a nutshell, theses excuses will never let you be in peace; therefore, it is wise to understand and eliminate your self-imposed limitations before they clutch you under their gravitation.

1. It is very difficult

Difficulties are nothing but lame excuses that stand in your way to success. They show you the mirror image of what you are. Aparrantly, they may seem to be extremely antagonist but in reality they create opportunities for you on conquering them. Helen Keller is the most remarkable example to win over the unbeatable difficulties. She was 19th months old when she became deaf and blind. But despite having the most difficult form of disability, she accomplished every seemingly impossible thing in life. She lived the life the fullest and showed great possibilities to live in the gifted and greatest way with physical and mental limitations. Keller was the first deaf and blind ever to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree.

“Be of good cheer. Do not think of today’s failures, but of the success that may come tomorrow. You have set yourselves a difficult task, but you will succeed if you persevere; and you will find a joy in overcoming obstacles. Remember, no effort that we make to attain something beautiful is ever lost.” ― Helen Keller

2. I am too young or too old to go for it

Many people give up pursuing their childhood dreams with the growing age and a time comes when they start feeling ‘It’s too late to give them a try’. Age is just a number and there is no age limit to go for your passion.

One of the most successful American folk artist “Grandma Moses” Mary Robertson Moses was the best example of unshakable willpower at an old age. She proved that one should never think of age as the barrier to pursuing passion and achieving the impossible. She started pursuing her childhood passion at the age of 78 and soon became a world famous painter.

Peter Roget, a British natural theologian and lexicographer and inventor of Thesaurus, published his massive list of words in a book ‘Roget’s Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases’ at age of 73.
On the other hand, Mozart was only 5 when he was very competent on keyboard & violin and composed music notes. Anne Frank was 12 when she wrote the most matured diary about the beautiful world and compassionate people despite the gruesome cruelty of Hitler. Magnus Carlsen became a chess Grandmaster at the tender age of 13.

3. Nobody takes me seriously or I have been rejected

‘I have never been given importance’ is another most damaging excuse which can discourage you at the very initial stage. There is not a single great person who was never ignored or neglected at any point in their lives. Rejections can knock you down but it demands you to have faith in yourself and your actions. When Thomas Edison revealed his invention of electric bulb, everybody laughed at him calling it useless; he failed several thousand times but he never lost his faith. He knew that his invention will soon lighten the whole world.

Many egoistic people give up after some failed attempts. They make the lame excuse, ‘I have been rejected; therefore, I might not succeed here’; ‘I gave my best shot but it seems this is not in my fate’. The greatest basketball player Michael Jordan was thrown out from the basketball team in his high school but he worked against his rejection and became the person what he is today. Ask yourself, can some rejections decide our potential or worth?

4. I am not that much educated

Success has no or least relationship with education. One of the greatest inventors of all time Thomas Edison was home schooled, Albert Einstein left his school when he was 15, Walt Disney dropped out of high school, the founder of Digg.com Kevin Rose was a college drop-out, and Bill gates, Mark Zuckerberg and Steve Jobs were college dropouts. They all have evolved and emerged through failures and experiments.

5. I don’t know how

It is a big but common excuse among others. When Edison started working on his ides of electric bulb, he had a complete vague or abstract idea about how to start but this excuse could not stop him from achieving his mission. He failed thousands of times but never got discouraged. We learn through experiments and nobody is experienced before the journey. The first step will lead you to the answer HOW. The greatest people you have ever inspired of have known the answer of HOW by starting the way towards it.

6. I don’t have time

How many times do you say ‘I don’t have time’? If frequently, then you need to eliminate your negative thoughts. If you don’t have time other than your work, it means you are exerting yourself on something you don’t enjoy. To become successful, one does not require to work 20 or more rigorous hours a day. When you work for your passion, then spending maximum time on it becomes fun and makes you creative and productive; otherwise, your efficiency and potentiality automatically decreases with overwork.

Recently I stumbled upon an incredible 12 year old math genius Gordon Brown. Besides being a full-time school student he attends university lectures on Sundays, knows three different languages- French, Spanish and Latin- and plays piano and violin. If a kid has time to accomplish several things, we should never be short of time.

7. He/she is responsible for my failure

Blame game is a very common tendency, we often make others scapegoat for our outcome by throwing accountability on them. Blaming others is the destructive excuse that keeps you in illusion of being safe and correct. When you blame others, you are not ready to confront your mistakes, make them correct and move forward. Ultimately, you are stressing and harming yourself by letting your excuses to win over your ability. Do not indulge in blame game, look around and find a solution for your problems.

8. It is very risky

“It seems to be a law of nature, inflexible and inexorable, that those who will not risk cannot win.” ~John Paul Jones

Taking a thoughtful, creative and calculated risk is the secret to success. Risk glorifies your accomplishments. Winning over the fear of failure is like winning a battle of life. It is what makes you winner and leaves the losers behind. Never be squeamish about your actions, they all are experiments. If you fail you have learnt something to get better and if not then go to the next round. The greatest risk is never taking any risk because then you never know what you could have achieved.

9. What if/could/would

“The best day of your life is the one on which you decide your life is your own. No apologies or excuses…The gift is yours—it is an amazing journey—and you alone are responsible for the quality of it.” ~Bob Moawad
Before taking any decision or stepping towards our goal; what if, Could, and would are the common phrases we think of in the possibility to make the journey stop even before it starts. Whoever has overcome these excuses and pushed forward has wondered at the end.

10. The idea is not perfect or might not work.

Every idea is abstract or not perfect at its initial stage. They emerge, take a shape and get polished up through our actions. We all come across some unique ideas but the winners are those who dare to make them come true through actions and hard work. Famous English naturalist Charles Darwin took long 20 years to develop his theory of natural selection and put them down in a book ‘On the Origin of Species’.

Stop making excuses today to find a way to reach your destination anyway and anyhow. Several excuses are always less convincing than one. ~Aldous Huxley.

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“When you reach an obstacle, turn it into an opportunity. You have the choice. You can overcome and be a winner, or you can allow it to overcome you and be a loser. The choice is yours and yours alone. Refuse to throw in the towel. Go that extra mile that failures refuse to travel. It is far better to be exhausted from success than to be rested from failure.” – Mary Kay Ash

Failure has several assorted interpretations that can be taken as a precious learning experience, source of inspiration and an opportunity to start intelligently. It can be perceived as a worthless obstacle and insurmountable barrier to the way of destination – it is defined according to the interpreter’s matrix of mind. Failures might result into temporary defeats and disappointments but resting on it will instigate ignorance about your dispositions and summon everlasting regrets upon realization in the coming phases of life. Don’t be afraid to fall, it begets courage while taking risks and initiates to come out from your elongated comfort zone to collect virtue, benevolence, wisdom, generosity and honesty, laying on the rough surface of failures.

Patience

You steal a handful of patience, perseverance, and decisiveness from failures.

While enduring and overcoming the process of failures, you develop a rational outlook with a courageous soul that eventually leads you to success. Patience is your focused energy and silent function that accelerates the process of your success.

Note: Don’t extend your patience for prolonged period of time that you become a coward. Don’t justify it as the virtue of waiting; it will make you idle and lazy. Instead, use it as your determination that processes your energy silently, steadily and positively.

Humility

Photo: Matthew Quick

Read about any greatest personality, you will come to know that they all expressed humility. Their principles of living greatly and bravely lie hidden in their ability to face difficulties with humility and accept the truth without being over smart. The course of failures replaces your fool-self, that blindly shouts ‘I’m so amazing’, by humility which silently makes you smart and strong to go the extra mile. If it fails to do so, then you live insecure about your inadequacies and humility has no relationship with insecurities or inadequacies.
So it is your failure that teaches you to embrace humility to feel tranquility of heart.

Pursue your passion

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Whoever you are – a student, a businessman, a musician, an athlete – if you are not a man of your passion, you simply are a man of buried force and possibility. Consistent failures don’t always mean you have to be patient, or success will arrive to you one day, it can also be a hint that you are not going for your passion. Recognize it first, then, it does not matter how much struggle you are to undergo or how many times you fail because at the end of the day, you will be the winner.

Greatness lies in pursuing your own dreams, understanding your own plan and walking on your own path; and not by chasing someone else’s dreams or footsteps.

“Without passion man is a mere latent force and possibility, like the flint which awaits the shock of the iron before it can give forth its spark.” Henri Frederic Amiel

Necessity of a proper planning

Time is the most accessible and common thing to be wasted. Failure poses a question ‘Do you have a perfect planning?’ Through prototyping or architecting and researching your plan, you are actually visualizing and experiencing the way to reaching your destination. Planning and speed together breed the momentum, inspire to stay focused, fight the difficulties, embrace failures, endure the pain to win. It is failure that assists you in figuring out the well-planned and thought out vision.

“Our goals can only be reached through a vehicle of a plan, in which we must fervently believe, and upon which we must vigorously act. There is no other route to success.” – Stephen A. Brennan

Faith

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If you are truly familiar with the virtues of failure, then you realize that it does not take your guts and spirit out of your soul; it rather puts strong faith and perseverance in your devotion for passion. Faith, as a result of failures, strengthens your potential, prepares you to go beyond your defined boundary, whispers you for one more try when ‘Give Up’ stands in front of you demanding your courage, lighting up your true knowledge within the heart to lead you to the achievement.

“When you are on the edge of ‘Darkness’ and ‘Despair’ is about to knock you down, don’t give up, your faith will raise you up as the brightest hope to fly you to ocean of possibilities.” Don’t believe only in the facts, lengthen it by having faith in invisible potential in you.

Retain your success

Success is not permanent; it is a consistent process that has to be continued. Failures teach you not to rest on your success to fall again. Keep moving and looking for the process to ensure your success lasts longer. Anyone can be successful for a variety of reasons- for sheer luck, by hard-work, persistence or replicating success of successful persons- but retaining it is the greatest challenge. Failure will always be there to remind you to rest on the process of persistence itself, not on the pause of success. So the lesson learnt is ‘success is fragile and fallible and your greatness is in retaining success and not in one time success’.

Be Creative

Photo: AlicePopkorn

Failure makes you innovative. It cultivates the habit of experimenting, failing, getting up and starting once again with fresh idea and clear vision. It lets you play with various imaginary thoughts and come out with the most viable idea and extend the boundaries of possibilities from well-established facts and together they make you creative.

A series of experiments might go in vain or appear of no significance; nevertheless, don’t ever stop experimenting because that’s how you discover your path, invent things and become creative. The greatest scientist ever Thomas Alva Edison failed thousands of time but he never stopped experimenting.

Be Strong

Photo: dailypicksandflicks.com

It’s failure that builds up your ‘Never Give Up’ attitude. It teaches you to paddle your own way across the ocean of troubles. It motivates you to keep running until you reach the goal, traverse the wild road and desert, and climb up the cliffs of mountain until you reach the pinnacle.

“Failure creates the path to success in return of your little courage, little more strength to endure the temporary pain and loss, and a little bit might to be still and steady.”

Bring value

Failure is an alternative route that lays a foundation of better understanding for a worth-while life; it is instructive that coaches you to make the significant choices of life. While going through lessons of failures, you become a man of value, a man of perseverance, discipline and strong attitude that together make your success more glorious.
Don’t disgrace the value of failure as falling intelligently is one of the greatest arts of life.

Conquer Yourself

Photo: thesaleslion.com

Failures demand your persistence, commitment, consistent actions towards the accomplishment of your dream through which you learn to control your thoughts, know the mighty person dwelling inside, and eliminate jealousy, hatred, and selfishness. It ultimately makes you wise to have a better judgments and choices of life.
“It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles. Then the victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you, not by angels or by demons, heaven or hell.” Buddha

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A Tale Of Two Cities

A Tale of Two Cities (English)
Author: Charles Dickens in 1859
Genres: Historical novel, Fiction, Novel
Copies Sold: 200 millions

A Tale of Two Cities, a fictional classic by Charles Dickens, is set in London and Paris in the latter half of the eighteenth century during the French Revolution. It is a tale of true love, sacrifice, profound hatred, and mistreatment of the aristocrats towards the lower class in French Revolution. In the history of fictional literature, it is the most popular work the world has ever witnessed.

The novel portrays the dilemma of the French peasantry and their sufferings of prolonged abuse and brutality by the French aristocrats during the revolution. The lives of lower class people become horrible under the tyranny of upper class. Several protagonists emerge through various events and some notables are Sydney Carton and Charles Darnay and some of them also fall under the extreme wrath of the revolution and Charles Darnay is one of them.

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Le Petit Prince (The Little Prince)
Author: Antoine de Saint-Exupéry in 1943 (French)
Copies Sold: 200 millions

The Little Prince is a story about searching the answers of the important questions of life and about the importance of knowing the real meaning underneath the shell of life. We are shortsighted and don’t even intend to discuss or go deep into the significant facts of life. The narrator, through The Little Prince (the protagonist of the novel), emphasizes on seeing anything with heart instead of just with eyes. Sadly enough, young people face much difficulties in doing so.

We grown-ups are more concerned about irrelevant things of life and feel bored when it comes to discussing the important facts; we spend our whole life being obsessed about money, power and technology. The narrator has tried to draw the attention of the readers to some of the world’s real-life problems.

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The Lord of the Rings
Author: J. R. R. Tolkien in 1954–1955 (English)
Genres: Adventure novel, Fantasy, Speculative fiction, Chivalric romance, High fantasy
Copies Sold: 150 millions

An epic and fantasy novel ‘The Lord of the Rings’ was written by the English philologist and professor of the Oxford University J. R. R. Tolkien. It is world’s third bestselling novel with 150 million copies sold. The novel was published between the years of 1954 and 1955 as it is a much larger works that consists of six sections. The publishers published it into three series The Fellowship of the Ring, The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers and The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.

The Lord of the Rings started as a continuation of another earlier work of J. R. R. Tolkien titled The Hobbit that was published in 1937. When the work received huge popularity, the publishers George Allen & Unwin initiated J. R. R. Tolkien to make it larger into a series.

The Hobbit
Author: J. R. R. Tolkien in 1937 (English)
Genres: Juvenile fantasy, Speculative fiction, Adventure novel, Fantasy, Fiction, Children’s literature
Copies Sold: 100 millions

The Hobbit, a popular children book and fantasy novel by J. R. R. Tolkien, was published in 1937 and received crucial acclaim and award for best juvenile fiction from the New York Herald Tribune. The work is still popular among children and known as a classic in children’s literature.

The ostensible protagonist Bilbo Baggins is a decent and conservative hobbit who is sent with a group of thirteen dwarves to search and find out the hidden treasure that was taken away by the evil dragon Smaug. He succeeds in finding the vast treasure while going through many dangers; he also finds The One Ring.

Hong lou meng (Dream of the Red Chamber)
Author: Cao Xueqin in 1759–1791 (Chinese)
Genre: Novel
Copies Sold: 100 millions

Dream of the Red Chamber is considered to be one of China’s Four Great Classical Novels and the most rich Chinese literature. It is written by Cao Xueqin during the Qing Dynasty in the 18th century. It details about mysticism, fate, predestined romance, Chinese family values, social hierarchy and the fortunes of an aristocratic family in China.

The novel is also known as the semi-autobiographical book that reflects the rise and fall of author’s own family. As the chapter goes, the author introduces the women he knew in his childhood, his friends, relatives and servants. In a nutshell, it is precious work that represents detailed observation of life and social structures of 18th century through vast number of characters.

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And Then There Were None
Author: Agatha Christie in 1939 (English)
Genres: Children’s literature, Mystery, Fiction, Crime Fiction and Suspense
Copies Sold: 100 millions

The 7th best-selling detective fiction novel ‘And Then There Were None’ was composed by the British crime writer of short stories, novels, as well as plays Agatha Christie. The novel was first published with the title of ‘Ten Little Niggers’ on 6 November 1939 in the United Kingdom by the publisher Collins Crime Club. Later in 1040, the title was changed to Ten Little Indians by Dodd, Mead and Company.

In the story about the mysterious premise of 10 people who are all strangers to each other; they are invited to the Indian Island by the mysterious Mr. Owen for the weekend. All the strangers have been involved or complicit in the death of others but somehow they manage to escape the punishment. At the dinner table, one of the guests chocks to death and gradually every guest falls the victim of death, all one by one. It seems somebody tricks with them and their arrival together is not a coincidence.

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The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
Author: C. S. Lewis in 1950 (English)
Genres: Children’s literature, Speculative fiction, Fantasy
Copies Sold: 85 millions

Four kids and siblings Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy Pevensie are sent to live with Professor Digory Kirke who lives in a country house. While living there, they start to explore the house and Lucy suddenly finds a doorway to a magical world named Narnia. It is a story of 1940, at the time when the World War II had just begun.
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is a fantasy novel for children that is widely known as a part of the original book of The Chronicles of Narnia. It was written by C. S. Lewis and published in 1950. The novel has been translated and published in 47 foreign languages. Time magazine has enlisted the novel in its TIME 100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 to 2005.

She
Author: H. Rider Haggard in 1887 (English)
Copies Sold: 83 millions

The classics of imaginative literature She: A History of Adventure is one of the best-selling novels of all time with more than 83 million copies sold in 44 different languages. The novel was written by an English writer of adventure novels named Henry Rider Haggard and first published as series in The Graphic magazine in 1886 and continued till January 1887. The novel was an instant hit on its publishing; the literary historian Andrew M. Stauffer says “She has always been Rider Haggard’s most popular and influential novel, challenged only by King Solomon’s Mines in this regard”.

The novel emphasizes on female authority and their behavior and has attracted praise as well as criticism for only representation of womanhood. The story starts with the expedition of the character Horace Holly and Leo Vincey to a lost kingdom in the African heart.

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The Da Vinci Code
Author: Dan Brown in 2003 (English)
Genres: Conspiracy fiction, Crime Fiction, Speculative fiction, Thriller, Mystery, Fiction, Detective fiction, Suspense
Copies Sold: 80 millions

The Da Vinci Code is a controversial and mystery-detective best-selling novel written by an American author of thriller fiction named Dan Brown. The novel is about hunting treasure, a potential secret that has been kept under wraps of mystery for thousands of years and it features the themes of cryptography, symbols, codes, keys, symbols, plan and conspiracy theories. The novel has been translated and published into 40 languages has sold over 80 million copies worldwide.

The novel has been heavily criticized and the author has been accused as an anti-Christian. In response, he defends himself on his website by saying that The Da Vinci Code is “an entertaining story that promotes spiritual discussion and debate” and suggests that the book may be used “as a positive catalyst for introspection and exploration of our faith.”

Think and Grow Rich
Author: Napoleon Hill in 1937
Genres: Inspirational, Psychology, Economics, Business
Copies Sold: 70 millions

Think and Grow Rich is a motivational and personal development book composed by Napoleon Hill in 1937 during the great economic depression and before the World War II. It is one of the top selling books of all time and is inspired by the meaningful life of the most successful Scottish-American businessman Andrew Carnegie. The book focuses on ‘how to be successful’ with passion and extreme and honest desire to succeed. It teaches us the ways to stay consistent and determined with a solid planning in mind. In the book Hill writes, “Patience, persistence and perspiration make an unbeatable combination for success.”

The book has been very popular and is widely read for its success principles and their implementation in real life. John C. Maxwell, an evangelical Christian author who has written over 60 books with chief focus on leadership, has enlisted this book in his A Lifetime “Must Read” Books List.

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