There’s a saying that is more truth than just words, “If you want to be successful, find out what successful people do and follow suit. Also, find out what unsuccessful people do and avoid those things."

The same goes for being rich, if you want to be rich you need to do what rich people do and not what people who struggle with money are doing. There are a few exceptions to the list I’m going to share but overall once the metrics are understood the exceptions are that because they are not equal. 

One example could be gambling, today many successful people are seen gambling in poker tournaments and they have no financial challenges or fear that they could lose everything. Even when some of these people lose a million dollars on a hand or a round of golf, financially, that’s not going to hurt them badly, their contexts are different than mine and most peoples, but generally for someone trying to create success the loss of any money could be immediate and lifelong devastating. 

Here's a list of things done by successful people that can trigger success for all. Let’s start off with one, not all successful people eat well but…

Successful People…

Stay Fit and Exercise:

Most successful people exercise in some way. From walking and running, yoga, spinning, golf, to just plain old gaming, to the gym or even being in formal leagues, successful people know you can compete if you are not up to it. In fact, most successful people I know can do 1 if not all of these - Swim, Ride a Bike, Play Golf, Catch and Throw a Ball, Snowboard or Ski.

When I’m with a group of friends or business colleges, I wanted to have more time with the team members that were able to say, “yes I can go do that”.

Read and Learn:

This is another one of those where both the content and the context matter. I always admired those who were reading about businesses or self-help books. I would try and read them too. Sometimes these books were not my style or speed, but if they were reading it and referring to the book, I needed to, too. 

A great example for me would be the book Good to Great, while it is a great book for me, it was a tough read because of its size, and some chapters did not seem relevant to me immediately. What it did do was it put me on the same playing field as many of my corporate teammates; something many other artists chose not to do and therefore took themselves out of many strategic and growth meetings and opportunities. 

There is a saying, “Find out what successful people are reading and read that, and if you see what less successful people are reading, don’t read that!”.  In my salon we have no People, US Weekly or any other celebrity/pop culture magazines, guests can read them in the checkout aisle if they want. We offer fashion, design, visually-interesting and thought-provoking content that we hope opens and expands people’s ideas and knowledge, not gossip.

Travel, Explore and Eat

One of the best ways to be successful is to have a better understanding of your advisory in war and business.  The more you know about their strengths and weaknesses the better advantage you have, including what to avoid entirely. 

My favorite thing about traveling is realizing that my normal is not normal. When our daughters were 15 and 12 we took them to London, Paris, Duesseldorf, Rotterdam and Amsterdam, on points, as their birthday and Christmas gifts that year, to show them that being an American teenage girl is not normal in the world. 

Food is the same way. Travel is an opportunity to experience what is normal in other places to eat. My rule is when at a business dinner, if everyone else is eating everything, there is something I can eat too. 

In Africa I did request the crocodile a second night because I did not want to try quail and in Korea my friends and I did request the ocean crab be cooked where the restaurant wanted us to eat it raw, so I do understand having some limits.

Eating is one of the best ways to learn as you travel because almost every other country lives farm to table or ocean to table and what is local is best. In other words, if in India, eat Indian food because the Italian restaurant you think could be a better idea might not have access to the Italian ingredients you were expecting. 

Lastly, explore and see what life is like. Don’t just do the tourist stuff, get up and ride the way the locals do to their work, go at lunch time to where working people eat, and find out where they go after work to relax. Traveling has been one of my greatest privileges in life from flea markets around the world where I could see things of their past, to malls, restaurants and cities that show the hopes and future for a people and culture.

I believe in putting your money where you mouth is and as I am having more and more conversations with people looking to create their successes, including our two daughters, I thought this would be a great way to start our year.