If it isn’t your job to do it, perhaps it is your opportunity.

When riches begin to come they come so quickly, in such great abundance, that one wonders where they have been hiding during all those lean years.

Someone once observed that the reason we often fail to recognize opportunities is because they come disguised as problems. When a customer, a colleague, or your boss has a problem, it may create a valuable opportunity for you. It isn’t important to the person with the problem how your company is organized or whose responsibility it is to solve the problem; he or she only wants the situation resolved.

The next time a customer, a colleague, or your boss asks for your assistance in something that falls outside your area of responsibility, instead of referring them to someone else, offer to help. Look at the situation from the other person’s point of view. How would you like the situation handled if the roles were reversed? Take the initiative to find the answer, solve the problem, or keep the project moving forward.

It is a natural human reaction for you to wish to correct others when you see them making a mistake or doing something differently than you would have done it. It is far more difficult to control the impulse to show them how much more intelligent you are. The ability to recognize and control such impulses marks the beginning of the development of wisdom. A wise person knows that when he shows his intelligence with the actions he takes, others learn a far more valuable and lasting lesson.

If you see someone who could benefit from your advice, you can gently lead him to a more appropriate conclusion by asking open-ended, nonjudgmental questions. Let others find the flaws in their reasoning by leading them logically through the process. As Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, “The secret of education lies in respecting the pupil.”

If you really are smarter than others, show them with your actions.

As a general rule, people will accept you for what you say you are until you prove yourself to be otherwise. Don’t take advantage of the goodwill of others.

Abraham Lincoln once observed, “You may fool all the people some of the time; you can even fool some of the people all the time; but you can’t fool all of the people all the time.” Regardless of how cleverly you package yourself, others will eventually see through your masquerade and recognize you for what you really are.

If you have more enemies than friends, the odds are a thousand to one you have earned them.

Of all the negative emotions, envy is perhaps the most insidious. It is especially sinister because it destroys you from the inside by replacing all that is positive and productive with negative feelings of anger, jealousy, and despair.  But when you congratulate others upon their successes and genuinely wish them well, not only do you give credit to those who deserve it, but you also feel better about yourself.

Once you’ve overcome your envy, you may want to determine what specific actions the other person took to achieve success. Meanwhile, you will have strengthened your relationships by recognizing the achievements of others.

Waste no words on a man who dislikes you. Actions are the only thing that will change their perspective.

Some people think they can talk their way out of any situation, and for a time they may be right. But, if someone already dislikes you, whether from misunderstanding or an error you have made, he or she will be especially difficult to persuade with words. Their emotions will always get in the way of their ability to think logically and reasonably. And words will make the situation worse.

The only true way to alter another persons perspective is through your action. The value of someones perspective must be changed.  We all frame things is life to make is easier to function. IE,The sky is blue unless it rains when its grey.  Oh today the sky is grey, must be its going to rain.

Consistent actions over a sustained period of time, are the only way a persons perspective of you can be persuaded differently. If you constantly demonstrate that you are a generous, kind, trustworthy and caring person, it will be very hard for even your enemies to dislike you.

Persuading yourself that you can do something differently is a strong beginning. The longer you delay, the harder it will be to begin. Seldom is a plan perfect. If you have a clear vision of your goal and a plan that is flexible enough to allow you to deal with unexpected obstacles or take advantage of unforeseen opportunities, don’t delay another minute.

Just getting into action — even if you do have to make adjustments later — will help focus your mind and channel your energies in the direction of your objective.

Even if the original person cannot see your changes….you will become a better and happier person for having made the effort.

If life hands you a lemon, don’t complain, but instead make lemonade to sell to those who are thirsty from complaining.

Wally Amos, the man many consider to be the father of the gourmet cookie industry, has turned lemons into lemonade so often in his life that in his official portrait he holds a pitcher in one hand and a glass of lemonade in the other. A perennial optimist, Amos refuses to acknowledge that obstacles are anything other than stepping-stones to success.

In a career that has spanned several decades, he has made it to the pinnacle of success several times, only to lose everything and be forced to start over. But he’s never lost faith. “You have to have the trust and faith to let go and not agonize,” he says. “Don’t waste your time worrying. Worry is not preparation. Analyze the situation and focus on solutions. There is always an answer.” Offer results, not alibis.

There are many people who — perhaps with the best of intentions — make promises they somehow never get around to keeping. These folks have usually developed a number of perfectly plausible explanations for not meeting their commitments; they have become experts at explaining away their failures.

Successful people, though, are those who accept responsibility for their lives. They know that talk is cheap; actions are all that really matter.

The world is waiting for men and women who seek the opportunity to render real service — the kind of service that lightens the burdens of their neighbors, the kind of service that 95 percent of people do not render because they do not understand it.

When you provide a truly useful service, enthusiastically and in a spirit of genuine helpfulness, success will automatically follow. The world seeks out such individuals and rewards them accordingly.

The greatest of all success rules is this: do unto others as you would if you were the others.

How often do you look at those around you and say, “I could do any of their jobs better than they can if I only had the opportunity,” never realizing the price they have paid and the knowledge they have accumulated to earn the right to hold that position?

It’s easy to be a Monday-morning quarterback and second-guess the actions of others. But it’s far more productive to recognize the contributions of others and give them the credit for a job well done. If you aspire to a higher level of recognition, demonstrate to others — your peers as well as your superiors — that you can be counted upon. The world’s greatest rewards accrue to those who always deliver on their promises.

The moral is – Don’t covet the other fellow’s job if you are not prepared to accept the responsibility that goes with it.

By using the Golden Rule as a principle of ethical behavior; we have a dynamic force that can work good into our lives. When you make it a practice to treat others as though you were the others, you spread goodwill among people who, in turn, may be moved to do the same. By their actions, they influence still more people, who generate goodwill among even more people.

This force for goodwill increases exponentially and will return to you from totally new sources. The benefit you receive from a good deed performed today by a total stranger may have been a chain reaction from long ago when you observed the Golden Rule in your own dealings with another.

No action takes place unless it is preceded by thought.

If you’re unhappy with the circumstances in which you find yourself, you can improve your situation through the power of thought, just as surely as you can destroy a positive life with negative thinking. Success begins with an honest analysis of your present condition, acceptance of responsibility for your own life, and the development of a workable plan to achieve what you desire.

Many successful people have found opportunities in failure and adversity that they could not recognize in more favorable circumstances.

You may have found that your mind seems sharpest when you are faced with the greatest difficulties. Desperation often proves you really are better than you think. But with the exception of an immediate threat to your life or health, there are few situations that require instantaneous action.

When the world seems to be conspiring against you and nothing is working out right, pause for a few moments to think the situation through — then develop the most appropriate plan of action, the one that has the greatest likelihood of success.

You can think your way into or out of almost any circumstance, good or bad. Your friends will be what you make them. If you are the kind of friend who freely gives of your time and always shows consideration for others, your friends will be generous and kind.

But, if you are the kind of person who takes your friends for granted, neither giving nor expecting much in return, you will attract friends who exhibit the same qualities. In friendship, like attracts like. Assess your behavior occasionally to determine what kind of friend you are.

Are you the kind of person you would like to have as a friend? Do you freely give more than you expect in return, or are you always asking and never giving? Do you take the time to stay in touch, to remember friends’ special occasions? When you become so consumed with your own interests that you forget about your friends, you are well on your way to becoming friendless.

All achievement, all earned riches, have their beginning in an idea! If you are ready for the secret you already possess one half of it; therefore, you will readily recognize the other half the moment it reaches your mind.

Your job will never be any bigger than your imagination makes it.

Daniel Burnham, the turn-of-the-century architect and civic planner whose plan for the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair had an enormous influence on contemporary civic design, was quoted as saying, “Make no little plans.” He knew that to achieve great things we must have grand ideas. If you can imagine it, you can create it. And if you can create in your imagination the job that you would like to have, it is possible to create it in the real world.

When the going is hardest, just keep on keeping on, and you’ll get there sooner than someone who finds the going easy.

If you think achieving great heights of success will be easy, you either don’t understand at all how the process works or you have your sights set too low. Reaching the top of any field is difficult, time-consuming, and often tedious.

The reason it isn’t crowded at the top is that most people won’t do the things that are necessary to achieve success. They are all too willing to give up when the going gets tough. If you need inspiration to persevere, read the biographies of men and women who have achieved greatness in their lives. You will find that they prevailed because they refused to quit. They continued to toil alone long after the masses had given up and gone home.