Success is what you intensely long for

Success is a natural instinct. Everything in nature has a success instinct. If it were not for the success instinct, there would be no plants. There would be no animals. They are born with this natural success instinct, the urge, the drive to get what they want. Yet some people fail. Why? Nature intended for them to succeed. The answer is: People fail only because they have not used the natural success instinct with which they were born.

I had been very lucky to meet some of the most successful people in the country – right from politics to the entertainment world and successful businessmen who had no much college qualification. When I closely observed and studied their journey I found that they may not be aware about the very existence of something like public relations, but that is what they had been doing all their life to reach at the top and also to remain at the top. So Public Relations is the best tool to succeed in life and we all are engaged in it subconsciously. Imagine the result it can give when we employ it consciously?

People who have not succeeded to the full extent of their capacities always have an excuse. And, of course they may have a handicap. Everybody has handicaps, only some handicaps require more effort and will power to overcome than others. Real or imagined, physical, mental or financial handicaps are something everybody has. Suppose your handicap is that you did not have much school education and you are very poor. If you look at some of such poor people you will be surprised to see the name of Henry Ford in the list. And so we can go back through history and learn one of life's greatest lessons; nobody is holding you back but you. Composer of immortal symphonies Beethoven was deaf and Joan of Arc, an illiterate and penniless peasant girl, became the heroine of France. To put it simply, success is available to everybody.

But What Do You Want?

Believe me; it actually is simple and easy to get whatever you want. There is not anything difficult or complicated about it. Anybody can do it. The first requirement for getting whatever you want is to know what you really want. What you want is your destination in life. It is your life-goal. What you want is your life-target. You cannot aim at no target.

The first reason that people do not succeed is that they do not know what they want. When you ask yourself: What do I want? Think only in terms of a life goal. What do you want? Happiness? Love? Success? Wealth? Influence? Power? Popularity? Fame? What? So, knowing what you want is the first step in getting it. According to psychologist Paul Zak, "Experiments show that having a sense of higher purpose stimulates oxytocin production, as does trust. Trust and purpose then mutually reinforce each other, providing a mechanism for extended oxytocin release, which produces happiness."

Having chosen to BE SOMETHING, you must decide to DO SOMETHING and that confronts you with choosing amongst life's tangle of pathways. You must choose which action to take. Unless you know what you want, you have no life-target at which to aim. Unless you know which of many choices will produce success, you are lost in your search for a rewarding life. Now you have to know HOW to do it.

I have read somewhere that success method may be different for each field but three things are common in each – Maintain a magnetic Inner glow, Radiate a magnetic Outer-glow and Smile with your Eyes.

These are the three keys which will unlock one of the many doors to the treasure room of success. If you can do those three things with the right people, in the right places, at the right times then you have arrived. These three are the ingredients of a powerful personal magnetism. You will have to learn, practice and use.

Psychologists say, "Face is the index of mind, and eyes are the windows of the soul." So smiles are the greatest of communications and one must develop it. It is not a paper smile. You find counterfeit smiles there. The real kind of smile comes only from the purity of your heart and your character. That smile is always seen. One look at the face and you will know whether he is really sincere in explaining the properties of the product/ organization or an individual. By looking at the face, you can see that.

(Writer is National President of International Chambers of Public Relations; Vice Chairman & Admn. Head of World Communicators Council &former Head, Corporate Communications,Central Bank of India)