Habits of the Highly Successful

Image credit: Christopher Burns via Unsplash

Do your daily habits correlate with your expected level of success?  

As a company working with freelancers, who are more often than not running their own show, we often hear about how hard it is to stay productive and motivated. This week, we’re exploring the daily habits of the most successful people.

• Waking Up Early: If you’re not a morning person, you might roll your eyes at this one, but it makes sense. The earlier you rise, the more hours in the day, allowing more time for activities like exercise, journaling, and personal projects. 

• Reading: A lot of reading, mostly focusing on educational, self-help, biographies, and historical books. Successful investor and philanthropist Warren Buffet is a big advocate of this, and considers reading an essential habit for success. 

• Continuous Learning: This is a significant aspect for those most successful. Their thirst for knowledge and self-improvement is implemented into their work as they develop healthier mindsets around failure and success. Bill Gates was known to consume dozens of books each year. 

• Keeping a Routine: Many of us learned how important routines were during those tough, non-productive work-from-home days in covid. Having a routine ensures consistency, reduces stress and decision fatigue, and ensures productivity by eliminating time wasted on figuring out the next task. An example of a successful routine follower is Oprah, and the good news is that all the things she does, you can do too—just probably not on your acres of land. Her routine involves walking the dogs, exercising, and meditating. 

• Time Management: Effective time management is one of the most common habits among the most successful. With only so many hours in the day, a successful person understands the value of time and can prioritise duties accordingly. Elon Musk is known to break his day into blocks of time dedicated to specific activities, and this disciplined approach minimises any wasted time. Another person who thrived on a good routine was none other than Bill Gates, who would live each day mapped out in five-minute intervals to avoid distraction. 

• Goal Setting (Steve Jobs): Steve Jobs set long-term and short-term goals to have an outlined roadmap to success. Long-term goals provide direction and an overview of where you want to be, but short-term goals make the long term more achievable and less overwhelming in day-to-day tasks. Having a goal keeps you on track and gives you specific tasks to work on. 

• Healthy Lifestyles: Not a surprising one—our physical and mental well-being, of course, play a factor in our success. Many accomplished individuals prioritise diet, exercise, and sleep and attribute their success to each of these. 

• Exercise: Richard Branson claims that exercising each morning at 5am is the reason for his doubled productivity. 

• Sleep: We all know how important sleep is and how much better we function when we get our eight hours in! Albert Einstein preferred 10 hours – after all, it affects memory function and creative thinking. 

• Mindset: Michelle Obama’s habit or ‘secret’ to success is to give herself permission to be happy. Knowing the way she feels mentally will have a ripple effect on her work and the way she interacts with others around her. Of course that is easier said than done and rather than just choosing to wake up and BE happy Michelle says she has to “plan my happiness” as it doesn’t just happen, “you have to work in some happiness too”. Everything really does take work. 

When considering the most successful individuals, it’s easy to overlook that they, like us, focus on engaging in simple day-to-day tasks to stay on course toward their goals. Despite their numerous achievements, they are relatable, as there is a commonality of habits and the need for consistency, highlighting our shared humanity as creatures dependent on routine for survival.