成功者一定具备的特质——坚持到底（英文）
2008-01-24 14:56阅读：
坚持到底一直都是成功者的特质，做任何事情，想要取得成功和卓越，都必须要经历一系列的问题和障碍，突破等待坚持到底才能够实现目标。在英语学习上，是否能够坚持到底，尤为重要。
你是否能够将一本书认认真真的读完，看懂，吃透其中的每一个单词，每一个句型，每一种语法？
多少人，失去专心，连将一本书看完的毅力都不够，都没有耐心坚持下去，还如何学好英语呢？
老老实实地将一本书研究透，彻底搞明白，比马马虎虎，走马观花看上各种各样的封面和图书有效果得多。
下面这篇文章的结尾，列出了四种帮助养成坚持到底习惯的方法，非常值得学习，但是一定要从头读下去，才会有更深的启发。
Persistence by Bob Proctor
If you were to choose just one part of your personality to
develop that would virtually guarantee your success, I'd like to
suggest that you place persistence at the top of your list.
Napoleon Hill, in his classic Think and Grow Rich felt so
strongly about this subject, he devoted an entire chapter to it.
Hill suggested, 'There may be no heroi
c connotation to the word persistence but the quality is to your
character what carbon is to steel.'
Think about it. If you took a quick mental walk down memory
lane and reviewed some of your accomplishments in the past – large
and small – you would have to agree that persistence played an
important role in your success.
Napoleon Hill studied many of the world's most successful
people. He pointed out the only quality he could find in Henry
Ford, Thomas Edison or a host of other notable greats, that he
could not find in everyone else was persistence. What I found even
more intriguing was the fact that Hill made comment of the fact
that these individuals were often misunderstood to be ruthless or
cold-blooded and that this misconception grew out of their habit of
following through in all of their plans with persistence.
It's both interesting and sadly amusing to me that, as
a society, we would be quick to criticize people for realizing they
had an unshakeable power within them and were capable of overcoming
any obstacle outside of them. This power would
ultimately move them toward a greater chance of achieving any goal
they set for themselves!
Milt Campbell is a good friend of mine. He and I have shared many
hours together discussing the very topic of persistence. Milt was a
Decathlete in the Olympic Games held in Helsinki, Finland in 1952.
His goal was to capture gold for the US. Unfortunately, another
fierce competitor who had taken home the gold four years previous
in London wasn't satisfied with one gold, Bob Mathias wanted two;
Milt had to settle for silver. That did not deter Milt one bit. He
had formed the habit of persistence and four years later in
Melbourne, Australia, Milt won the gold medal, earning him the
title of the greatest athlete in the world.
On numerous occasions Milt has said, 'There were many guys in
school who were far better athletes than me, but they quit.' I can
recount story after story about individuals who overcame obstacles
so great, but only did so because they dared persist. These
individuals are no different than you and I.
Ultimately persistence becomes a way of life, but that
is not where it begins. To develop the mental strength –
persistence - you must first want something. You have to WANT
something so much that it becomes a heated desire... a passion in
your belly. You must fall in love with that idea. Yes, literally
fall in love with the idea and magnetize yourself to every part of
the idea. At that point, persistence will be virtually automatic.
Persistence is a subject I have studied all of my adult
life and I can tell you one thing I know for certain: very few
people ever, mentally or verbally, say to themselves... this is
what I really want and I am prepared to give my life for it, and
thus, they never develop the persistence to achieve
it.
Persistence is a unique mental strength; a strength that is
essential to combat the fierce power of the repeated rejections and
numerous other obstacles that sit in waiting and are all part of
winning in a fast-moving, ever-changing world. As Napoleon Hill
found out, there are hundreds of highly successful men and women
who have cut a path for others to follow, while leaving their mark
on the scrolls of history… and every one of these great individuals
was persistent. In many cases it was the only quality that
separated them from everyone else.
It is generally believed that a lack of persistence is a
consequence of a weak willpower. That is not true. A person could
have a highly evolved willpower and still lack the persistence
required to keep moving forward in life. In more cases than not, if
a person lacks persistence, they do not have a goal that is worthy
of them, a desirable goal that excites them to their very
core.
Though willpower is important in moving a
person toward their goal, if there is ever a war between the will
and the imagination, the imagination will win every time.
What that means is: you're powered by desire and fuelled by the
dream you hold. Once you start to use your imagination to help you
build a bigger picture of your dream, to define and refine it until
you get it just right in your mind, the emotion that is triggered
by that desire far outweighs any force that may be caused by sheer
will alone. I am not suggesting the will does not have to be
developed, it does. It must become highly developed in order to
direct you toward the image with which you are emotionally
involved.
Your intellectual factors hold the potential for enormous
good when they are properly employed. However, you must remember
that everything has an opposite and any of your intellectual
factors can turn, without warning, into destructive lethal enemies
when they are directed toward results that are not wanted. It is
easy to find individuals who are persistently doing what they don't
want to do and achieving results that they do not want. A lack of
persistence is not their problem; that person is persisting to
their own detriment. Ignorance and paradigms are the enemy that we
must defeat. Everyone is persistent. Our objective must be to put
persistence to work for us rather than against us.
Vision and desire have to be the
focus of your attention if you're going to develop persistence into
the great ally it can become.
Another excellent example of persistence was demonstrated
when, in 1953, a beekeeper from Auckland, N.Z., Edmund Hillary and
his native guide, Tenzing Norguay, became the first two people to
climb Mt. Everest and return, after having tried and failed the two
previous years.
Hillary had two obvious character strengths that took him to
the very top —- vision and desire. Even despite the seemingly
insurmountable challenges, he had no trouble persisting with the
strenuous acts that were required because every act was hooked into
the image of him standing on top of the mountain. They were
expressed because of his persistence, but he was persistent because
he was emotionally involved with the image. Without persistence,
all his skills would have meant nothing.
Persistence is an expression of the mental
strength that is essential in almost every profession, where
repeated rejection and obstacles are part of a daily
routine.
In closing, let me give you four relatively simple steps that
will help you to turn persistence into a habit. These steps can be
followed by virtually anyone.
1. Have a clearly defined goal. The
goal must be something you are emotionally involved with, something
you want very much. (In the beginning, you may not even believe
that you can accomplish it—the belief will
come.)
2. Have a clearly established plan that you can
begin working on immediately. (Your plan will very likely
only cover the first and possibly the second stage of the journey
to your goal. As you begin executing your plan, other steps
required to complete your journey will be revealed at the right
time.)
3. Make an irrevocable decision to reject any
and all negative suggestions that come from friends, relatives or
neighbors. Do not give any conscious attention to
conditions or circumstances that appear to indicate the goal cannot
be accomplished.
4. Establish a mastermind group of one or more people
who will encourage, support and assist you wherever
possible.
What do you dream of doing with your life? Do it. Begin right
now and never quit. There is greatness in you. Let it out. Be
persistent.
Bob Proctor
