I can't compare myself with my social media peers out there. I know there isn't perfect balance in anyone's life. I know what works for me and I need to stick with my own formula for "success."

Effort is really the key component of the cycle of success, because even if you are inspired, motivated, or determined, you will not succeed if you don't put in the effort. Effort is the last step of the cycle before accomplishment.

There are, of course, challenges and obstacles we face in our external environment; however, there are also insidious unseen obstructions of which we are not even aware. These barriers are the self-constructed limitations we create with our own beliefs.

To be successful, you need to understand the very vital difference between believing you will succeed, and believing you will succeed easily. It's the difference between being a realistic optimist and an unrealistic optimist.

Here's the problem I see: we can't rely upon raw passion by itself to sustain our efforts over time, because like all emotions, it will come and go. Can passion effectively fuel our desire? Absolutely. Is it sustainable? I don't think so.

Skills, knowledge and ethos -- improve the first two, and you'll be pretty good, but tackling the third will put you on the road toward greatness.

The last couple of years of economic turmoil should have made it obvious that we all underestimated how much success is needed and how valuable it actually is to our survival and well-being.

Decades of research on achievement suggests that successful people reach their goals not simply because of who they are, but more often because of what they do.

Most resolutions fail because they don't make us happy while trying to achieve them. For instance losing weight, exercising more, working harder. Also, they aren't attached to anything bigger than ourselves.

If you want to be the kind of person whom others instantly like, trust and listen to, you need to understand some of the keys to communication, magnetism and listening.

Are you doing what you love? Any new undertaking or journey or endeavour requires that first crucial step, and your focus should not be on how far you have to go but on actually taking that first step towards your dreams.