Summary on
Winning The Game Of Life
By
Adam Khoo

Submitted To:
Mr. Mohammad Rezaur Razzak
Associate Professor
BRAC Business School
BRAC University

Submitted By:
Morshed Hossain
ID: 11204009
BUS 321 (Sec: 02)

Table Of Content:

Contents Page
Introduction 03

Introduction:
From the day we born, we enter the game of life. Like all games, the game of life has specific rules we need to play by. The game of life can be competitive and can be a lot of fun. We can choose to sit at the sidelines and marvel at how other people play or we can be a player by ourselves. We can choose to play the game of life to win or to play ‘not to lose’.
There are many aspects that make up our game. We have the career game, the relationship/family game, the money game, the lifestyle game, the health game and the spiritual/moral game. Many people believe that it is almost impossible to win at every game. You can win some and have to lose some of them. However, the author of this book Adam Khoo has written the ways to win in all the aspects of our life. It is not impossible as there are many success stories despite of so many struggles and obstacles. All you have to believe in yourself and follow the set principles and strategies continuously.

The book “Winning the Game Of Life” contains some of the key elements that those successful people use to practice in their lives. You cannot only sit and see what is happening around you and cursing your luck why these happened to you. There are so many hidden issues that these successful people have to went through. This set of principles can lead anyone to the desired goal and bring success in every phase of the life. 1. Success is a Journey
Success cannot be gained instantly. Someone cannot say I am a successful person by just establishing or reaching one goal. Success is not a destination but a journey. Journey towards the fulfillment of the set of your desired goals. If it is asked what is success? You may get hundred different answers of it. All of them want to be successful in different ways; everyone has got different definition of it. To define success the best answer we can have is, success is not a destination that you get to. Success is not about reaching a goal or target you have set. Rather, success is a process of continuously moving towards your goals each and every day. It is like building a home, every time you put a brick to make it; actually you are getting closer to your goal by gaining that small achievement. However, the journey is not that easy, you may fail many times before you reach the goal, but you should not stop at that point. Failing in one part cannot destroy the whole game. You should learn from your mistakes and hit back to achieve that goal. That is way successful persons used to do. For example, if I want to be a good cricketer and quit the game after failing several times, I would not able to reach to the finish line. I have to keep trying and gather small successes to be the best player and thus the journey of success continues.
If our lives, so many people never realize their potential and achieve anything in life because they never dare to dream and go for their dreams. It is not because they have less potentials, it is because of the way they have defined success and failure. Successful people do not dare to dream big, they set an effective, specific and measurable set of targets to achieve that. While, others keep thinking they will ever able to do these or not. To achieve what you want, very first you have to have a clear vision and planning of it, because goals are not something you look at once and put away. If you do not have a clear target to focus on every day, there are many things those will distract your attention. Failure may also try to distract you, but if you can stay locked to your goals regardless of the failures and keep yourself moving on the track; you will get to where you want to go.

2. Success Leaves Clues: Study It
To become successful you have to follow a continuous process. Some people eventually reach their goals but only after years of trial and error and recovering from past mistakes. It is true that, without failure and recovery it is impossible to get at the end. However, there are some ways by which you can speed up the whole process. Studying and using clues left behind by successful people allow us to learn from other people’s mistakes and experiences. By standing on the shoulders of giants, you can achieve so much more in life, at a much faster rate.
There are many success stories, how they reach to that place instead of many difficulties. With the help of modern technology it has been easier for us to know their stories behind the success. You can find people to follow like these in every phase of your life, whether you are a student or a business man. Even successful nations have stories behind, and by following the models things can be better than the past.
You may have your own definition about success, but it is not always necessary to become the first one in the industry, you will be called successful if you become the best. If you can learn from the mistakes done by others, you can easily avoid those steps and concentrate more on other issues. It will give you a huge advantage, you do not need to worry or can get a clue how to handle those situations. Now, the key is to model the great parts and throw away the lousy parts. In so doing, you can develop an approach that is even more superior. The writer made a list of areas to focus for modeling: * Paradigm: Collection of the beliefs, values and attitudes of the successful persons. It can help you to determine the way to think, to perceive the world and how to take the decisions more effectively. * Knowledge and Skills: The capabilities and the skills to achieve in order to be successful. * Emotional State: How to control your emotions, motivation, confidence and passion of what you do. * Behaviors: The communicational skill and attitude towards anyone. * Environment: The surroundings that a successful person has. A challenging and motivated circumstance will also encourage you to be so.
However, it is always not possible to model all these five areas but you can start modeling by watch videos of them, read books about them and joining seminars. You can also take interviews and work with them to know them very well. If you can follow the way they do and learn by watching them, do not repeat the mistakes they did, it will definitely help you to get to your desired position.

3. Raise Your Standards. Don’t settle for Mediocrity
Some people in their lives stay in a relationship with unhappiness. Throughout their lives they remain unhappy with what they have and what they are. They want to change the situation but do not take necessary steps to improve it. Some of them try to change it but when they face any difficulty, they quit and again come back to the previous life. The reason they lack behind, is to achieve what they want is like something they think they Should do or Should have, it is not something they Must do or Must have.
There is a huge difference between these two words Should and Must. When you think you should do something, it means that you will take actions when it is convenient, easy and within your comfort zone. It is not your priority; as long as something else comes along, you will put it off for later. The reality is if the words ‘should do’ stuck in our minds we will never get it done. We will come up with lots of excuses about why it is not happened. Whereas, in a must do condition, we will not allow anything to stop us. It becomes our absolute priority above everything else. We will take action even if it is inconvenient and costly.
As human beings, we always get what we absolutely must have. If we fail to raise the standards that we must have, the only thing left to do is cursing the luck. The problem with most people is that they choose to for less than what they can truly be, achieve and create. They wish for success but they do not make an absolute must. To become the successful one there is no way to turn your wishes into must. Demand from yourself and from life will help to settle the standard for the must. Make yourself dissatisfied and uncomfortable so that you can search a place to be satisfied and move towards it. Being satisfied and not setting the bars high will not help you to gain success. Set a new standard for yourself and start working for it, aim for it, nothing less than that, visualize and build your capabilities to match to the new standards. Look forward along with the new standards and you will get what you really deserve.

4. The Price of Talent is 10,000 Hours
We see many geniuses around us every day. People with superior talent, able to produce extra ordinary results, far beyond the reach of the average person. They do these superhumanly workings so effortlessly that bound us to think them as an in-born talent. However, psychologists and neurologists studied for more than a century and came to a conclusion that it was more hard work than just in born talent. A research done in 1993 which included a batch of violinist who were divided into three groups according to their talent; it was revealed that a child of 14 years of age spent 18 hours a week practicing skills required to enhance their performance. So a total of 10000 hours of practice is required if you want to excel in a curtain ground. Studies about the most successful people in the world, has proven that their genius only came after more than 10,000 hours of focus and hard work. Now, if you want to do your best in any field you do not always need to start practicing them from the age of 3 or 4. You can do it also from the older age, a practice of 6 hours in a day can make it possible just in 4 and a half years. The stories of legends in some areas like Michel Jordan, Warren Buffet and Tiger Woods enforces that practice makes it perfect whatever you do.
Most people do not have the patience and faith that their hard work will pay off. They want instant success and instant results. Once they fail to get it, they think that they lack the talent and give up. So they never become great in anything. 10000 hours is not only the hard work that will bring success for you, it is also the love, the passion for the work. There are lots of people who do the same thing, every day, for years; still they are not up to the mark in what they do. Researchers have found that mere practice is not good enough. Doing something for the same way will keep getting the same results. There are some key factors to keep in mind while practicing; focusing on continuous and never end improvement will motivate to getting better, external feedbacks can help to take corrective decisions, transforming the knowledge into skill and pushing beyond comfort zone will prove how it works during pressure. Thus you can be the master of the area of your passion.

5. You Become Whom You Spend Time With
We cannot live without the society, people surrounded by us. If you want to see a preview of your future, look to who you are hanging out with. If you spend time with people who are constantly trashing your dreams then after time, you begin to believe their doubt and their fear; not because their doubt and fear are true, but because we are creatures of habit and our subconscious mind begins to absorb what we hear, especially the feedback from people we love and spend a lot of time with. And if you start to believe their doubt, then soon you will begin to take action from that belief in doubt and of the belief of doubt becomes real. Not because it is true, but because the belief of doubt became your dominate thought pattern and that thought pattern influenced your actions and your actions produced the outcome. The outcome of our lives begins within us, within the people we spend most of our time. As rich people become richer because they spend time with those people who always want to double their money.
But, this can be prevented by hanging with the proper community of people. If we hang with people who uplift us, who encourage us towards our dreams and who challenge our thought patterns, it will obviously create an extra boost in our lives. Let us not surround ourselves with people who always agree with us, but rather people who support our growth by challenging our beliefs and helping us break through to new mental and spiritual ground.
Who you spend time with and who you believe is a major factor that will determine whether you are successful or not. Our aim should be to hang with people who love us, who believe in us, who challenge us to go to the next level and who inspire us. Life is far too short to hang with people who are always negative and pull you back as they are. People who support our growth, not necessarily the way we want, but most certainly the way we need is the most important for our future growth. To be the best, you have to stay with the best for your own progress.

6. Leveraging Your Way to Success
Leverage is the process of multiplying the results of your efforts. It is the knowing how to create huge results by the application of relatively small effort. The secret lies in the fact that the most successful people in the world understand and harness the power of leverage while the mediocre majority does not. They leverage on other people’s time, other people’s talent/experience and other people’s money. You may not come with everything in this world, some has money, some has time, and some has intelligence to do the works more efficiently and effectively. So, what makes them successful if they lack of those things? Here, the leveraging comes into the role and create the bonding that leads to success.
Apple is one of the leading electronic brands in this world, but the founder Steve Jobs was not an engineer himself. He knew how to deal with the problems may arise in his organization and by hiring the right people for the right job and by making a perfect team to work with he made this possible. There are some tasks that take an enormous amount of time for a single person to do but with a large group of people, each one specializing and doing part of the task, you can get a tremendous amount done. Leveraging can be beneficial for both the parties, who has money and who has the talent as well or who has the time to get the jobs done. In this book, the author has mentioned to ways to leverage money; public money, which means franchising your business to a third party who will pay a franchise fee and borrowing at a low interest rate from financial institutes and then investing that money on a project that yields higher return than the borrowed interest rate. These can be helpful if you want to start your business as an entrepreneur.

7. Mastering Your Inner World
Our world is full of both types of people successful and unsuccessful. What are the reasons behind it? Does the environment or life circumstance determine this? Well, the answer is, not always. There are so many people who have been given all the privileges and advantages yet they turn to be lazy, directionless and unhappy. On the other hand, there are people who have been given nothing, treated unfairly but proved themselves successful and fulfilled in front of the world. We can see the struggles faced by Oprah Winfrey and Eminem, how they have proven themselves as a role model to this world despite of poverty and being abused. It was their tough background what gave them determination and motivation to make a better life for themselves. Actually what really determines our destiny is the way we choose to respond through our thoughts, emotions and actions. This is our inner world, on which we have complete control to become successful.
The ways people choose to react in certain situations determine their destiny. Many of us think that “E=O” (Events= Outcome), rather than “E+R=O” (Events + Response= Outcome). If we are born poor, we believe that we will be poor for the rest of our lives. But, successful people feel that the way they choose to respond to a curtain situation determines their outcome. And also there are stories vice versa. If we take every situation positively, we can response accordingly and hope for a better result and if we take every little thing in a negative way then we might die ourselves by blaming why this happened to me? Very firstly, we need to take control over our thoughts, because it triggers our emotions, which will determine our actions. Controlling our inner world can make things turn around into your favor. Success story of Lance Armstrong, teaches us that positive thinking is required in order to have positive outcomes. Thus, directing his inner world after having cancer helped him to reach his goal. We should remember one thing; we cannot control the events of outer world but through the positive help of inner world we can unfold many encouraging outcomes.

8. Change Your Identity. Change Your Life. Each and every one of us wants to make some changes into their lives. The way we feel, act or the results we produce. When person make a change and it lasts it is not only because he/she make changes at the behavioral, emotional and cognitive level, but they also make a shift at the level of self-identity. Identity is the belief you have about who you are as a person, how you see yourself. As we grow up, our identities shift all the time, sometimes in a better way, sometimes worse. But, the danger is when identities change without our conscious directions, we may develop a negative or destructive identity. If we somehow manage to change our thoughts and think positively, then we would change our identity which will affect our destiny in a positive way. We must remember that the identity now we have is the result of generalities of past experiences, behaviors and past choices. To change the identity you have to first view yourself differently. By adopting the “Be, Do and Have” principle, we can be the person we want to be and do the things that we want to do and have the things we want to have. Many of us cannot maintain the change is because we do it in the reverse direction. Our actions towards life will determine the results and ultimately the destiny. The way you see yourself effects what you think you can do or cannot do, you want to achieve in life and thus you may take actions consequently. If you want to make a positive and sustainable change to your identity, there are several steps to follow: write down the changes you want to make in your behavior, think as a successful person and how this can change your identity, execute your changed behavior until you are comfortable with it, communicate your changes to other people around you and lastly, make physical changes in yourself, change yourself so that you see yourself as a new person.

9. Develop Success Habits