The After Work Habits Insanely Successful People Have That You Need To Adopt

The reason most people are unable to meet their own expectations is, obviously, because they can’t put in the amount of work that is needed. However, not being able to produce is not just the cause; it’s also the effect of another, larger problem. People are unable to put in the needed work because they are unable to utilize the remaining time they have to support the efficiency of their work.

Human beings require a certain level of comfort in order to work most efficiently — the more discomfort you experience, the more trouble you will have focusing on the work and finding the motivation that is needed to succeed. It all boils down to what we want most. We may tell ourselves that we want to work towards our dreams more than anything, but if our minds are sluggish and our bodies are worn then the mind starts second-guessing itself and leading us astray.

Luckily, there are some practices that we can adapt as our own that will make working easier, focusing more natural and success inevitable. Here are 10 of them:

1. Hit the bar.

Grabbing a couple of drinks with your friends after a long day of working is a great way to help unwind and to distract yourself from all the work ahead of you. Get together with some friends for happy hour drinks and forget about any problems that you may be experiencing at work. Socializing helps the mind change focus — which is needed from time to time — and moderate amounts of alcohol reduce the risk of heart attacks and strokes. Plus, it relaxes you after the first drink. Keep it moderate because overdoing it will only leave you feeling worse the next morning.

2. Get creative.

Play an instrument. Do some painting, drawing, sculpting — anything that you enjoy and that forces you to focus on your movements. Doing something that requires you to be creative works parts of the brain that may not be flexed throughout your workday. Just like you don’t want to just work out certain muscles, ignoring others, you don’t want to work only some parts of your brain — you want to try to work the brain as a whole. Although we are still working on decoding the brain, studies have shown that working on something that takes creative thought helps the rest of the brain function more efficiently.

3. Take a walk.

Spend some time outdoors. Go for a run, a walk, a hike or just sit down under the shade of a tree. Get some sunshine and fresh air. Outdoor activities have been proven to increase your efficiency and productivity once you do get back to work.

4. Play a physically demanding sport.

We are humans — but we’re still only animals. Smart animals, but animals nonetheless. Our bodies and minds require us to exert ourselves physically to perform properly. The mind and body are tightly linked — one directly affecting the other. The chemicals that our bodies release while playing intense sports help the brain function properly. Plus, it’s a whole lot of fun. Fun is good.

5. Hump like a rabbit.

There’s nothing much more relieving than a good hour’s worth of sex. It mixes the benefits of rigorous sport with the physical pleasures resulting from the close and intimate interaction with another person. There’s no better way to get your mind off your work than working towards orgasm.

6. Get some sleep.

Sleep is extremely underrated. Just because we can manage with only five hours of sleep doesn’t mean that we should. We are capable of managing under many less than ideal situations, but the goal is to maximize efficiency by maintaining a certain level of physical and mental comfort throughout the week. There’s no better way to rejuvenate your mind and body than by getting a good eight hours worth of snoozing.

7. Catch up with your family.

Family can be your greatest support system if you allow it. It’s what having a family is for. Your family is in your life to help you when you need help and guide you when you need guidance. On top of that, the closeness that we feel towards our family cannot be fabricated or replaced. Your family can make you feel nostalgic, safe and comfortable — allow you to put aside the workload you have ahead of you. Not everyone is so lucky to have a supportive family; if you do then make sure to use that fact to your advantage.

8. Plan your next mini vacation.

Vacations themselves are great for relieving stress. It’s a way to remind yourself that there is more to life, more to you and more to the world than the walls around your office. Moreover, the anticipation of an upcoming vacation does wonders for your mood. Excitement isn’t a cure all… but it’s close enough.

9. Read a novel.

Fictional reading is one of the best ways to clear your mind. It allows you to transplant yourself from your reality to the reality contained between the covers of a book. Novels allow you to transport yourself to another place, another time, maybe even another dimension. They always have grand-morals that will give you a different outlook on life and often will bring great ideas to the forefront of your consciousness.

10. Meditate.

The busier we are, the less likely we are to slow down and to experience the essence of living itself. We fill our minds with things from the past and the future, not bothering to look at the present. We keep so busy that we don’t realize all the little things that we feel living in our skins. Taking some time to slow down, sit still and control your breathing will allow you to keep yourself grounded and present in the moment. Meditating regularly can — literally — change your life. Don’t knock it until you try it.

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Good Guy Billionaires: 115 Of The World’s Richest People Pledge To Donate Half Their Wealth

115 billionaires from around the world have signed a pledge to give away half of their fortunes.

This agreement is the result of a campaign called “The Giving Pledge” started by Warren Buffett, Bill Gates and his wife Melinda in 2010.

The pledge intends to give the wealthiest people in the world more control of where their money will be donated over the course of their lives.

Twelve billionaires from nations such as Russia, South Africa, Australia, Germany, Ukraine and Maylasia have signed on.

The Giving Pledge is a chance for the rich to give in a “smarter” way, Gates told the Wall Street Journal last September.

“This new group brings extensive business and philanthropic experience that will enrich the conversation about how to make philanthropy as impactful as possible,” he said. “Their thoughtfulness and deep commitment to philanthropy are an inspiration to me, and I’m sure to many others as well.”

Russian media mogul Vladimir Potanin wrote last year that he joined to teach his children a lesson about certain essential values.

“The decision I made is not just an attempt to be remembered as a philanthropist,” he wrote. “I also see it as a way to protect my children from the burden of the extreme wealth, which may deprive them of any motivation to achieve anything in life on their own.”

By 2012, Gates and Buffett had already recruited 92 billionaires, including Mark Zuckerberg, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and Netflix CEO Reed Hastings.

Charlie Rose recently caught up with Bill and Melinda Gates and Warren Buffett to discuss the morals behind the pledge and just how natural this promise came to them.

From Top Info Post:

Charlie Rose: Is it necessary to join the Giving Pledge that you promise 50 percent of your net worth?

Melinda Gates: Yes. In your lifetime or in your will.

Charlie Rose: Or in your will?

Warren Buffett: Right.

Charlie Rose: Are people shocked by that?

Warren Buffett: I don’t think so.

Melinda Gates: We’re asking them to be bold. We’re asking them to step out and to do something big. But a lot of them were already on their way there and just hadn’t put a numeric number behind it. And I think now also the Giving Pledge has gotten going, people know that’s the expectation.

Warren Buffett: And we don’t, we don’t, we don’t find a lot of people that say, “I want to join if it was 40 percent.”

Charlie Rose: Some may say I’m happy to give much more than 50.

Warren Buffett: Oh, most of them. Most. My guess is that a very significant percentage of our members, I mean, way over half are going to give a lot more than half.

Gates and Buffett are already leading by example in terms of this prediction. According to Top Info Post, Bill and Melinda Gates have committed to giving away 95% of their wealth, while Warren Buffett has pledged 99%.

H/T: Top Info Post, Top Photo Credit: WENN

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Singapore's Newest Billionaire Made $2.1B Fortune From Nothing

Liang Court Complex (Source: Wikipedia)

Goh Cheng Liang is one of Singapore’s best-known and least-celebrated tycoons. He has neither featured in any rich lists nor ever talked to the press,  save for a one-off interview in 1997.  Yet some of Singapore’s most prominent landmarks, like the high profile hospital Mt. Elizabeth and the Liang Court shopping mall at Clarke Quay, have been built by this reclusive businessman.

Business was booming when an opportunity to tie up with Nippon Paint of Japan surfaced. Goh took the plunge with a 60-40 holding in a joint venture called the Nipsea Management Group. From nothing rose a paints conglomerate whose Nippon brand is today a household name in Asia. The Nippon brand now sells in 15 countries outside of Japan with some 15,000 employees and factories in 30 locations. Its annual turnover stands at $2.6 billion. Son Goh Hup Jin oversees the company run by professional managers.Goh never went to school. He was born to a poor family in a one-room tenement in 1928, one of four siblings. As a boy, he sold fishing nets and worked in a hardware store, learning business skills that were to shape his destiny. In 1949, when the British were auctioning off surplus stocks from World War II, Goh bought all the barrels of rotten paint for a song. With a Chinese dictionary of chemicals in hand, he went about mixing solvents, pigments and chemicals to make his own brand of paints called Pigeon. The following year, the Korean war broke out and an import ban landed Goh a whopping profit windfall.

Goh’s career has been the gritty journey of an entrepreneur. He never missed an opportunity to create, build and sell businesses to unlock their value. Over the years, he invested some of his profits from the paint business into property by building shopping malls, hotels, serviced residences, as well as a retail distribution business with Japanese partners, a contract manufacturing electronics business, specialty packaging, logistics, a food manufacturing operation in America and even a mining company in China! When his U.S.-educated son, Hup Jin, set about professionalizing some of the group companies and taking them public, Goh carved a parallel private empire with his longtime partners and employees under Yenom Industries. It owns serviced residences, gold courses, marinas, hotels and housing developments in Gulf Habour and elsewhere.

Over the years, Goh has been selling his stake in the publicly listed companies. He sold his 59% holding in Liang Court for $175 million to Pidemco Land in 1999. The $1 billion electronics service maker Omni Industries was sold to Celestica CLS -2.95% of Canada in 2001. Mt. Elizabeth was sold off, too. More recently, along with Crown Holdings CCK -1.93% of the U.S., he is taking listed Superior Multi-Packaging private.

Goh has come full circle, retracing his steps to his core competency in paints. Early this year, he made a $751 million bid for an additional 30% stake in Tokyo-listed parent Nippon, but quickly retreated in favor of growing the Asian business. He still makes news, though more for his generous endowments to scholarship funds, cancer research and education through the Goh Foundation, rather than his business moves.

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