Mel Robbins

Trying to control people and situations doesn’t calm your fears. It amplifies them. Any psychologist will tell you, the more you try to control something you can’t, the more anxious and stressed out you become.

Having been married for almost 30 years, I can tell you that mutual give and take and compromise are critical to a successful relationship. No one is perfect, no relationship is perfect, and every relationship changes with time.

The more you let other people live their lives, the better your life gets.

Remember, the power is in your influence. That means focus on what you can control: your behavior. Model change and make it look fun and easy.

One of the most common questions that I have been asked over the years is: ‘How do I motivate someone else to change?’ You can’t.

You’ve been trying to control the uncontrollable, trying to force the world to conform to your expectations. But what if, instead, you focused on your own response to whatever the world was throwing at you?

When you’re an adult, your life, happiness, health, healing, social life, friendships, boundaries, needs, and success are all your responsibility.

You get one wild and precious life, so go live it in a way that makes you proud.

My life didn’t change because of one thing I did; it changed because of the thousands of mornings where I woke up and didn’t feel like getting out of bed, but I 5-4-3-2-1 made myself do it.

Spoiler alert: Life is going to test you. When you’re working to change your life, or achieve a goal, or pursue your dreams, you will hit a roadblock. Always. It is unavoidable.

When researchers study all the things that could change your life or that can make a meaningful impact on the quality of your life, the single most important change is making it a habit to be kind to yourself.

When you replace the self-doubt and self-criticism that drags you down with self-acceptance and self-love that lifts you up, your life will change. So, how about YOU make this a habit?

You can always tell when the high five attitude has disappeared because you will not feel like taking action.

When you are an adult, there is only one person’s opinion that matters: your own.

Procrastination and perfectionism are the two deadliest dream killers. They aren’t a high five—energetically, they’re a hell no! They slowly choke your ambitions to death until one day you wake up disappointed and resentful when you realize, I never even got started. First, let’s get one thing straight: You’re not a procrastinator or a perfectionist or an overthinker. You’re just scared.

You can always connect the dots in your life if you are looking back. The true art is believing that this moment right now is a dot that is connecting you to something amazing that’s coming in the future.

Feeling fear is normal. It’s what you do the moment after you feel the fear that makes the difference. You can be terrified of losing the game but still swing for the fences. You can be scared and still be confident in your ability to face this. You can feel the weight of the world on your shoulders and still stand tall.

Most people get manifesting wrong because they try to visualize the end result. Neuroscience research tells us to visualize yourself doing the hard, annoying, small steps along the way to reaching your dreams. In doing so, you tell your brain, ‘I do the hard work. I take advantage of opportunities. And I don’t back down, I take action.’

If you’re searching for that one person who will change your life look in the mirror.

The 5 Second Rule: The Moment you have an instinct to act on a goal you must 5-4-3-2-1 and physically move or your brain will stop you.

Knowing what you need to do to improve your life takes wisdom. Pushing yourself to do it takes courage.

As you use the Rule, you’ll see it too—there is a five-second window between your initial instinct to act and your brain stopping you. The problem was very clear. It was me. I was holding myself back, five seconds at a time.

If you have the courage to start, you have the courage to succeed.

Hold on. Let me over think about it.

There is no right time. There is only right now. You get one life. This is it. And it’s not going to begin again. It’s up to you to push yourself to make the most of it and the time to do it is right now.

Productivity can be boiled down to one word—FOCUS. There are two types of focus you need to master productivity. First, the ability to manage distractions so that you can focus moment-to-moment on the task at hand, and second, the skill of focusing on what’s truly important to you in the big picture, so you don’t waste your day on stupid stuff.

The 5 Second Rule: The Moment you have an instinct to act on a goal you must 5-4-3-2-1 and physically move or your brain will stop you.

When you are an adult, there is only one person’s opinion that matters: your own.

When researchers study all the things that could change your life or that can make a meaningful impact on the quality of your life, the single most important change is making it a habit to be kind to yourself.

There is no right time. There is only right now. You get one life. This is it. And it’s not going to begin again. It’s up to you to push yourself to make the most of it and the time to do it is right now.

Spoiler alert: Life is going to test you. When you’re working to change your life, or achieve a goal, or pursue your dreams, you will hit a roadblock. Always. It is unavoidable.

You can always connect the dots in your life if you are looking back. The true art is believing that this moment right now is a dot that is connecting you to something amazing that’s coming in the future.

Your life only gets easier when you do the hard things all the time. Push through your resignation and do it.

Knowing what you need to do to improve your life takes wisdom. Pushing yourself to do it takes courage.

When you replace the self-doubt and self-criticism that drags you down with self-acceptance and self-love that lifts you up, your life will change.

Success is a numbers game. And you’re not going to win it if you keep telling yourself to wait. The more often that you choose courage, the more likely you’ll succeed.

Life is not a one-and-done sort of deal. You’ve got to work for what you want.

To play any game, you have to start. To win, you’ll need to keep going. If you want to make your dreams come true, get ready for the long game.