Learn about popular tips on wealth and success that don’t work for everyone. Discover why following your passion, working harder, and get-rich-quick schemes may not lead to success.
There are many pieces of advice on how to become richer and more successful, but not all of them work. Sometimes you can believe in beautiful words and miss really important opportunities. Let’s analyze popular attitudes scientifically and study whether they really help in life.
1. “Visualize and wealth will come”
They say that if you stick pictures of an expensive car, a house by the sea and a suitcase with hundred-dollar bills on the wall, all this will come true. This is explained by the fact that, firstly, visualization increases motivation, and secondly, the subconscious mind simply begins to attract the right people and situations like a magnet.
In reality, positive fantasies do not help generate energy to achieve what you want. A study by scientists from the Department of Psychology at New York University proves that vision boards do not work: people wait for a gift from the Universe instead of moving towards the goal. The brain perceives the visualization of success as an already accomplished success and stops looking for ways to achieve the result.
In another study at the University of California, two groups of students visualized different things: one group visualized the process of preparing for an exam, the other group visualized successfully passing it. Students from the first group thought about preparation, spent more time studying, and ultimately received better grades than those who imagined the result. It turns out that visualization prevents you from focusing on specific steps that lead to achieving your goal. And sometimes it relieves a person of responsibility: why try yourself if the Universe itself will attract what you want?
2. “Use positive affirmations to become successful.”
An affirmation is a short positive statement used for self-hypnosis, for example, “I can do anything.” In popular psychology, there is an opinion that if you often repeat affirmations, the subconscious will fix the required image or attitude. This supposedly improves the psycho-emotional background and leads to the desired changes in life. For example, to be more confident, it is recommended to repeat the phrase “I turn my opportunities into success.” One of the adherents of the method is success coach and author of the book “The Miracle Morning” Hal Elrod, who suggests repeating affirmations every morning.
In fact, positive affirmations are not a panacea. They will not help you boost your self-esteem, change negative thoughts, or escape from difficult feelings. Research shows that positive affirmations only support people who already feel positive or highly effective. That is, if affirmations are spoken by people with high self-esteem, they feel a little better. But such phrases are not capable of creating new attitudes – and can even make things worse.
Stephen Hayes, PhD, professor of psychology at the University of Nevada, writes : “Recent research has shown that positive affirmations, such as “I am a good person!” work great until we really need them. When we really need support, such as when we start to feel bad, affirmations make us feel worse and act ineffectively! It’s a cruel joke.” In the study cited by the psychologist, scientists from the Universities of Waterloo and New Brunswick have an explanation for this pattern: “… if people who believe that they are unlovable repeat: “I am an attractive person,” they can refute this statement and, perhaps, even strengthen their belief that they are unlovable.”
In another study, the authors from Lingnan University advise using affirmations with an emphasis on positive statements with caution, because people with low levels of need satisfaction experience a worsening mood after reading such texts. The mind pays attention not to the affirmation itself, but to the gap between reality and the phrase being spoken.
3. “Get up at 5am and you will conquer this world”
A number of motivational speakers recommend getting up every day at 5–6 a.m. or even earlier to discipline yourself, become more energetic, healthier, and more efficient. Examples often cited include Benjamin Franklin, who started doing things at 5 a.m., or Tim Cook, who jumps out of bed at 4:30 a.m.
Some people will benefit from this regimen, but others will feel unwell, lose productivity, and overeat. After studying data from more than 700,000 people, a team of researchers from universities and medical centers in America, Great Britain, the Netherlands, Germany, and other countries discovered more than 350 genetic factors that influence how energetic people feel in the morning or evening. They determine the periods of the day when a person feels most alert. The advice to “just get up earlier” oversimplifies how the human body works.
Many studies, including the work of scientists from the Harvard School of Public Health, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich and other universities, have proven that sleep patterns are determined by individual biological clocks, which are mainly influenced by genes. The authors of the study advise adjusting your work schedule to your feelings, going to bed and getting up at a comfortable time. This helps you feel better, be more efficient and not experience unhealthy hunger.
Oxford University biologist Katharina Wulff, who studies chronobiology and sleep, says that when people stick to their natural rhythm, they feel much better and more productive, while when they change their routine, they disrupt physiological processes. For example, when “night owls” wake up early, they still produce melatonin while they are awake and feel crushed. In addition, when people try to reset their internal clock, their insulin and glucose production can be disrupted, which leads to weight gain.
It’s about the time you wake up, not the number of hours you sleep. A person can get enough sleep but still feel exhausted if they wake up too early or too late.
4. “Always think positively”
Positive thinking is a concept whose supporters try to perceive the world in the most favorable light for themselves, always notice the positive aspects of what is happening and completely distance themselves from negative thoughts. It is believed that such a view of things helps to attract positive events, live in harmony and peace. The Mayo Clinic staff cite the following as advantages of this approach: improved well-being, easy overcoming of difficulties and stress, lower rates of depression, and a reduced risk of death from cardiovascular diseases.
But positive thinking doesn’t always work, and in some cases it can be harmful. Psychology professor and author of The Positive Power of Negative Thinking Julie Norem explains that positive thinking is an ineffective strategy. It takes a certain amount of anxiety to get a person to take action when they’re in a bad situation. When you think positively, you’re less likely to cope with problems because your brain thinks they’ve already been solved.
In some cases, when reality does not fully correspond to the positive statement, consciousness emphasizes the gap between the desired and the real and only worsens the psycho-emotional state of a person. A realistic view of things helps to evaluate life situations more objectively and correct mistakes in time.
Positive psychology often uses stories of people with cancer who were able to overcome the disease thanks to their fighting spirit as a positive example. But a study by scientists from the University of Connecticut School of Medicine found that positive thinking alone does not actually help fight cancer.
And it turns out that even just telling others that you always think positively now isn’t very helpful. A study on how our mood is influenced by social expectations showed the following. If your environment expects you not to be sad and to charge everyone around you with positivity, then you can experience much more negative emotions than if no one pressured you.
5. “The more you spend, the more you get”
This principle is supposedly derived from an esoteric law of the universe that suggests that the more you give, the more you receive. Sometimes business coaches apply this to money.
If you spend all your money on others, you will not get rich, but on the contrary, you will not be able to cover your basic needs and use money to increase them. American entrepreneur Warren Buffett, one of the richest people in the world, advises investing in yourself: “The best investment you can make is an investment in your abilities. Anything you do to develop your own skills or business is likely to be productive.”
However, spending absolutely all your money on anything, even on yourself, is also unwise. If you put anything aside and do not track your expenses, this will not help you multiply your funds. Simple tools help you achieve your financial goals : creating a personal financial plan , analyzing your budget, tracking your income and expenses . Nothing about spending all your money so that it will return one day.
It is not worth giving up generosity completely: it can be useful, but not in financial terms. Scientists from German, American and Swiss universities have proven that generous behavior increases happiness. Participants in the experiment who spent money on other people noted that they felt happy. Researchers studied brain activity and found a connection between the areas responsible for generous behavior and those responsible for happiness.
The idea of spending more does not help you become richer. The only benefit is the pleasant feeling of being generous.
6. “Go to the goal. If you can’t walk, crawl”
Supporters of the method strongly recommend working tirelessly and not allowing yourself to relax for a minute in order to achieve maximum results.
Scientific research has proven the opposite – the human brain needs rest to increase productivity, alertness and strengthen memory.
Scientists from the University of Southern California claim that when we rest, the brain is not inactive, but rather launches the necessary processes to process recently received information and identify unresolved problems.
Psychologist K. Anders Ericsson of Florida State University has spent more than 30 years studying how men and women achieve success in various fields. Ericsson has found that most professionals can only focus on something for an hour before needing a short break. The psychologist also noted that outstanding professionals in various fields rarely work more than four hours a day on average. Ericsson wrote that “people often experience overwork injuries and, ultimately, incapacitating burnout.”
Several studies have found that not only rest such as walking, meditation or sports is useful, but also a short daytime nap. It improves concentration and productivity, which helps to work more efficiently. Based on these scientific studies, we can conclude that working with breaks for rest will bring more results than working without breaks.