The self-help industry is worth billions, possibly trillions of dollars. Every few years, there is an outpouring of new books and articles on the topic of “How To Succeed and Grow Rich”.

Yet, decade after decades, and after millions of people purchased books with the hopes of pulling themselves up by the bootstraps few ever make the transition from their life of, and surrounded by, failure, to their dream that defines their vision of success.

What is it that separates the winners from the losers? What separates the wanna-bes from the achievers?  Why is it that the overwhelming majority of people FAIL? These are the 30 most common reasons:

  1. Wrong thinking.  Arriving at conclusions and opinions too quickly.
  2. Wrong thinking.  Reading, studying, learning the wrong information.
  3. Wrong thinking.  Misunderstanding right information. Interpreting it incorrectly.
  4. Wrong thinking.  Blocked by preconceptions, prejudices, bigotry, false assumptions.
  5. Wrong thinking.  Choosing to focus on, remember, or even select and study information that is comfortable rather than all of the information.
  6. Wrong thinking.  Choosing to blame others, one’s environment, once’s circumstances.
  7. Wrong thinking.  Assuming change of any sort is easy, instead of difficult. This lowers the threshold of effort, persistence, drive, dedication, motivation, and causes people to quit trying too soon.
  8. Wrong thinking.  Failing to understand that success requires both time and many attempts. After a few failures or a few weeks or months, people give up.
  9. Wrong thinking.  Failure to recognize that one’s attitude is all-important. If one attempts to succeed but does so half-heartedly, or from a negative perspective, it is impossible to steer a course towards success.
  10. Wrong thinking.  Listening to advice from bad sources, be those sources negative and conspiracy websites, merchant websites disguised as advisories, or even family and friends who are mired in similar circumstances.
  11. Wrong thinking.  Surrounding oneself with negative thinkers, people who have already failed or who choose to avoid any effort to change, improve or succeed, people of little or no motivation to change their circumstances, people who criticize or belittle success and those who achieved it.
  12. Wrong thinking.  Choosing the wrong role models or not setting a role model(s) to emulate.
  13. Wrong thinking.  Misconstruing energy “vampires” for concerned friends and continuing to socialize and interact, even a little, with them.
  14. Wrong thinking.  Failing to recognize that one can seldom go it alone and therefore failing to build a “success group” of allies who can shore up one’s weak attributes or who can compensate for one’s lack of knowledge and expertise in areas important to one’s goals and success.
  15. Wrong thinking.  Failing to be open to changing one’s opinions and beliefs.
  16. Wrong thinking. Failing to let criticism roll off one’s back, like water on a duck. Worrying about criticism. Fearing being kicked out of one’s social group. Fearing ridicule.
  17. Wrong thinking.  Assuming you must convince other people to your way of thinking, that you must build a concensus of support among people you love, value and respect before becoming fully immersed in acting to achieve a beneficial goal.
  18. Wrong thinking.  Letting one’s upbringing and thinking…that “inner voice”…make decisions and impose limitations.
  19. Wrong thinking.  Blaming or being restricted by one’s environment, upbringing, etc. You can recognize this kind of wrong thinking by the words said to one’self or to others, such as, “You are luckier than me because…” or “I never had the opportunity for…”, or “Where I come from…”
  20. Wrong thinking.  Assuming that one can make change, achieve success,  without having to change oneself along the way. The you of today is failing. The new you needs different values, attributes, etc., and has to evolve and become different than the you of today.
  21. Wrong thinking.  Refusing to accept and prepare for the training period that is required to make any muscle stronger: correct nourishment, time, load bearing, and repetition. Failing to recognize and treat success as it were any other muscle.
  22. Wrong thinking.  Ignoring the impact of failure stemming from one’s daily habits, addictions, and behaviour pertaining to almost every aspect of daily activity and living. What you do “automatically”, that is almost without thinking, causes failures to unwittingly erect brick walls.
  23. Wrong thinking.  Gambling, taking unbalanced chances with one’s resources or relationships, going all-in when assuming a risk, without planning for, and considering the consequences.
  24. Wrong thinking.  Failing to understand the cost of achieving a goal, whether personal cost or financial cost. Ignoring or minimizing that the positive results which were achieved by other people came after great suffering, great effort, great commitment, great persistence, great passion, great motivation, great resourcing,  and by sticking to those goals over a great deal of time.
  25. Wrong thinking.  Failing to understand the true effort and process required and, instead, assuming that just because he or she thinks of the idea, then he or she has a sense of being owed, or entitled, to the outcome.
  26. Wrong thinking.  Failing to recognize and understand that the problems of today that surround a person are largely the result of wrong decisions,  wrong opinions, etc.
  27. Wrong thinking.  Failing to understand how one’s mind actually functions. To the mind, there is no difference between a dream, vision, wish, goal, and one’s fears. The art of succeeding compels one to suppress, conquer, and all but eliminate one’s fears and elevate one’s dream, vision, and goal.
  28. Wrong thinking.  Failing to understand that the mind can not entertain conflicting goals at the same instance. Fear must be conquered before success can take its place.
  29. Wrong thinking. Trying to do too much before the mind and one’s internal spirit are aligned and capable. Prepare to take small steps forward toward greatness.
  30. Wrong thinking.  Failing to accept that progress consists of plenty of study, effort, perspiration, fortitude, and especially trial and error.

The art of succeeding requires one to first suppress and compartmentalize: fears, criticism from others, and distractions caused by old habits. …To succeed, FIRST MAKE ROOM IN THE MIND to allow for one’s dream, vision, and goal.