7 Secrets Successful Students Will Never Tell You

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What defines a successful student? Many might say that good grades, a high GPA, and a good college define a successful student. But that’s not all!

In my opinion, a successful student is defined by his/her own self. You are successful if you find joy in learning and actively work on learning new things all the time and using your knowledge for good purposes.

Of course, it can be difficult to enjoy learning, especially if you’re not academically inclined in the first place. But in this case, I tell you: fake it ‘til you make it. You may not be successful yet, but you can take action now and get closer to your goals.

So take these 7 secrets of successful students, read them carefully, and start putting them to use!

They have a clear vision

Soon-to-be-successful students must have a clear vision in their minds. They must know the details of their goal, including what, why, how, when, and who.

What and why

First, you must determine what your goal in school is. Is it to earn perfect grades? To make a lot of friends? To hold a lot of club/group officer positions?

At the same time, there must be a motivating factor that’s pushing you to become better and reach this goal. Just keep asking yourself “why?”

Do you want to earn good grades so you can go to a good college, where you will learn how to start a business, so you can successfully build up a company? Keep digging deeper into your goal until you have full reason and motivation to commit to it.

How, when, and who

Once you’ve determined your goal and are committed to making it come true, you must form a strategy. This strategy will outline the steps (both big and small) you will take to reach your goal.

A good, dependable planner could aid you significantly in planning your vision and your strategy. This undated goal planner is perfect for this purpose, as it helps you outline your goal and strategy in detail.

You must also take into consideration when your deadline is (either the required or your personal deadline) and who you will be able to collaborate with to facilitate the process of reaching your goal.

Your goal planner will help you stay organized with all this information, which I highly recommend over trying to keep it all in your brain.

They stay accountable & responsible

With a vision in mind, successful students are always actively trying to work towards that vision. And no matter what their strategy is, they are always being responsible for their actions and staying accountable.

What does this look like?

This means being highly productive whenever they need to be, and always staying organized and with their head in the game. All in all, a successful student always has control over him or herself.

So… how can you become a highly productive and organized student? It’s all in the details! Here are some habits you should be practicing:

Breaking large projects down to smaller, more manageable tasks.
Finding and making use of your peak productivity hours.
Scheduling time blocks for work and breaks.
Using planners, todo lists, calendars, etc.

While a goal planner is perfect for tracking your vision and strategy, it’s not quite enough to plan out your daily life to maximize productivity. Instead, you’ll need something like the Ultimate 3-in-1 Student Planner, made by yours truly.

This planner includes over 40 great planning layouts– calendars, weekly and monthly spreads, daily planners, timetables, date trackers, habit trackers, academic planners, grade trackers… you name it.

Check it out here and get it before it’s gone!

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They learn from their failures

Successful students aren’t perfect (no one is!). Everyone makes mistakes, and everyone goes through “failures.” However, the difference between a successful student and an average student is that the latter treats failures as failures.

To a successful student, failures are even more valuable than successes. You must treat them this way as well and learn from them instead of moping over them.

For example, let’s say you really wanted to get a 90% or above on your next math test. You spent both nights on the weekend to study everything in the book, yet you still got a 72%.

Here, an unsuccessful student would say “WTF?”, start complaining about it to all their friends, and give up for the next test. But what will you do?

You might also say “WTF?”, but you’ll then go on to analyze what you could’ve done differently that may have helped you do better. Maybe you’ll study in the morning next time instead of pulling all-nighters. And how about focusing on your “weak spots” instead of skimming over the entire textbook?

So the next time you come across something you view as a failure, see what you can learn from it. It may just be a shift in mindset, but it makes a huge difference!

YOU’LL LOVE THIS POST: 7 Powerful Habits Of Highly Productive Students

They can balance school & social life

Many students nowadays struggle to balance academics and socialization. Often, they do too much of one and too little of another.

Of course, there is no set “rule” of how you should approach this balance; it’s different for everyone. Based on your own needs and abilities, you might be delegating your time differently than your friend, and that’s okay!

What you need to do is the following…

Set priorities

Your priority could be your classes, a business, or another project of the sort (think back to your goal/vision and your strategy!). Whichever it is, you must stick with it and respect it all the time.

Whenever you’re making plans, quickly think about your prioritized task: have you done the work for the day? The week? Is this a good time for me to have a distraction?

Make plans in advance

Not only should you make plans in advance, but you must also finalize them in advance. Settle the who, what, when, and where of your plan and respect it when the time comes.

You must also remember to designate times to study and times to hang out. Multitasking does not work well in this case, and you must focus on one or the other.

Find the right group of friends

You must surround yourself with a good environment and with good people. If you do this right, you won’t be constantly tempted to do something else while you’re working, or vice versa.

Later in this post, you’ll read more about this.

They know how to stay healthy

Being a student can be super tiring. It can get stressful and can impact your mental and physical health. But successful students are able to adapt to pressures and take care of themselves, and this can happen in many ways.

Here are some examples of self-care activities you can try whenever life is bringing you down.

Mental health

Catch up on your sleep (the lack of sleep is an often-overlooked reason for anxiety).
Meditate for at least 10 minutes.
Exercise or do some yoga, preferably outside.
Talk to a trusted friend or family member.
Do a calming activity or something you enjoy doing.

Physical health

Get up and walk around multiple times a day.
Go for a run/walk/swim a few times a week.
Maintain a healthy and balanced diet.
Always, always eat breakfast.
Drink enough water every day.

They build habits and routines

Building habits (which then leads to routines) is a key step towards improving productivity and efficiency. These will get you towards your vision faster and easier.

But how do you just… build habits? Follow these steps:

Choose 1 very specific habit to build at a time.
Give yourself a deadline to build that habit.
Attach new habits to things you already do routinely.
Don’t miss your habits more than once.
Congratulate yourself after the habit is built, but don’t slack off.

These are just the backbone of successful habit-building. If you want to become a true pro at building habits and become a successful student faster, this Complete Habit-Building Guide will be a life-saver.

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They have a great support group

Successful students always have a support group behind them, whether it’s made of 1 person or an entire village.

The right person or people will motivate you to do productive work and reach your vision, but you’ll also be able to have a lot of fun with them when you’re not working. When you are with the right people, you’ll find yourself becoming a better version of yourself everyday.

Meanwhile, if the people around you make you feel bad for working on yourself and your vision, it’s time to find a new support group.

You don’t always need to sacrifice a hand and a leg to find the right people. If you’re pursuing your vision and being true to yourself and others, the right people will come to you!

Conclusion

Finding success as a student or as an individual has no secret shortcut, but there are steps you can take that will help you on the way.

I hope this post will help you take action and become a successful student, whatever that means for you! And while you’re at it, check out these similar posts: