7 Solid Tips Students Can Pick Up From MS Dhoni on Success
Whatever goal or aspiration you seek. You can achieve it if you create a strong will instead of merely wishing for it.
Who knew that an ordinary kid from Ranchi in Bihar (now in Jharkhand) when called upon to try his hand at wicket keeping, will become an icon of Indian cricket. That he will entertain millions of fans across the world with his extraordinary wicket-keeping and batting style. That success-seeking individuals outside sports will study and follow his success principles. That he will have books written on him. That a biopic will be made depicting his career.
Ordinary kids born in ordinary families hang on to that one thing that they are passionate about. They pursue it with great devotion. They fight hard to overcome their adversities and misfortunes, break all their barriers to create a breakthrough in their field, and go on to not only earn tremendous success but also become a role model for others.
You should know what you are chasing.
If you have the talent in you and are willing to chase your dreams, then MS Dhoni’s principles of success that I share below can inspire you to overcome your day-to-day hurdles and reach your potential.
Let’s get started right away.
1. SET TINY GOALS:
Forget big goals, instead, focus on setting up tiny goals. Achieving small goals will eventually add up in the long run, helping you achieve your bigger goal.
MS Dhoni never gave too much thought to winning the world cup. He thought worrying too much or daydreaming about winning the world cup will not help them win the world cup. He focused on playing the match at hand with full concentration. The team was not allowed to talk about losing or winning or how good the opponent team was. All they had to do was to go out and play their best game. The strategy worked and India won the 2011 world cup.
As a student, worrying too much about exams or how difficult the subject is will not help you score good marks. Attend all the lectures and pay attention to the topic covered one lecture at a time. Practice writing the concept in your own words. This way, the theory will start getting clear in your mind.
2. UNCOMPLICATE YOUR GOALS:
You take care of your daily studies and the marks in the exams will take care of themselves.
If we watch nature closely, we may find it complex but seldom complicated. Nature has this natural ability to simplify things.
Our minds also love things that are simple and often shuts down when faced with complicated situations.
Learn to uncomplicate your academic goals.
To convince your mind to work towards realizing your goals, cut down your bigger goals into small size chunks so that the mind can see them as something achievable. Simplify the activities for your brain and it will feel inspired to take action. Revising two answers every day is easier for the brain than cramming the entire book one night before the exam.
Chalk out your daily study plan. If we have sketched out what we need to do today instead of thinking about what we will do one year from now, the mind will support us. Chart out what you need to do today -- Which subjects to study, which home works to complete, which topics to revise?
Dhoni’s plan to win the series or the world cup was always uncomplicated–Just prepare for the match that you are going to play first.
Dhoni says that he has greater clarity about the match he is going to play today or tomorrow instead of a match that he will play ten days from now or even worrying about how to reach the finals. He knows the challenges of the game at hand and the resources available to him to overcome those challenges. This helps him take better decisions and also perform according to a strategy.
Crushing ourselves by thinking and worrying about the exams all the time will not lead us anywhere closer to success. We will only bring ourselves to failure.
3. CREATE A SUCCESS PROCESS AND FOLLOW IT RELIGIOUSLY:
Not fear, but preparation is part of the success process.
If you have this aspiration to score 85% marks, (or whatever your aim is) then there is a process that you should create and follow. If you don’t work on the process to achieve your goal, then your goal will become to some way study something and score enough marks to just pass the exams. You will struggle during the exam thinking about what to write to score just pass marks.
The winning process followed by the team under the captaincy of Dhoni was to create a winning strategy, deciding on a game plan, keeping the players motivated.
What they eliminated from the process was worrying about the results, being over assured of winning, fearing the opponent team, thinking about what will the media write if they lose.
Include in the process what is in your control and eliminate all those things that are out of your control.
As a student, making a study timetable, preparing good notes, practicing writing answers, attending lectures attentively, and clarifying doubts are in your control. Include that in your success process.
Will the question paper be tough, will it be easy, will I be able to score good marks, what will people say if I fail or score low marks, will I get a good job?–These are questions over which you don’t have any control on. Just delete them from your process.
Don’t lose sleep on what you can’t control. Instead, start working on your process and improve your chances of success.
4. EXPERIMENT WITH NEW-NEW TECHNIQUES:
Experimenting with the resources we have makes us move forward in life.
Let’s say you are studying a subject with a certain technique and you find you cannot learn the concept. Instead of complaining about the subject being tough, seek a new technique to learn that subject. Try that out. If one method doesn’t work, does not mean the other will also not work. Find out what is creating a hurdle in your understanding of the subject. Seek methods that can help you overcome that hurdle and try it out. You will never know unless you try.
On the field, Dhoni experimented with his bowlers and fielders. He experimented with how he threw the ball at the wicket to run out the batsman. Most of the time, his experiments paid off, sometimes they didn’t. If it didn’t, he tried another technique.
5. DON’T COPY WHAT YOUR TOPPERS DO OR HOW THEY STUDY:
Every student is different. The study techniques that work for your class topper may not work for you. Copying their technique might be of little help to you.
If Dhoni had tried to copy his captain Sourav Ganguly or the master blaster Sachin Tendulkar, who were great legends playing for the Indian team, he may not have become what he became. He stuck to what worked for him and eventually captained Sachin Tendulkar.
You can take advice from your toppers, look at their study pattern, and see if it works for you or not. Tweak the techniques if required to suit your temperament and personality.
Instead of copying the batting technique of other great cricketers on the Indian team, he mastered his own technique and practiced hitting the ball out of the field in his famous ‘helicopter shot’.
A student’s mind shapes over the years and develops its own technique to remember things. Many factors must have shaped his memory. Thinking that if I copy the style of the topper, I too may top the class is a recipe for failure.
Find your own way to reach the top or better still create one.
6. LIVE IN THE MOMENT:
Don’t allow unnecessary matters to come to your mind. Keep on doing what you need to do today.
When you are in college or attending an online lecture, understanding the topic being taught should be your priority, not your attendance, not your mobile phone, not your friends, not your plans for the evening. Nothing else matters.
When you watch a movie or web series, your full attention is on it. You don’t care what is happening around you. Sometimes you may even forget to have lunch. The same concentration should be for the subject you are studying. Decide that nothing else will matter to you unless you complete reading a particular chapter or complete an assignment.
7. BE A GREAT FINISHER:
Every student begins their college life with a dream, but only a few finish with dreams achieved.
Just preparing well for your exam is not enough. You should also be able to finish writing your exam well. Not just one paper, but every subject exam should be a good finish for you.
You joining a college is the beginning; you writing your final exams and coming out a winner is a great finish. Make sure you finish in style.
A student who is a great finisher in college does not blame his professors or teachers for not teaching him well. He takes charge of the situation. He practices active learning, asks questions, clarifies his doubt to master the subject, and leads himself to his academic success.
Students who don’t perform well look for a scapegoat to put the blame on. They shun away from their own responsibility as a student.
As you sit down to attempt your exam paper, focus on one question at a time. Understand what the question is asking, think about how you will start the answer, how you will build on it, and finally, how you will end your answer. Then start answering the question.
Never fret or get upset about questions you cannot answer. Give your best shot to the questions for which you can write a suitable answer. For every question you attempt, the answer should be so good that it forces the evaluator of the paper to give you maximum marks. It’s like hitting a huge six on a ball in the game of cricket.
When a cricket match is moving towards a nail-biting climax, for the batting team, every dot ball is a missed opportunity. The questions that you don’t attempt in your exam are all dot balls. Even if you can’t write the complete answer, at least write what you know. This way, you ensure you don’t get a zero on that question that you were planning to leave.
It is not how well or how badly you began, what is counted is how well did you finish.
References / Bibliography / Further reading
Sahare, Sfurti. ‘5 Success Secrets: Think and Win Like Dhoni’. Mumbai: Jaico Publishing House, 2016. Print.
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