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Disclaimer & Uncopyrights Please note that information in this e-Book should be used only as a general guide. While the author of this book has taken reasonable efforts to ensure the accuracy and timeliness of the information contained within this book, author assumes no liability with respect to losses or damages related to information in this e-book. Information provided in this e-book is my personal opinions and isn’t guaranteed to be accurate, so please use your best judgment while implementing them. Author is not engaged in providing any legal, financial or other professional services. Seek an expert's help if needed. Individual results may vary.

This is an original work by the author. However, you can freely distribute this e-book in any form you wish. You can also recommend others to grab a free copy of this book by referring them.

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Free gift for subscribers of planetnaveen.com

About me and the book Hi, let me quickly introduce myself.

I am Naveen Kulkarni, an Engineer by profession, personal development enthusiast and a blogger turned online entrepreneur.

Predominantly, I have been associated with the computer industry for over two decades now. My life was never a smooth journey. With constant challenges (now I realize that they were the stepping stone for the growth) in my career and personal life, there was a time when I was not getting anywhere. It was the eye opening information about self development and self-improvement that helped me to overcome the obstacles and eventually achieve success. Needless to mention, I followed my passion and converted information into practices, and in turn, into habits.

I now live a happier life and enjoy what I am doing. What helped me for this transformation was my self-realization and actions towards personal growth.

Why did I write this eBook? It's because I want to help you. I want you to follow your passion, excel in your career, and live a content life.

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Over the period of the past 20 years, I have collected a handful of practical tips and strategies for career and life that I have been sharing so far with other people through my verbal interactions and other media. I felt that I can reach out to a wider audience if I created an eBook on these experiences and tips. Thanks to the internet, which has made information sharing so easy.

So, I am here with this eBook, through which I will be sharing my thoughts and experiences with you. I am sure this book will interest you in some ways and I will be more than delighted if, at least some of the tips within this book benefit you.

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Table of Contents Introduction 6

Part 1: Attracting Success 10

1: Eradicate fear from your life 11

2: Discover your true passion 13

3: Build your life around your unique talent 13

4: Have enthusiasm to learn new things 14

5: Learn effective communication 14

6: Create a habit of waking up early 15

7: Cultivate the habit of reading great books 15

8: Work when you are at work 16

9: Learn to relax 16

10: Don't work keeping money as the sole motivator 17

11: Learn from people who run a business of any form 17

12: Avoid getting trapped in debt 17

13: Honesty Pays 19

Part 2 : Living a Content Life 20

14: Life is fast is a myth 21

15: Control stress, before it controls you 21

16: Batter late than never 22

17: Health is wealth 24

18: Visit museums and understand history 24

19: Donate 24

20: Create something 25

21: Develop a hobby and nurture it 27

22: Offer a free service 27

23: Focus on health, family & Learning 27

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Introduction “Ideas can be life changing. Sometimes all you need to open the door is just one more good idea” - Jim Rohn

Most of life's challenges are simple. It’s we who make them appear complicated by misunderstanding and missing their details. If we pay attention to their details, we will discover that these challenges are actually simple and life can be easier. Life has so many wonderful things to offer us. It has success, fame and much more. It has hidden treasures. Life is beautiful. It’s just that we need to observe life’s details and discover the hidden treasures.

Unfortunately, most people don’t try to discover life. They just sail along with life. They instead create a layer of self-limitation around them and try to adjust themselves to the situation. They chase happiness but fail to recognize it when it is already in front of them.

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They live life in fear and their life lacks the most important ingredient: self-satisfaction.

How can you discover the hidden treasure that life has to offer you, then?

How can you be more productive at work?

How can you become rich?

How can you stay rich?

How can you accomplish more and live a content life?

How can you live a wonderful life?

Is there an answer for these questions? If so, what is it?

This book is all about sharing such secrets, precisely 23, that you can use, implement and experiment with in your daily life and benefit. Most of the secrets are simple, achievable and amazing. Some of them are innovative and some offer a new way of doing existing things.

In a nutshell, this book is your handbook for attracting success and living a content life.

Getting success is one part and being happy is the other. A winning combination of success and happiness can create a wonderful life.

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You will find two sections in this book. Attracting success and living a content life.

The first part of the book speaks about 13 pointers to success.

Success itself has different meanings to different people. It can be money, power or position in society. Success doesn’t always depend upon what chances we get or choices we make, but upon the actions we do in these scenarios. In this book, I am going to discuss simple and achievable tips for achieving success.

In the second part, I share a few very simple, yet effective ideas for living a content life. Unlike most people say, being content in the modern era is actually simple. However, most people close the door for fulfillment because they surround themselves with so much unnecessary clutter with or without their knowledge. They need to simplify their life and discover what makes them really happy. We will discuss simple strategies of how can we live a happier and more peaceful life. Simple things can transform your life into a peaceful and content one. Let’s explore more on this in the second part of this book.

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Let’s head over to those 23 secrets.

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Part I: Attracting Success 13 Secrets for succeeding in the modern, competitive world

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1: Eradicate fear from your life Some people live life in fear of something. Either they fear that they may lose their job or that they may fall sick. They fear the future. They fear their past. They fear taking risk. In short, they live their life in fear.

Is this fear really inevitable? What are we gaining from this? Fear won’t help us in any way for our overall growth. In fact, it gets in the way of growth. Fear won’t allow us to live in the present. Fear won’t allow us to come out of our comfort zone. When we don’t come out of our comfort zone, we will not be able to experiment. When we don’t experiment, we can’t compare the results. When we can’t compare results, we can’t see that the results we are achieving currently may not necessarily be great ones.

In short, due to fear, we may not achieve anything extraordinary. Fear and doubts are two sides of the same coin. There is a quote that reads “Faith moves mountains, but doubt creates one “.

Doubts create mountains for us. Fear is that mountain

Don’t get me wrong. You still need to have doubts. but don’t doubt everything you see, touch and feel. A great opportunity can be lost because of your doubt. Fear is the opposite word for courage. Why don’t you eradicate fear then?

How can you liberate yourself from fear? Fear is natural but don’t let it get in the way of your achievements. Believe firmly in what you are doing. Affirm yourself that you are capable of achieving the best and beat the fear.

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Try a new challenge that is in front of you. Trying may get you success but fear never will. Fear closes the door, trying opens it. To combat fear, first you need to eliminate doubt. For eliminating doubt, you need knowledge. For gaining knowledge, you need to gather information. Doubt breeds more doubts when there is lack of information. Before attempting anything new, gather information and make yourself knowledgeable on the subject. Ask friends, search the Internet or read books.

Acquiring knowledge is the first step in eradicating fear.

Once you are equipped with knowledge, you will know what action is needed to eradicate fear. Take the appropriate action.

For example, if you often fear public speaking, then you might consider enhancing your language and presentation skills, and practice speaking in front of family and friends. Ask their honest opinions for improving further. Move on to the real stage. If you fail in initial attempts, don’t be disheartened but keep practicing. Repeat this until you are successful. Fear will be vanquished once you treat the root cause. You can also associate yourself with people who are adventurous and fearless. It helps. If others can achieve something, why can’t you?

Once you learn to deal with fear, you will be able to perform much better in your work and will be more adventurous to accomplish much higher goals in life.

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2: Discover your true passion Find out what your passion is. Make it your Life. Listen to your heart, which might be frequently giving you clues about your passion. Don’t ignore it. For example, you might be often tempted to see and read a lot about home designs and buildings. You often change the design of your house and experiment. You buy lots of design magazines. That shows that you are passionate about interior designing or home design.

Why don’t you cultivate your passion and become more knowledgeable by acquiring required skills? Attend a course, interact with relevant community or find a mentor. With time and dedication, you should be on your way for transforming your passion into talent.

3: Build your life around your unique talent Here we go. Talented people draw their talent from passion. You have a distinct talent that amazes people and you are well aware of this. However, you have not taken any steps for nourishing your talent. May be , other things in your life have taken priority over your unique talent. Hold on. What if your talent is nourished and brought to a better shape and made to earn you fame and a passive (sometimes extraordinary) income as well? Think about it. Money is only a side benefit of your talent.

Think about the fame and recognition you get from your unique talent. I suggest you listen to your heart and grow your talent and give it wings. Let it fly. Nourish it and you will be amazed to see the outcome. Acting, singing, writing, painting, photography, cooking , teaching, speaking and sports are only a just few examples of unique talents.

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4: Have enthusiasm to learn new things Learning should be a continuous journey. Money, fame, and recognition are really just side benefits of learning. You never arrive, but you just travel on this journey of learning. What matters is how enthusiastic you are throughout this journey. The more you are inclined to learning, the more you will be able to gain knowledge. Give your complete attention when it comes to learning new things. Ask questions, brainstorm, discuss and do whatever it takes to understand the topic. Just concentrate on learning. Everything else follows.

5: Learn effective communication Communication is always looked upon as a key factor in a person’s overall growth, whether in a career, or personal or professional relationships. Indeed, it is. In this section, I will focus on a few points of how communication can influence one’s career growth and how one can be turned into an effective communicator.

What is effective communication?

Many people confuse communication with excessive talking. Effective communication is not excessive talking.

A good communicator talks less, says more

It is the art of conveying a message effortlessly, which most of the crowd or an individual can understand and grasp quickly. There are lots of people out there who work really hard but struggle when it comes to communication. They simply can’t express or explain their feelings or information effectively, resulting in disastrous results and outcomes. For reading more, you can refer to this article I wrote for PickTheBrain.com

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6: Create a habit of waking up early I am not referring to 3 am here :-) Try waking up at least around 5 am. Waking up early has tremendous benefits. You can enjoy the calmness of the sweet morning hour. Go jogging and do some exercises or yoga. If you are in a creative profession, like painting, writing or a musician, this morning hour can be a blessing to you. Utilize this period for creating fresh content. There is no one to interrupt you, no noise to disturb you. It’s just your creativity and you.

Waking early also gives you an opportunity to plan your tasks for the rest of the day in a systematic manner; it doesn’t matter which profession you are in, you will always benefit from this planning. Hence, you will have your time well managed and utilized for the rest of the day because you have set proper directions for the day in the morning itself.

7: Cultivate the habit of reading great books Great authors influence society by their motivational thoughts and success strategies. It’s lot easier to learn from their actual experiences. Develop the habit of reading great books. Books give you a direction, goal and action points for your life. Books can change your life. There are many fantastic books on very key aspects of life, such as financial literacy or personal growth. Grab these books, read, absorb and implement. Create notes when you read and implement the points that are very much relevant to you.

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8: Work when you are at work What I want to say here is, maximize your productivity by cutting unwanted distractions while you are at work. Focus only on work and finish one task at a time. Take a small break between the tasks and get back to the next task.

Any issues that arise while on the task, clarify them then and there and document the clarifications. The message here is be attentive, smart and never keep a backlog of your work. You will have a good night’s sleep if you finish your work with good results. Try eliminating your disturbances at work. Don’t do many things in parallel. Imagine what happens if all the vehicles at a crossroad are allowed to cross the signal at the same time from all directions. Parallelism won’t necessarily increase the speed. In fact, it will result in serious damage to the quality of the work.

Set up a workspace that is soothing and calm so that you can work more effectively and achieve wonderful results.

9: Learn to relax Laziness is one’s biggest enemy, but relaxing is not! Our mind and body need rest from day-to-day routine activities. Take a break and relax. In fact, taking a break will enhance your productivity and performance at work. You can also listen to soothing music while taking a relaxing break. Here is the main difference between relaxing and laziness: Laziness is taking a break without working; relaxing is a break between your work chunks. When you decide to relax, free your mind from any thoughts and release the pressure of your mind. Observe the beauty of nature, listen to music or even read a poem.

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10: Don’t work keeping money as the sole motivation Instead, work for gaining knowledge. Keep enhancing your knowledge and skills. Money follows. If you start working for money, your focus shifts away from gaining knowledge. Money can be the biggest distraction. I am not saying money is not important, but working for money alone will never make you rich. If you want to become rich, learn things and invest in gaining knowledge. Money follows.

11: Learn from people who run a business of any form This is important and the reason is simple. Sooner or later, you will need to learn about entrepreneurship.

Whether you work for a full-time job or as a part-time worker, try meeting business people in your circle of family or friends and develop a network with them via casual chat or in-person meeting. Why I am saying this is you will get an opportunity to understand how they manage various things. Find out how they lead people and get work done. Whether in your work or business, you need to learn. You need to understand the dynamics of business. Meeting business people exposes you to practical scenarios and you can learn various tips from them. It leads you towards entrepreneurship.

12: Avoid getting trapped in debt Having a credit card is actually a bigger problem than not having a job itself. With compound interest rolling in your bills, you will become poorer with each passing month. You will be forced to work just to pay credit card bills.

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Ask yourself, Is this what you always wanted from life? What’s going on here? Same logic applies to various forms of loans. Any kind of credit is dangerous. Resort to them only if it is absolutely necessary, otherwise manage your expense in the money that you have earned.

I am not saying getting trapped in debt is entirely your fault. It’s very easy to get carried away when you see a catchy advertisement about a new gadget or a new offer on TV or internet.

Before pressing the buy button, ask yourself a question , whether buying this thing is absolutely necessary. Are you buying this because your friend or relative has it? Is it wise to pile up debt on your credit card? There is a solution to this. Controlling your temptation is the solution.

If you feel controlling your temptation is difficult, cut the source of temptation itself from your life.

Watch less TV, read less gadget reviews or even minimize visiting malls. By isolating yourself from the source of temptation, you are putting yourself in safe zone and you will be able to build a better financial position because you will be buying only the things which are essential.

The message is clear. Buy what you can afford. Spend what you have earned. Save money. Here is an in-depth article on how to improve your financial situation and avoid getting trapped in debt.

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13: Honesty Pays Admit and accept the facts that you don’t know. It’s impossible to know everything. Be true to yourself. Honesty breeds great relationships and keeps them healthy.

Honesty is the pillar of trust and building block of any relationship, whether in work or in family. Be honest, no matter what. People don’t get rejected in job interviews because they did not know something, but because they fake themselves to be someone else and forget to highlight their own unique abilities. Being honest opens the door for unlimited opportunities for growth.

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Part II: a Content Life 10 Secrets to living a joyful , content & fulfilled life

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1: “Life is fast” is a myth. Take time to enjoy every moment of life Life, by itself, doesn’t have any pace. It’s we who tweak its pace. We surround ourselves with so much clutter and unnecessary things that we don’t have time to live. What are we busy at? Why are we running so much? Is life a marathon? Slow down. Find time to enjoy the slowness of life. Spend quality time with your loved ones. Smell real flowers, take a walk in nature, play golf. Don’t run through life, rather live life moment by moment. Appreciate life.

2: Control stress , before it controls you The new generation faces a great threat in their life. Stress is thy name. Many feel that stress is natural and normal. I feel it’s not.

Let me give you an example. You have a flight to catch at 8 pm and you are on the way to airport.

This morning, you were totally fine without any stress but now this journey to reaching airport seems so stressful to you because you are running out of time, and there is a heavy traffic jam out there.

Somehow you reach the airport in time. Now, the question here is what caused you the stress? You didn’t do anything wrong. Think again. You did something wrong. Your planning was not solid. You would have left home a bit early or you should have taken a route with less traffic or you should have properly estimated the journey time considering whether it’s a weekday or weekend.

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Stress is something that we create by ourselves most of the time. Stress is the result of our own improper planning. Be a good planner; consider all the scenarios when you plan something.

Spend quality time in planning. When you plan well, you execute well. Hence you will be stress free.

Sometimes stress can hit you due to unforeseen events which are out of your control. Again, it depends on you how you handle it.

You can break into tears and increase the chances of getting high blood pressure or you can control your situation and face it with courage. I suggest you choose the latter. Maintain your cool; Be aware that stress can be the root cause of many diseases.

Learn relaxation techniques to keep stress at bay. Health is the real wealth.

3: Better late than never Success and happiness in our life depends on our completed and fulfilled tasks. A task becomes an achievement only when it is completed. Completed and fulfilled tasks can result in profits, sales, recognition, satisfaction, happiness and peace of mind.

The reason I wrote this point was to encourage you to complete your pending tasks. What can be categorized as pending tasks? Any task that is pending for a long time which you felt you could have done much earlier.

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I am not only referring to tasks related to your career, also to your dreams and passions as well. What is it that you always wanted to do but you couldn’t do it due to some reason? You know it’s late, but can you still give it a second try?

Did you dream of becoming a musician or a photographer? You were quite passionate about it, but somehow couldn’t nourish your skills and make it big due to your other preferences. Can you re-attempt it now? It is time to try again by rekindling your passion. I am sure over time you have gathered (knowingly or unknowingly) more information about your passion or dream.

How to get started with your pending tasks?

First of all, take a small notepad (I call it a Task Pad) and start writing down all the activities and tasks that you were interested in or supposed to do but you couldn’t. It’s not important why you did not do it, but it’s important that you can still do it. Once the list is ready, prioritize the list and start working on the task with the highest priority. Remember, there is no hurry this time, since there is no deadline (since you already missed :-) ). Start working with complete attention to the task. Attend one task at a time.

Break the task itself into mini tasks and attend them one by one. For example, you always wanted to learn music but never made a serious attempt. Try now with full attention. Find a music school nearby and surrender yourself to immersive learning. Once you get started, you will be surprised to see that this task was so easy. The only obstacle for this was you never initiated it. Never underestimate the power of trying. Keep making efforts. It is better to be late than never.

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4: Health is wealth I am sure you would have heard this before, as well. It’s true and it is like writing on the wall.

With people getting busier than ever in either improving their financial status or climbing the corporate ladder, health is getting neglected and the result is so devastating that it is irreversible in some cases. There is a quote saying, “Man loses his health for gaining the wealth, and then loses all his wealth for gaining the health back” Don’t let this be true in your case. Adopt a healthy lifestyle. Learn to control the stress; yoga is a good ritual to adopt. Don’t forget the wonder drugs called water and laughter. Both are amazing gifts to us.

5: Visit Museums and understand history Believe me; this particular habit is bound to generate a lot of feel-good vibrations in you. That’s because, when you visit museums, you will witness many things like the lifestyle of ancient people, or the origin of many things like this. Observe those and understand how simple their lifestyle was and how clutter-free. This experience makes you think differently and creates lots of inspiration for living a simpler and more satisfied life.

6: Donate The world needs your help and your help makes someone keep going. In a big or small way, offer your helping hand. Again, this is a very important ritual for living a content life.

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7: Create something Folks, have we ever asked ourselves the question, what actually makes us happy? Have we ever noticed that we actually run behind material things thinking that they give us happiness? What is it that we are gaining when we stop by to see the latest version of a gadget? Why are we always being a consumer or a customer? Why not a creator?

Where am I going with this point? Let me simplify. We are heading towards an addiction, which I like to call illusion-happiness. That means we are creating an illusion of happiness, which is not only momentarily, but also comes at a (high) cost. For example, we buy the latest gadgets and the latest cars thinking that they make us happy. They do make us happy, but only until the next version arrives. Again, we run behind getting that version.

We live a life surrounded by latest versions without having time to experience real happiness. Have you ever noticed that the happiness you are experiencing by upgrading your gadget or car to the new version, fades within months and you start regretting that you bought it because a new version has arrived already? Is this not true? Be ready to empty your pockets again for an upgrade without upgrading your happiness quotient.

Time has changed; technology has changed. Lifestyles have changed. But the source of happiness has not changed. We are creating a new virtual happiness by failing to tap the sources of real happiness.

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So how do we tap the real happiness then?

Happiness lies in creating something. Create a painting, give advice to an aspiring student, composed your own music, create your own software product that can actually solve many people’s problems?

Create something new that never existed before. Have you ever inspired someone to come out from bad habits and change their life by creating a healthy mindset within them?

How did you feel when you did any of these things? I am sure it’s a more fulfilling and long-lasting happiness feeling. I recall a famous saying: “Happiness lies in small things”. It’s time to control that carried away feeling you get when you see the latest version of your favorite gadget. It’s time to take your paint brush and canvas. It’s time to switch off your television and go for a walk in nature and hear the sound of real birds. It’s time to stop changing your desktop wallpaper and go out and smell the fresh flower and enjoy their creation.

It’s time to stop playing 3D games and go to the nearest playground and awaken the child in you by playing a real game and becoming healthier. It’s time to stop being virtual. It’s time to get real. It’s time to go back to the old version of life. It’s time to create something new. Giving and creating gets you close to happiness.

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8: Develop a hobby and nurture it A famous quote says that books are man’s best friends. I would say that hobbies are man’s best friends, because hobbies are the indicators that reveal one’s passion about something.

If you don’t have any hobby as of today, you might be lying to yourself. Everyone is inclined towards some hobby. It could be music, gardening, crafting, cooking or anything that excites you. Hobbies are, again, one of the key ingredients of the recipe for a content life.

9: Offer free service Take up a project or task that is purely for a non-commercial purpose. It could be anything, like participating as a volunteer for a noble cause or even helping a non-commercial activity with your skills. Involve yourself in social work. The reason I am recommending this to you is activities like these create lot of self-satisfaction within you. Recognition and respect are other rewards you get out of these kinds of activities. It’s not wise to compare the peace of mind you get from doing such activities with the monetary benefits.

10: Focus on 3 things: Learning, Health and

Family We have reached the end of this book. I request you to focus on 3 things, learning, health and family. When you focus on these aspects, everything else falls in place. You will able to lead a successful and content life.

“It's not a hobby. It's a job.” - Joan Brehm

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Hope you enjoyed reading this E-Book. If so, please share it your friends and relatives. You can share this book via Emails, social media or in print.

Feel free to leave your feedback and suggestions by sending an email to planetofnaveen@gmail.com

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Visit my website at www.planetnaveen.com

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