College Professor Can Immediately Tell If Someone Will Be Successful In Life By 3 Characteristics
Success can be defined by whatever fulfills you most.
Jens Lindner / Unsplash Being successful rests on how you define success for yourself and how that definition aligns with your values.
Some people seek professional success, gunning for promotions and accolades in the workplace. Others lean toward financial success, and others still eschew those versions of success for free time, family, travel, or artistic endeavors.
A college professor can tell if someone will be successful based on 3 characteristics:
Cristina Muise is a CEO with an MBA and a PhD. The former college professor shared insight she’s collected through the years, revealing how she knows when someone will find success in the future.
“When I was a college professor, I could tell immediately when a student was going to be successful in life,” she said. “The same thing goes for people I hire. I can work with them in a week, and I know whether or not they’re gonna be successful.”
1. Curiosity
“They all have three characteristics that separate them from everybody else,” she said, noting that being curious is the first characteristic of a successful person.
“They understand there’s never one perspective of any side of anything that’s told to them,” Muise said.
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She revealed another trait that’s directly tied to curiosity: They’re “always asking questions.”
“They need to know more; they need to know the ‘why,’” she said.
A person who looks for underlying patterns and acknowledges that they don’t hold the answers to every question walks a pathway toward success, as they exhibit humility and an intellectual hunger to understand how the world works.
2. Resilience
The second trait that Muise identified as a measure of success is a person's level of resiliency.
She explained that a person who’s resilient reacts calmly to critique, accepting the need to be flexible and change their attitudes or behaviors in the workplace if something isn’t working for them.
A successful person can “manage their defense mechanism,” Muise said. “It’s not that they don’t get defensive, but they have resilience.”
“When they get feedback, they can actually manage it with the ‘CRAPP’ method we talked about yesterday,” she said, which she claimed is used by happy, successful people.
Muise delineated what the acronym stands for, saying, “They calm, they reset, and they figure out where the opportunity for growth is,” a tactic she called “A game-changer.”
The first step to Muise’s method for success is staying calm and remaining unbothered, “No matter what’s happening… It’s the biggest gift that you could give yourself.”
“You’ll be able to really center yourself and be able to really think about what your next moves are,” she said. “Don’t act impulsively.”
The “R” stands for “Reset,” which Muise explained has to do with keeping a grounded perspective and avoiding any impulsive reaction.
“Give it a chance to settle in. Give yourself perspective and reset your thought process,” she said. “Give yourself that time and give yourself that gift of perspective.”
“You’ll have time to get yourself a little more information, [and] information is a gift” she explained, touching on how this technique is also based on being curious and staying open to other possibilities.
The “APP” part of Muise’s “CRAPP Method” stands for appreciation and gratitude.
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She advised people to “Really sit back and talk about what good can come out of this entire situation,” which is a great way to reframe difficult situations into becoming growth points and learning experiences.
“You can sit there and perseverate and anticipate and think about all the negatives that are gonna come up with what is happening, but that is not the mindset you want for yourself,” Muise said.
“You end up putting good out into the universe instead of building on hate and building on negativity,” she concluded, which is a mindset that leans more toward finding fulfillment in acceptance than forcing change.
3. Showing up
The third trait that Muise said is a solid indicator of success is just showing up and being present.
The people who get ahead in the world are the ones who take advantage of the opportunities they’re in front of them.
“They’re not looking for the at-home days; they’re not looking to find ways to phone it in,” she said. They understand that opportunities come to those closest to the problem.”
Muise explained that these are the people who want to be in the office when no one else is there, so they can get pulled into “those last-minute problems, which are the greatest learning opportunities.”
“Those are the people who get my attention because those are the ones who are worth it,” Muise said.
“You want to spend the time on people who will learn, grab that opportunity, and go for it,” she said, touching on the benefits of mentorship as an avenue for imparting knowledge and helping others level up their skills.
“Opportunities are meant to come and go,” she said. “They don’t sit there, waiting for you to take them.”
“Those are the people I bet on,” she concluded. “And I have a pretty good track record.”
Ultimately, finding your own version of success depends on being the most authentic version of yourself. It means you keep your mind open and your choices flowing from one thing to the next, always looking for what makes you feel the most fulfilled.
Alexandra Blogier is a writer on YourTango's news and entertainment team. She covers social issues, pop culture, and all things to do with the entertainment industry.