华盛顿邮报前两天发表了Alex Banayan为 VentureBeat（好像是一个专讲“创新”的地方，Wiki的介绍是a technology blog that focuses on innovative companies and the forward-thinking executives behind them）写的一篇文章：“极端”成功人士的五个特质（The 5 traits of radically successful people）

（http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/on-innovations/the-5-traits-of-radically-successful-people/2012/06/15/gJQAfG5FfV_story.html?wp_login_redirect=0 ）——他说的五个人我就不说了。作者开头就说：I have a crazy idea: success isn’t just about hard work. 我觉得这话比传说的爱迪生名言更“技术”：如果路线和方法不对，不要说99%的汗水，24K的汗水也不会成功。

    下面摘引那五个特质——作者没有用简单的词儿来概括每一点，我的概括也不准确，但为了“摘要”，只好硬加一个小标题：

第一 打破“潜规则”

Straying from the norm isn’t easy when you’ve spent your whole life following rules laid out for you at school and at home. It takes a major cognitive shift to understand that the way things are, and have been, can be challenged.

Ask yourself what rules in your industry you accept as fact. Why do you follow them? If the excuse is “that’s the way it’s always been,” it’s time to consider pulling a Tim Ferriss.

    这一点与我心有戚戚焉——我见过一些同学做的东西，怎么看都有问题，但“大家都那么做”，有什么办法呢？我也不好意思说大家做有什么不好，但我肯定不会那么做。

第二 “无理”的成功

…to the point that others thought was irrational. Turns out irrational commitment leads to irrational success.

Does what you’re working on excite you so much that it inspires an irrational sense of commitment? Are you willing to chase the school bus for years—before seeing any return? If so, keep running. If not, maybe it’s time to think bigger.

前一点是要破别人的规矩，而这一点只是自己做事情——别的同学做校车上学时，Leonard不上车，而是跟在后面跑。这不算坏规矩，只是在别人看来奇怪。“The other kids thought I was crazy,” Leonard said, “because I would run in the rain, snow—it didn’t matter. I did it because I didn’t just want to be better than the next guy, I wanted to be better than all the guys.”

第三 发现问题

“It became a tool that allowed people to recognize that I was willing to do things differently. It shined the light on me and it and gave me more currency to make more daring choices,” Guber said. He explained that, “You are in the ‘problem solving’ business—always. That’s the way it works.”

Although HR reps fail to mention it on the first day on the job, it seems that taking risks, solving other people’s problems, and creating value—even in a formal corporate environment—could have huge payoffs for your career.

Are there any problems, even outside your job description, that you could solve? What opportunities can you create to add value to both help people as well as supercharge your career?

第四 给日历加长

Lu has engineered his body to function on four hours of sleep a night thanks to an unusual regimen that ranges from timed cold showers to daily three-mile runs.

Driven by an unusual hunger to do more, Lu’s sleeping schedule has added an extra day’s worth of work time per week, which aggregates to nearly two months of productivity latched on to every calendar year. And he did it while still in college.

Ask yourself how badly do you want to do more. And what are you willing to give up for it?

这一点对一般人可能不大好，不是每个人都能练出可以延伸日历的体魄的——长远来看，那种体魄也未必健康。做实验的同学，千万别整天泡在实验室里。

第五 玩儿“人的游戏”

What helped Spielberg become the youngest director signed to a long-term studio deal was his focus on building relationships. This has nothing to do with “networking”; this has to do with making friends and focusing on people.

What little changes can you make in your life, starting today, to put a greater focus on people? What investments can you make, in both time and money, to hone the way you play the people game?

有些行业是需要多多“做人”的，有的人很会“hone the way you play the people game”。

作者总结说：当你像他们一样转变了思维定式，成功就“自我实现了”：

Success can come in different fields, but the principles behind it are one…these stories show the unique personality traits that tipped the scales in favor of the world’s most successful people.

Success—while defined by everyone on their own terms—is something that truly manifests itself once you make that mind-set shift and tell yourself it’s go time. Are you ready to make that shift?