Becoming mentally strong is a key to attaining your full potential. It helps you navigate through life on a day to day basis without being too affected by a harsh colleague, a disrespectful cab driver, and practically every obstacle that life throws at you.

It takes mental toughness to handle these situations with composure and ease. Mentally strong people stand apart from the crowd because of this ability. They’re able to cope with the difficulties in life because they see obstacles as opportunities.

Being mentally strong is not something you are born with, it’s something you cultivate with your lifestyle and habits. It does not mean you should start a strict training but simply stop doing things that make you mentally weak or prevent you to become mentally strong.

When you stop doing these things most of the population does, you’ll soon find life is not as hard as you think. At least, it’s how mentally strong people see it.

12 Things You Should Stop To Become Mentally Strong:

1. Stop being scared of being alone.

Some people dread being alone. They’d rather be in a bad company than being alone.

Mentally strong people would rather be alone than spend time with people they don’t resonate with. In fact, they prefer to have alone time in their day.

Being alone has nothing to do with being lonely. An alone time is an opportunity to be in touch with your inner self, with your emotions and thoughts. It’s time to reconnect with yourself. It helps you reboot your mind and unwind. When your mind is revitalized, you act more than you react in situations.

2. Stop dwelling on your past and worrying for the future.

The past is a gone. The future is yet to be created.

Worrying or thinking about the things that you should have done doesn’t make any wrong right, doesn’t make any regret go away. However, it keeps you in the same loop of missing out the present and accumulating more regrets.

Mentally strong people have a daily habit of coming to the present moment. They focus on the present moment and from there they decide how they can improve themselves and their life. Thinking from the present moment gives much more rational decisions.

3. Stop believing the world owes you anything.

The world doesn’t owe you a thing.

The world is free for everyone. We live within man made rules and we play accordingly to society. But in reality you are free, everything is free. And the world doesn’t owe you a thing. If you manage to find food, shelter and connection to survive, good. if not, it’s your fault. But nobody owes you a thing. If you want something you find a way to get it, but it’s your responsibility, no one else’s.

If you do things, you do them for yourself whether the world notices it or not. Stop believing that the world will appreciate you instantly for your good deeds. Recognition will come in due time, but let it not be a driving force that motivates you to do good.

4. Stop expecting immediate results.

Take the lesson from nature.

It has its own seasons, tides, birth and death. This means the result that you’re waiting and expecting for will come in its due time.

Continue to do the right things and sooner or later, the reward will come to you.

5. Stop trying to please everyone.

Finding balance in your life means saying yes and no.

Say yes when you can and say no when you can’t. Say yes for the things you want and no for the things you don’t want. That’s what mentally strong people do best, they will turn down something that does not resonate with them unapologetically.

If you say yes to everyone all the time, you’ll soon deplete your reserves and resources and you’ll lose yourself in the process. On the other hand, people will come to abuse your kindness if they know you can’t say no to them.

6. Stop feeling sorry for yourself.

Everybody gets hurt at a certain point in life. Don’t think that your sufferings are greater than those of others. And even if it is really greater, it’s not for comparison.

Mentally strong people show kindness to others because they empathize with the fact that we are all fighting a hard battle. Don’t limit yourself by pitying yourself. It will get you nowhere.

Instead of dwelling on the negative things in your life, be grateful for the things that you have and show some kindness to others. This way, your focus will shift to the positive things in your life.

7. Stop wasting your energy on things you can’t control.

Some things are in your control and some aren’t.

Your thoughts, feelings, and actions are under your control. So, keep your focus on them. Change the things that you can. Those that you can’t, let them go.

Mentally strong people put their time and energy in things they can control and embrace things they can’t. They don’t waste their energy to change the waves but to surf them, they don’t try to change the winds but adjust their sails and use them in their advantage.

8. Stop allowing others to be responsible of your emotions.

Be in control of your emotions. It’s ok to feel bad, but it’s not ok to make others responsible for your emotions.

Let’s say your best friend finds a new best buddy and you feel rejected. It’s not their responsibility you feel rejected, it’s your emotion. It’s telling you something. Analyze it, learn from it, hear its message. You might discover some inner wound or fear of rejection.

Emotions are the language of your soul that’s communicated through your feelings. They hold powerful messages. You have the power to influence your emotions and thoughts. Exercise that power rightly. Mentally strong people do not react to their emotions, they use them for direction and growth because they take responsibility for what they feel.

9. Stop resenting the success of others.

Resentment for the success of others starts in your unconscious habit of comparing yourself with others.

You compare your own goodness with other people’s results. Do you see the fallacy in this way of thinking? You don’t know their path, you don’t know what they went through and it’s not your path, it has nothing to do with you. Yet, you argue it’s you who should have their results or that they don’t deserve those results.

Let me tell you two facts. The first fact is, your journey is different from that of others. The second fact is, if a result is achieved, it’s deserved. Mentally strong people see what worked and use it for their success instead of accumulating negative emotions by comparing things that have nothing to do with each other. Other people’s success doesn’t mean you’re a failure, it means there is something you can learn from them.

10. Stop avoiding your daily responsibilities.

Face your daily responsibilities because they’re stepping stones bringing you closer to your goals. If you don’t find meaning in doing something, don’t do it. If you need to do something to get somewhere you want to get, stop postponing and do it.

There are responsibilities outside of your control, but they need to be dealt with. Stop asking why, of all your siblings, the responsibility of taking care of your sick parent falls on you. If you are there to help them it’s your responsibility.

Mentally strong people tackle their responsibilities without checking an imaginary scoreboard. If they need to do something, they do it. If something falls on their lap, they deal with it. They use those opportunities to grow.

11. Stop giving up after the first few tries.

The greatest athletes, entrepreneurs, and other successful people on Earth didn’t earn their success from their first attempt. Every highly successful person failed more times than most unsuccessful people ever did.

But it’s not about failures, it’s about what you want to achieve and finding ways to do it. It’s about how much you want to succeed. It’s not about going through trail and error and facing challenges, it’s about being willing to do all of it in order to succeed.

Of course you will fail, who can guess the right way of doing something from the first try? Failures are steps you need to take in order to reach the top. Mentally strong people do not even perceive failures, they just evaluate if what they want is worth it. If it is, they give all.

12. Stop being scared of calculated risks.

Take calculated risks. Calculated risk is said to be the difference between an ordinary and extraordinary life. If you want that extraordinary life, then go for your dreams no matter what it takes.

Use the fears lurking around to your advantage. Write down the pros and cons and the strategies you will use in case if it doesn’t work. Having a back up plan will ease your anxiety and it will give you a more positive outlook.

Positivity keeps you grounded even if things won’t work out fine. But when they do, you’d be thankful for taking those risks. Mentally strong people tend to push their limits in a calculated manner. They will either have a lesson or result. That’s how they grow.