Business guru Tony Robbins knows the drill: You read great business or life advice or you have an idea and you feel inspired, you vow to change your ways – and then you do nothing about it and get totally frustrated with yourself.
"Knowledge is not power – it's potential power," explains Robbins during a SuperSoul Series appearance. "Execution trumps knowledge every day of the week."
According to Robbins, "We're trained to listen in a passive state," like sitting at a desk looking at the computer or lounging on the couch reading a book. And passive learning does not inspire action.
So how do you get from information to action?
According to Robbins, the answer is the one thing that makes him smarter than other people: follow through.
Every time Robbins learns something important or makes a valuable decision, "[I] make myself do something in the moment that commits me to follow through," he says.
Everyone who wants change in their business or their lives should do the same, whether it's scheduling a meeting or just sending an email, he says. Because if you hesitate, a million distractions will come up and you'll lose your momentum.
"Often we allow ourselves to become caught in a mental trap of seeing enormously successful people and assuming they are where they are because they possess some special gift," says Robbins. But that's not true.
"When we get a closer look, we see there is no secret you don't already have access to. In truth, the greatest gift that extraordinarily successful people have over the average person is their ability to get themselves to take action."
Don't miss: Tony Robbins: For a better quality of life, answer these 3 questions
