I've been giving a lot of thought to which elements would enable anyone to maximize their performance in a given circumstance. I've come up with a set of principles which I'm getting pretty excited about. Now, this is a "perfect world" scenario, but the closer we can get to this, the better off I think we will be.

(1) Positive Self-Concept
The idea of a "Fixed Mindset" has been getting a bad rap lately. If you firmly believe that you have an attribute or quality which makes you good at something, what happens when you fail? That's potentially quite a shock and an ego blow, isn't it? However, I believe that certain fixed positive mindsets may be very helpful. If you don't believe you have some innate ability or attribute in a given area AT ALL, you're starting from a negative self-concept, a sort of "disempowered identity" that will hold you back.
However, you need something more, you need a

(2) Growth Mindset
A growth mindset is just the belief that with adequate effort, any person can change, grow, and thereby affect their circumstances. Research has shown that this gets you further than a strictly fixed mindset (unchangeable attributes) does. It is the total opposite of "learned helplessness", where someone believes that no amount of effort will result in a reward or change in circumstances.
I firmly believe in the value of

(3) Passion
Some people don't see passion as very important - personally, I do. However the innate danger of passion is stress, because passion equals dissatisfaction with what is, coupled with strong desire to achieve a better circumstance than what currently exists. That is very stressful, but also very motivating! (Big carrot and big stick).
To deal with it, we will need

(4) Patience
Who hasn't wished for more patience, only to eventually wish they never had? I think patience can be subdivided into:
(4a) Distress tolerance and stress management (who doesn't need more of those?)
(4b) Perceived goal proximity / awareness of progress (are you really getting closer to the goal? Yes, even if it's more slowly than we would prefer. Better keep track of progress, while reminding ourselves of 2 - growth mindset)

(5) Personally Meaningful Goals
It doesn't do much good to be working hard at a goal you don't really want anyway. If it has no real meaning for you, or if it doesn't align with your own values and preferences, you only work against yourself. Self awareness and self worth will likely help with choosing personally meaningful goals.

(6) Adequate Social Support
We really need to surround ourselves with the social networks which will support us in going where we want to go. If we don't yet have such a network, we'd best create one. Social pressure is real, and unless we can stand up to it and have enough supportive people in our lives, we may not have the social support networks we need. Problems like low self worth, social phobia (more common than is generally acknowledged, in my opinion) or a lack of specific people skills or situational knowledge can of course impede our progress in creating such a network.

I can see how every one of these factors logically interact with one another. I believe that the emotional hangups and fears we all end up with over time likely impede the formation of these positive factors. Looking at this system as a whole, certain processes in my own life are making more sense to me now.

I hope someone gets something useful out of this post. Does anyone have any related ideas to add to it?