Define Success On Your Own Terms

  “Your true success in life begins only when you make the commitment to become excellent at what you do.” —Brian Tracy

“Success comes from knowing that you did your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming.” —John Wooden

“The only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle.” – Steve Jobs

Success, like happiness, is an individual pursuit. For years, society has taught us that success is all about making a lot of money. That is also what parents have inadvertently taught their children, and in turn, they too will pass on this folly to their children. You might never have heard your parents speak about success, but isn’t it true that they often encouraged you to become a Lawyer or Doctor, long before you were old enough to know what you were good at?

Why do you think that happened? The prominence associated with these jobs may only be part of the reasons that parents subtly push children in that direction. But for the most part, it is the associated money that they find appealing. Even when children are accomplished within their respective areas of expertise, but they struggle financially, parents find it hard to regard this as success.

The result of this kind of narrow-minded thinking is a society of people who are unhappy, depressed or underachieving because they are stuck in a career they probably hate or become miserable because they can never live up to the unrealistic expectations forcefully imposed upon them. To put everything in a different perspective, simply consider the lives of so many wealthy celebrities you know that committed suicide or that are currently fighting hard to recover from substance addiction.

While being stable or even well off financially is often the result of much diligence and hard work, it is not the only true measure of success. There is no real satisfaction from being rich if you do not truly enjoy what you do.

The winning mindset is a fundamental factor in achieving success in life or in business. This mindset is who you are, it comprises all your beliefs, attitudes, feelings, and thoughts. It serves as the foundation of success, conscious growth, wealth, and prosperity. Part of having a winning mindset is to create a plan that will serve as your guide in reaching your goals. On the other hand, having the right strategy can make such goals easier to achieve. Most of the time, it requires an appropriate set of behaviours and a vision for the future. Without a holistic and flexible strategy, you are more likely to fall short in achieving the level of success that you desire.

That being said, what really makes a person successful?

Success is characterised in various forms, it also has many meanings depending on what each individual is seeking in life, relationship, and career. To an athlete, success can mean getting an Olympic gold medal, to parents success can mean raising children with good moral values, to doctors, success can mean saving a life, and to others, it can mean a job promotion or acquiring wealth.

One apparent thing about success is that every individual has to determine the true meaning of success in his own life. Someone else’s standard may never bring the desired happiness and feeling of success, that is why it is essential to define it in your own terms and stick to them.

The modern dictionary defines success as that certain measure or degree of achievement or accomplishment or as a desirable and favourable outcome. But here is what some of the greatest minds of this century have to say about success:

“Success is a personal standard, reaching for the highest that is in us, becoming all that we can be.”– Zig Ziglar

 “However difficult life may seem, there is always something you can do and succeed at.” – Stephen Hawking

“The starting point of all achievement is desire.” – Napoleon Hill

As you can see, each one has their own opinions about the boundaries within which they define success. That is because success means entirely different things to different people.

We should make our decisions based on what we truly want out of life and what life can offer us when we truly give it a chance to give back to us. We should measure success as to how close we come to accomplishing the goals that we have set for ourselves based on our own skills and abilities.

Expectation, belief, and desire are three powerful forces that can help us do so much. Before anything that we wish for to occur or to happen in our lives, we must first desire for it to happen, believe deeply that it will happen and should expect that it will happen.

Being healthy in mind and spirit goes a long way and has the potential to give you the needed push to succeed in life. Always remember that whatever you display in your beliefs, thoughts and actions are sent to the “subconscious mind.” 

So be very careful of your thoughts, beliefs, and actions, as they are great influences to your success.  Note that if you constantly worry about not acquiring enough finances, then you may never really consider you acquired enough; if you are always preoccupied that you do not have the abilities to accomplish your goals, then you will never achieve any; and if you assume that there are never enough open opportunities, you might miss some.

You have to determine for yourself what success means to you and make a plan to reach it. When you do accomplish your goal, stop a while and relish that satisfaction and pleasure of achieving a goal. You are the success because you are now beginning the journey of that life that you want for yourself!