38. |
Define Your Success |
Some people equate success with having a lot of money. While there’s nothing wrong with money, and we all need it (as we’ll discuss below), it alone will not make you feel successful. Too many people spend their lives chasing after money, only to find that it isn’t making them happy. Some have even lost everything in their obsessive quest for more dollars, yen, rubles, and pesos.
Others believe that having strong family and community connections results in feeling successful. Of course, while these ties are an important component of a successful life, they too are not all there is.
Personal-development legend Earl Nightingale defined success as “the progressive realization of a worthy ideal.” Again, though this is an important part of a successful life and is certainly a great compass for deciding where to direct your efforts, it is also not all there is.
In my opinion, creating and enjoying a successful life is a combination of balancing several key areas. Cultivating a deep spiritual connection to your Creator is, in my opinion, essential for achieving a truly successful life. It is the glue that holds the rest together. Having loving relationships and a strong connection to your friends and community certainly contributes greatly to your feeling more successful. Meaningful work — doing something that you deem worth devoting your time to — is another key.
Whatever you spend your time doing, ask yourself if it’s worth the price you’re paying, namely, your life. If it is, terrific. Keep doing it. If not, what can you do to change it? How might you spend more of your time doing the things you feel are important and less time doing things that are not?
An obvious key to a successful life is good health, although judging from the way people ignore it, you’d think otherwise. We all need a certain amount of energy to enjoy our life’s pursuits, and we certainly want to remain free of illness and disease.
Developing and maintaining a healthy lifestyle — complete with a healthy diet, a reasonable amount of exercise, and regular health checkups — will go a long way to bolstering your well-being. The increased energy you will enjoy as a result will help you in your quest for greater success in all areas of your life.
The last, but no less important, area to consider is financial wellness. In order to feel successful and have a full life, we need money. While most people would agree that money is not all there is, it is necessary for many of life’s pleasures.
You can have all the love there is, but your banker is not going to take it as your mortgage payment. And your cable company doesn’t want to hear about your fantastic health when the bill is due. Yes, money is important.
One of the best ways to ensure financial health and security is to develop more than one stream of income, whether you’re an employee or you work for yourself. Of course, living within your means and not taking on unnecessary debt is important as well, as is taking the time to learn about investing and paying close attention to your finances.
Balancing all these different parts of your life can be tricky. This is why I suggest creating an overall vision for the life you want and setting measurable goals based on that vision. It has been said that “what gets measured, gets done.”
Taking the time to define what success means to you and then tracking your activities will reward you with a life beyond anything you could have expected.
You deserve a successful life filled with all the joy, love, and happiness you desire. Accepting less is shortchanging yourself.
What simple step will you take today to begin to define and create your amazing success?