What is success to you? Is it the money and toys that it brings? Is it living your dream? To answer that question comes down to what you call successful, however what would you do for success? I asked a friend of mine that very question and he said to me, “If you view having the job, car, house, and toys as success, you will be working your entire life and achieve no real success. The reason I say this is because most people forget that just waking up for another day is true success. Yet that is not what TV and the media tell you.” It would be another few years until he would see what I call success in the industry that we worked in. I retired and he is teaching in one of the best Culinary school in the world.
The first thing that most people see is what the media tries to sell success as. Most believe that and try to buy success with keeping up with the Jones’. The sad fact is that is what most people are lead to believe because they saw it on TV or the family next door just go a new truck and that is a mark on the other person. This society is all about trying to out do each other and feel that being in debt to show you are successful is what you are meant to do. For me, just having a good home with support from family members and friends plus being able to eat everyday is what I call success for me. The wants that I have that cost me money is a new computer when I need one as an author it is a must.
When we are in school as kids and young adults, it comes down to how you view success. As a youth, we need the help from our teachers to guide us into university or college for the career path that we may enjoying doing. Then in post-secondary education we develop a clear picture of what we want in our lives. Once that picture is seen, then the race to reach that success happens. Is it world fame you strive for? Or is it a family and a regular career? It comes down to you.
So, truly ask yourself what you want in life. Once you write down what you want, then look at what it is going to take to reach it. If you are only going to have two weeks a year to enjoy your success, that in my mind is not a life worth living. If you are always at work and not having the time to spend with your family and friends then that is not success, that is being a modern slave to money. The hard thing is that is most people are a slave to money because the more they make the more they spend.
There a few who are able to achieve success and not miss time with their families and friends and they also keep the same level of spending no matter how much more money that they make. They live in normal houses and drive regular cars, however they may spend the extra money on their vacations or investing it into their retirement. It is these people who are truly successful as they see their life in a different way.
Today as you read these words, take a moment to look at the goals that you have got for your life and if you do not have goals, start to set them. It does not matter how old you are or what you do for a living or even how much debt you have. (For those of you who have debt, the first place your money should go to paying it off and not into something new.) What I am getting at is that it does not matter how old you are when it comes to setting new goals for yourself and get onto the path that you see as what success is.
Some of you may have parents to take care of or your own children which does create its own challenges. Or you may have to go back to school to follow your dream of being successful which will bring debt. You may already work two jobs just to pay bills and you never seen your family even though you live with them. These are real things that happen in life and I understand that everyone’s life is different. The message I am trying to say is that at what cost will you take for success?
For success, it is just a word people use to feel better for themselves when they are burnt out from working all the time. As for me I am a successful author in my own mind as my books have been published and just starting my challenge of taking on the stigma of Mental Health is where my major success is going to happen. Hopefully in my lifetime I will see it.
Just remember if you wake up tomorrow you are successful and you always will be.
Stay safe.