“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma, which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice, heart and intuition. They somehow already know what your truly want to become.”
– Steve Jobs
Ever feel like your whole life had been leading up to that one moment, the moment when you thought you had finally succeeded to impress someone or get that thing? Then those hopes, as expansive and fragile as the glass in front of us, shattered. In one, gut-wrenching moment your highest high comes to a devastating new low.
For me personally, I remember being 21 years old. I was working as a Branch Manager for a direct sales company. I had trained for 8 months in pursuit to allow myself to earn the opportunity to have the ability to run my own office. I wanted it bad. I was seeking the approvals of my superiors and peers to validate myself because I was “under the radar” in expectations of what I was expected to do.
In the process of training to get that point, my typical day started by getting up at 6am to drive an hour south to advertise to build a team on the local college campuses for a few hours. Drive 30 minutes north to go to class from 9-2. Drive 30 minutes north of that to coach my basketball team from 3-5, then to drive an hour south again to run an interview of the people who inquired from my advertising efforts in the morning. In between all of that, close sales for the team we currently had. After my day was done at 9 or 10 pm depending on the day, drive an hour north again to go home sleep and get ready to do it again. It was a grind. I was committed to doing whatever it took to earn the right to have my name on the door.
When I received that promotion to Branch Manager, it was a wonderful feeling. I had a vision to make a name for myself in a tremendous way. The work ethic I developed allowed me to see “success”. Despite breaking a company record my first month out, developing a top 10 representative in the company that summer and finishing in the Top 10 in the nation of branch managers it was never validated.
That’s the moment when everything changed for me. It became an instant liberation. This low freed me. Think of it as a coming-of-age moment for me.
Instead of living your life to please someone, realize nothing you could ever achieve will change the opinion or what people think of you. Let go of the burden that some people carry for a lifetime, the burden of living to please someone else. The plummeting heartbreak you feel standing there with whoever’s opinion you value so highly, you can break the bondage you have struggled with your whole life.
Through those lessons it allowed me to become more than just being validated by a title or prestige. Its now about who I am developing myself to become. The impact of my actions that will empower others to do the same. Overcoming my challenges to be an inspiration to someone else to overcome their challenges. The opportunities I create for myself will give permission for someone else to go out and create their own as well.
Free yourself to pursue your dreams for your own sake. Untethered from anyone’s approval or disapproval. Realize your success has nothing to do with anyone.
This moment, decide you will define success on your own terms.
Here’s an exercise that can help you define what success means to you. Grab your journal, find a quiet place to sit. Close your eyes, take a deep breaths in and as you breath out, start writing and answer these questions.
Hopefully this will enable you to gain clarity on your definition of success as it did for me.
What will be the real purpose behind your success?
What authentic passion are you displaying during your success?
What personal core values are prevalent in your success?
What contribution are you making during your success?
How are you serving your family and community during your success?
Where is your desired direction in life based on your success?
What is the one thing you can attribute your success to?
What is your most important success strategy you have?
What is your definition success?
Stop. Read what you just wrote. Have any light bulbs started to light up? Are things showing up clearly?
Some define their success by the things they get, prestige, who you know, what you do, and what you accomplish.
Those who free themselves of the rat race of societal norms, define success by:
- Being the best son or daughter to their mother and father.
- Being responsible and caring for their family
- Having time to be a mother or father to their children or future family.
- Being the friend/wife/husband that they would want.
- Living life on their terms.
- Living a life congruent to their character and values.
We spend most of our lives pursuing success, but I’m not sure we stop enough to and ask ourselves: What does success mean to me?
If you have, in hindsight, you may have unknowingly allowed others to answer it for us . Maybe our parents defined it as the degrees we should obtain or the titles we should aspire to have on our business card. Maybe commercial media defined our success by have the car, house, or watch. Maybe the Joneses defined our success, comparing where we went on vacation, or the relative excellence of our kids.
Sometimes in life, the script we’re given no longer fits the story we want to live. We realize the rules we were following were assigned by someone who did not have our best interest in mind. And now, we must do something about it.
Answer those questions from deep within yourself. You can spark some real insight – an awakening to your true motivation, passion and purpose in life. It has for me.
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