March 14th, 2010 Not Another Article About Success
Articles and books that promise a formula for success drive me crazy! Personal success is the intersection of an individual’s life values, passions, and material goals. Just as no two human’s life experiences are exactly identical, no two definitions of success can truly be the same.
Yet the word success is constantly bantered in our society and we discuss it like we know what it means. Someone says, “He is so successful!” and you might agree as long as he has money and power or extraordinary altruism that match society’s standards for the word. But what do you know of his real success – that of his own standards? How successful does that man feel if he has destroyed his marriage, lost time with his child, put aside a artistic passion, or felt extreme loneliness on his way to achievement.
Recently, when I asked clients their definition of success several told me that they needed to ditch the word itself. What a step in the right direction! For one the new word was “achievement,” for another the phrase “being real” summed it up. In one case, my ambitious, and (by conventional standards) very successful friend used one definition for success as society would define it and then, admitting the description left her cold, blurted a second definition for “meaningful existence” which she finds much more motivating.
While, in my mind, it isn’t possible to give someone a formula for becoming successful, one powerful step toward defining and processing success in your own unique way is to shed that useless word!
Here are three ways to start defining success in your own terms:
1) Feel It. How do you feel when you achieve personal success? Identify at least 7 times in your life when you were very proud of your achievement or felt extremely fulfilled. Write down every remembered detail: the situation, who you were with, what you wore, and the smells and sounds of your surroundings. Relive the experience in your mind. What does your satisfaction feel like? Are there common threads in what you experienced and how you felt?
How do you feel when you’ve achieved something meaningful? Let those feelings guide your future activities.
2) Boil it Down. Steve, a dear friend of mine, fondly recalls a sign hanging in a Vermont country store. It says, “Sleep, Eat, Ski, Hike, Fish” and embodies to him a fun and fulfilling existence. Day to day, he works his 9-5 job in Washington, DC but still retains the five word mantra to remind him of his true passions and goals. For him, successful living is embodied in that sign: in those 5 words and the context of Vermont country life.
Can you boil your idea of success and fulfillment into five words? What metaphor or symbol embodies your ideal life?
3) Expand the Context. Sometimes defining success is overwhelming because it seems to require you to nail down ideas of lifetime achievement. While that is part of it, applying a single idea of success to all the situations and times in life is far too limiting. The terms of success must change as the context changes, and you are likely to have many different definitions. Keep your overarching goals in sight but also focus on day-to- day events to weave your personal view of success into the process of life.
How do you think about fulfillment in the different contexts of your life? What makes this one moment meaningful? What is achievement for you in this one hour, one month, one job or one relationship?
Laura Koehne
http://www.articlesbase.com/advice-articles/not-another-article-about-success-66562.html
on March 14th, 2010 at 9:12 pm
Why are americans so petty and pathetic?
Ive been following the olympics on yahoo, and ive just read an article on james degale winning middleweight gold, and it was filled with pathetic sideswipes at britain, british boxing, james degale etc, ending with the comment that ‘Degale, 22, has no real international success, but he made a surprise run to the title fight while the top middleweight contenders were eliminated by others’, despite the fact that degale beat the 2004 welterweight goldmedalist in the quarters, and the highly rated cuban in the final. Also in yahoo olympic boxing section, there is a medal table for the boxing, but for some reason britain is missing, when we should be second with 1 gold, 2 bronze, just behind Cuba, i can only suppose some pathetic, petty, crybaby yank just couldn’t face up to aknowledging britain second on the table while america is nowhere with just a single bronze. Also i read another article about britains cycling successes, which was again full of pathetic little sideswipes, basically suggesting they were only successful because of massive funding, wheras in reality, that funding has only brought funding in uk sports to a comparable level with most other western countries, and still nowhere anywhere near funding that US olympic sports get. They act like this, and yet they wonder why the whole world hates them
on March 15th, 2010 at 2:14 am
Because this way no one will mock us.
Oh, and we don’t wonder why the world hates us, we revel in that fact.
Of course it could be those silly Brits that want the spotlight on them all the time bringing up pathetic excuses to bring other persons and countries down to their level…
What’s really ironic is when you learn that the team responsible for that boxing page on Yahoo Olympics, is managed by a Brit… a little pot and kettle?
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on March 15th, 2010 at 2:16 am
cause we beat you in 2 wars
-revolutionary war
-war of 1812
so shove that up your navy’s A$$ and brew some tea u "bloody (UNT"
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on March 15th, 2010 at 2:18 am
did you not see the Degale fight? sloppy, cocky, bitchin about gettin "bit". what a bitch.
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on March 15th, 2010 at 2:20 am
Are still bitter about the Boston tea party?
Keep up that stiff upper lip, loser.
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on March 15th, 2010 at 2:23 am
why are you so pathetic that you have to bitch about another country like that. At least our country goes to war (with the exception under iraq) for good causes. Britain raped and murdered for power and money. All countries have good and bad people and it is unfair that you judge america based on one person’s comments. So since you talked shit about america here is some shit on britain you greedy tea sucker. Naseem Hamed and Ricky Hatton got fucked up by americans so suck it.
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on March 15th, 2010 at 2:25 am
I’m English, and TBH the guy who asked this question is a d1ckhead.
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on March 15th, 2010 at 2:27 am
I suppose they just got used to getting controversial decisions for decades I suppose now we will all have to grit our teeth as china become the next world leaders and things go their way for a while..politics I’m afraid
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http://www.powermeansmedals.com
on March 15th, 2010 at 2:29 am
just cause one person is an idiot dont mean all americans are like him. why dont u go buy a tooth brush you rotten tooth english
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on March 15th, 2010 at 2:31 am
Olympic boxing is not working. Many good boxers lost due to the inaccuracy of the scoring system.
Olympic boxing is in the level of "BOX FOR DUMMIES". Most of this Olympic gold medalist don’t ever make it as wold champions. I really doubt if Degale makes it as a pro boxer.
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on March 15th, 2010 at 2:33 am
this is a very long question that isn’t actually a question, but instead a witching and moaning post that implies a) you don’t know what you’re talking about, b) you stereotype an entire nation due to two articles you read and c) you don’t realize that questions like this in YA get reported
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