Real success & succeeding – questions to ask and answers to find

Is success, like art, only in the mind of the beholder? Or, is there a truly objective standard of success that can be applied to all people, at all times and in all places? Was success during one's younger years the same kind of success we come to expect and measure during a person's more mature or later years?

Success, can we ever define it objectively?

The answer is probably yes in some cases and no in other cases. If someone wins a competition or championship in sports or business – a trophy, a title, a monetary prize, a bonus – that is success on an objective scale. No one can deny that.  If you win small or big money in a lottery, that is a measure of success. Success can be as simple as a goal which is set and that goal subsequently attained. That is simple enough. So, there are some ways to measure success which are objective and all would agree upon. The amount of money earned or won, the number of diplomas and trophies, the material things that a person accumulated, the books or articles that a writer published, and this list could go on and on as everyone adds their own measures and doses of success.

Are there “bad successes”? Could we ever imagine such a thing?

 You bet! Successful crimes (she never got caught), successful lies (they never were uncovered), successful romances with many lovers (he was never found out). Yet, these and other successes can be one step or a few steps away from personal disaster. For sooner or later we see an individual who is uncovered and discovered. Some of these successful persons are imprisoned, despairing, heartbroken, depressed, lonely, isolated by the very success that brought them there. Therefore, success is sometimes only a veneer, a thin cover that overlays emptiness of person and spirit.

Now let's take at a quick look at some of the so-called simpler things in life: having a job that meets one's basic needs; making and keeping friends; keeping in touch; helping others; being a volunteer; studying, learning, being informed, seeking truth; filling a need, somewhere at sometime. Aren't these real successes too?

Some "successful people" were deemed to be successful by all objective standards, yet when the final measure was taken they were considered failures. Why? Because they finished poorly, they lost their lives, their being, their soul, while immersed in their success. Elvis Presley, Michael Jackson, Marilyn Monroe are elite examples of lives of mega stars which ended in failure and tragically.  

Are there both objective and subjective measures of success?

Yes, I think there are objective and subjective measures of success. Winners and victors are easy to identify in sports and many aspects of life. Medals and trophies and plaques are awarded, with or without monetary compensation.  But there are less dramatic, more subtle, less-easily defined life events, which if you take time, you can more easily identify. Here are breadwinners who deliver the daily bread through earnest and honest work; here are mothers, fathers, parents, grandparents who attend to the family day in and day out – they are all unheralded and very important success stories. The students who attend class, who study and learn and pass those tests are to be commended. These are success stories – simple and real success stories.

Without good plans and some concrete goals there will be little or no direction and progress.

Too many goals and plans can overwhelm, a few goals and plans really might be enough and work – no goals at all, is a danger.

Almost anyone can be a successful person – it certainly requires work and often it is not easy work. Simple success is possible. Billions of people on the planet prove it – day in and day out.