Who is successful in your eyes?
Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Warren Buffet, Beethoven, Maria Kallas, Aristotle, Thucydides, Simone de Beauvoir, Otto Von Bismarck, Jennifer Lopez, Leonardo di Caprio etc. These are some of the most common answers I get when I ask this question depending on my interlocutor.
And then I ask what is the recipe according to you? What are your criteria for successful individuals? The truth is you learn a lot about people when they unfold their thoughts about the path towards personal success.
On the list with the key elements constituting a successful individual, I am often acquainted with notions like freedom, independence, power, money, marriage, popularity, and many more. However, the tricky part is when people have to prioritize the contents of their list. For instance, when I am in a discussion concerning matters of a multilevel and complex nature (and success is one of them) my interlocutors about 9 out of 10 times will be confident about what comes first, and "money" is the most popular answer.
Of course, this is quite predictable, I mean as I usually say, money means power and the lack of it means problems. No matter how romantic or anti-conformist you are money makes the current world you live in go-round. Given that, when I hear this answer my typical question follows next: Is the money itself the success target though, or is what money can give you?
You see when with absolute certainty, people acknowledge their cash flow as their first thought associated with their idolized figures or their desired future selves, they project money as their primary goal (which it might be in some cases, but not all). To make this clearer, I will use the list of a lovely acquaintance I had during a trip back in the summer:
Money
Family
Knowledge
Popularity
Stability (not many ups and downs in daily life)
Now in the context of our conversation and observing carefully the answers I received, I decided to investigate a bit further: "Okay I see, and if you had to minimize your list by one what would be left out? I suspect stability since it is your last option?"
My interlocutor then stayed silent for a little and then said: "Hmm.. now that I am thinking about it ... No, let's leave popularity out. "
Me: "That means stability is more important to you?"
Interlocutor: "Yes it is. I believe that I could be successful even without being so popular".
This automatically triggered me to ask my final critical question, but not right away. I had to put a link first to understand better the person in front of me.
Me: "Can you please name a sum that you would like to earn every month to be satisfied and/or a sum depicting the wealth that you would like to have as a successful individual?".
Interlocutor: "Oh okay, em I would like to have monthly earnings of about 10.000 euros and a wealth of 500.000."
Me: "Great. Now tell me, if you had this amount of money, but you had also obligations that didn't let you see your family as much as you wanted, would you consider yourself less successful or it wouldn't really affect you?" To be honest I was really curious about the answer. My companion was silent and skeptical again but after a few seconds, he finally spoke with a voice very calm and collected.
Interlocutor: "The truth is I would like to have the freedom of choosing my priorities if it would be the job, family, or friends when that was possible. If I didn't have this kind of freedom at all then yes I would probably consider myself less successful -to use your wording-".
My interlocutor's most important aspect of success was freedom and money would give this aspect to him, that's why he put it first. He thought it was obvious that if he had the money, he would have the freedom as well, so he didn't mention it in the first place. The truth is "money" "connections" "education" are commonly perceived as indicators of personal success, but usually, they represent the means to reach our ultimate goals and not the goals themselves (without excluding the possibility of actually being goals, though), and most of the time even the person is not aware of it.
We tend to look at the personas we admire and inherently desire what they have in their daily routine and what they left as a legacy. While doing this internal comparison between who we are and who we wish to be there is always the possibility of getting lost in which path we should take or how the path should look according to our standards. And I believe this is an adventure that only the challengers dare to face directly by digging deeper into their "being". Knowing your inner self with its strengths and weaknesses is the first step to fulfilling your objectives and your ongoing defense towards your social circle eyes. The latter will judge you mainly based on their experiences, their incentives, and their outcomes, and partially yours. As a result, sometimes they can help and some others they can prevent you from unlocking your potential.
Nevertheless, even if you are not a challenger and you feel safe and supported within your comfort zone you can always devote 10 minutes of your day and think: "What would I like to achieve most in my life?" so you can start writing your chapter of success by your own hand.
Always remember: It can take time to know yourself better and decide what is most essential to you and that is perfectly okay unless you don't quit searching.
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