Your Definition of Success: An Inside-Out Approach
Have you ever had the sensation of going through motions – with little understanding of where you are headed – doing the same thing, day-in and day-out?
Many people find themselves “stuck” – in an unrewarding job or career of some other pursuit that is devoid of purpose. It might be time for you to consider the following three steps:
Discover your personal values and genuine interests
Define your vision of a successful life
Design choices and decisions in alignment with that vision
Seems simple, right? But then why do most of us continue to act as if everything is fine? Perhaps it’s because we’re conditioned to believe that this is just how things are (and should be) or maybe most of us hope that things will turn for the better – we just need to give it (more) time. But what if it doesn’t? As the author, Rita Mae Brown, once wrote, “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. Oftentimes even the idea that the present situation could change, that the future does not have to be this way, is just too daunting. And even the most exhausted and frustrated person is left thinking “I couldn’t do that”, or “What would other people think?”
One of the more challenging aspects to this work is accepting that we can do it – and by this I don’t mean that we are capable to do it – but rather dispelling the believe that we aren’t allowed to do it – this thinking prevents us from the preliminary inquiry about our values and interests. Why do we adopt this position? Because we either believe that we are on the right path – regardless of our own values and interests – or that we have obligations, responsibilities and commitments that prevent this exploration – it just isn’t appropriate and, therefore, not possible.
Discover your personal values and genuine interests
A lot of this thinking stems from an outside-in orientation – our actions are not necessarily aligned with our own values and interests – but rather with the values and interests of others.
The first step is to identify your values – what is important. Listing and ranking them can be a helpful process to understanding what motivates you. Again, these are not the values of others – this is an honest assessment, without judgement – after all, there are no judges here. Just you.
Coupled with your values are your interests – what do you like to do and how would you like to spend your time? What gives you energy – when do you feel enjoyment and satisfaction? These produce a strong sense of how you might spend time, if taking the opportunity to do so. We’ve all had moments where the current task, job or role is exhausting – we’re just not “into it”. If we could focus 100% of our time on our core interests, what would that look like?
Define your vision of a successful life
When we understand and discover our values and our interests – we can start to separate our internal drivers from external ones. Often, we’re surprised by the differences between the two. This initial comparison allows us to question those inherited definitions of success – ones we’ve been pursuing, even if unaware.
But it’s difficult to make the jump from “these are not how I define success” to “this is how I define success”. We need to create personal criteria, our own benchmarks, that are aligned with our values – to gauge how our values and interests translate into practice. One criterion that embodies a personal value may be “prioritize time with family” (speaks to the value “family is important to me”). How might we define a metric to determine that we are prioritizing that family time?
It is important to recognize the difference between defining success in alignment with our values and identifying the components that are in service to that definition. That job, that promotion, that financial reward – these can form building blocks in achieving the life you want. But they should not be interpreted as success in and of themselves.
A final step is to aggregate these various priorities – that we have developed apart from any outside influence. These come together to form our own unique definition of success – whether that is success in life, success in career, etc.
Design choices and decisions in alignment with that vision
It is important to understand that our definition of success is simultaneously aspirational and practical – in some ways it serves as a destination, a place to get to. But it also requires that our choices and decisions are components of living our values and interests in the present. One way to “practice” our successful state is to imagine hypothetical situations where we would act (or not act) on opportunities by considering the alignment (or misalignment) of the outcome with our definition of success – and testing our internal compass. How do we “measure up” to our internal benchmark in these situations. Further, we can contemplate what external opinions and pressures could result from our actions – helping build resilience against outside expectations.
It's important to ensure that our actions are in service to our own success – and when success is defined by us and for us – we have control over how that is implemented.
A final reminder - the ability to define success in alignment with our own values and interests is entirely within our control – even when it feels like we aren’t in control of anything. When we understand what we want and what we value we can then contemplate a future separate from the existing day-in and day-out, one in which we act in harmony with ourselves – where we actually can imagine different results.
