Does success come from focussing on failure or success?

In short, it can come from both, but one is more sustainable and gives you energy, whilst the other takes it away. Through working with many successful people (including myself) and especially with men, I have seen various patterns for success. I have found that many people initially became successful by ‘working away from’ failure and their reasons and drivers were negative and emotional. The ‘negative, away from’ drivers often comes from one or more of:

• Being bullied
• Trying to prove yourself
• Trying to gain acceptance from a parent or significant person in your life
• Being disadvantaged physically, intellectually or financially when you are young

Further, their version of success was often then defined by proving, external gratification (from people and objects) and was larger than necessity. This common version of success is emotional not practical and ego driven.

How should people decide what success is? A person needs a reason to strive for success but they also need to know what success looks like and therefore what they are aiming for.

The Oxford dictionary defines success as:
1. The accomplishment of an aim or purpose, or
2. The attainment of fame, wealth, or social status

The second definition fits exactly with the issues that I have observed and experienced myself. Television, marketers and advertisers have created a version for success based on what you look like, what you wear, how popular you are, the car you drive, the house you live in and on it goes. All of this, of course, is so the companies that the marketers represent can sell you more things that you don’t need!!

My belief is that this phenomenon ramped up when television started as television allowed the marketers to access the masses with visual messages. In the last 15 years the internet has taken this to a whole new level and even more recently, and especially with younger people, social media has taken this to a very scary place! There is no wonder that levels of depression, suicide and debt have risen sharply as a consequence. How can people ever feel enough when the marketing, emotional measures and judgements are so high and often unrealistic?

What can we/you do about this? My opinion is that people of all ages need to feel comfortable focussing more on who they are, what is really important to them and the value they add to others. The definition of success as society uses it is not enough as contentment, satisfaction and pride are incredibly important as well. We all know intuitively that these feelings are what really make us and those around us happy. We also know intuitively that these feelings come more from helping others than helping ourselves.

So, we need to take a rounded view to success and happiness. A parent being a great financial provider but not present as their kids grow up or anyone having lots of fancy ‘stuff’ without helping others are unlikely to deliver long term happiness. There are many more examples that we all see every day to prove that a one dimensional focus is not enough.

I came up with the following 5 points to help me define a rounded version of success and happiness. They also provide positive things to ‘work towards’ and remember. Hopefully they can help you too:

1. Your purpose

To define your purpose you need to be something and to give something. Everyone has positive attributes, gifts and ways of helping other people. Once you define yours it will help you make decisions on how to prioritise/balance your time. Enjoy sitting down and thinking of all the ways you can help others.

Mine is: To be inspirational and mischievous, giving guidance and laughter

2. What to be grateful for?

Think of the health you have, your loved ones, friends, talents and opportunities. There may be things that you take for granted and have forgotten to appreciate. I find this an important exercise to do as it helps us remember how fortunate we are.

3. What have I/we achieved in the last 5 years to set up our future?

We often focus on what we haven’t done, rather than all the things we have done to give us the success and happiness we desire. By listing all the things you have done to prepare you for your future you are likely to feel better about where you are at. Some of the things you have done may have been to clean up mistakes or lessons from the past. Whilst they might not feel like positive actions, they are necessary for you to achieve success in the future.

4. What do I/we want to achieve within the next 5 years?

This is to help you define specific things to plan for and/or complete. They may include spending more time with family or friends, helping someone achieve something, finishing off something for yourself, learning something, cleaning up something caused by past lessons…Objectives should be measurable and specific whenever possible.

5. What do I need to keep working through/remember?

Habits come from repetition. The only way I know of to change habits is to change what you think and what you do every day. To do this you need to have clarity about what to change. I use this to help me remember that I am on track and also that I can’t fix everything. My kids, for example, have their own journey and whilst I would love to make their life easy at every opportunity, that is not going to help their self-esteem or the development of their skills and determination. I also like to remember that the right decisions don’t immediately provide you with what you want. Good things take time to eventuate. This doesn’t mean that you are not on track though!

So, in summary, be aware when you are motivated by negative drivers as it will zap your energy and is unlikely to leave you feeling happy. Using positive drivers will give you energy rather than take it away as you will feel proud to help others on their journey through life. This will help you too!