Success Sucks. Skip Past The Disappointments And Double Your Results

 

We often think of reframing our failures. But do you ever reframe the way you see success? As you read this, maybe you’re asking yourself why you would need to. Here’s the thing: Your vision of success, your “blueprint,” is formed in your mind by the age of 6. This childhood programming may not match up with what you view as “success” today. Success is very much an individual thing. How can you be successful and happy on your own terms if you default to the mental model of success implanted into your brain in childhood or if you’ve never taken time as an adult to really consider what success means to you? In today’s episode of the Winning Mindset Mastery Podcast, April leads you through a simple, straightforward process to help you determine what success means to you. Not to your family, your boss, or society, but to you!

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Success Sucks. Skip Past The Disappointments And Double Your Results

In this episode, I want to reframe the way that you see success. Why would we even do that? Here’s an interesting fact. Our vision of success, what we think financial success is, career success, relationship success, and any and all success are formed in our minds by the age of six. It comes to us based on observing our family of origin, whoever that is. Let’s think for a moment about that blueprint that we have been given and that it may not match up with what is success for you. Think about that for a minute. Think about the people you know. Maybe this is you or a friend who went all the way through law school, got their JD, sat for the bar, became a very prominent attorney, and they’re miserable.

Also, think of the person who makes tons and tons of money but works so hard to have that financial success that they’ve been told is so important that they never have the time to enjoy the things that are really important to them. What about that person that you know, and this could be you, who has it all, who has done absolutely everything that makes them a “success,” yet they’re still not happy and fulfilled? How could you be successful and happy on your own terms if you’ve never taken the time to ask yourself what that is? We all take for granted that we know what success is, but success is extremely individual. It looks different for each and every one of us. By the way, it can look different for each and every one of us at different stages of our lives.

Success is extremely individual. It looks different for each and every one of us, and it can look different at different stages of our lives. Share on X

How do you know what that is? You need to ask yourself a few questions, and these questions will be incredibly enlightening. The reason is they will help you understand why when you’ve achieved things that should have made you exceptionally happy, they haven’t made you that happy. They’ll also let you know that there are other things in your life that matter more to you that you may not be paying a lot of attention to. The last thing that they do for you in many cases is they give you a sense of relief because you find out the things that are going to bring you the most joy and happiness are easier to achieve than the success that you’ve been chasing for so long. It wasn’t making you happy. What are these questions?

 

First question. I want you to imagine that you won the lottery. No one knows. You don’t have to tell anyone in your family or friends. You now have unlimited funds, and you get to choose how you want to spend your time. What are the top three things that you would like to spend your time on? These aren’t things you should spend your time on or things people you know want you to spend your time on. You can spend your time on absolutely anything you want and all of your financial needs will be taken care of. What are those three things? Here’s the second question. When you are your happiest, the most juiced, excited, and motivated to do things, what have you either just done or what are you about to do?

Third question, what are the things that if you made it all the way through your life and you never got a chance to experience them, you would regret the most? Write the top things that you think of that if you never got to experience this, you would regret the most. I want you to take a look at those answers and spend some time thinking about what they have in common and what they’re pointing you towards. It’s because what those answers are sharing with you are the things that are most important to you. No matter what society, our family, or the people we surround ourselves with deem success, it’s not going to bring us happiness unless it aligns with our internal values of success.

 

I want you to take these answers and spend some time thinking about what they mean to you and how you can find ways to incorporate these things in your life more now. Even if it’s not changing your job or your lifestyle, what are the ways that you can incorporate this even for small amounts of time each week? What you’ll notice is you experience a great deal more happiness and you may feel like you are already successful based on your values. Everything else is just a bonus. You’ll also find that when you are aligned with the things that matter most to you versus other people, you are much more fulfilled even if you haven’t reached what you would consider “success” yet. I want you to take a look at these and think about them over the next week.

 

Reach out to me and let me know what you think. Don’t forget that you can always go to the website for the show at WinningMindsetMasteryPodcast.com. At the very bottom of the page, you can start a conversation with me personally and privately. Ask April a question or give me feedback on this. I love to talk you through it because the amazing thing is this. When we boil down everything that we want in life and everything that we go after, it is always with the intent that we’ll feel better having it, we will be “happy.” However, if we’re following the wrong map or someone else’s map, we’re never going to get there, but if we can map it out for ourselves, we can speed up how quickly we get there and increase the amount of time that we get to enjoy it. Here’s to your success.