Ironically enough, about a year ago I wrote about failing and quitting. But since then I realized I had not written about the flip side of that: succeeding and success. Well, better late than never right?
I've been reading a book recently about success and what that means. When I take a look at success I always think career-wise, financially, and relationally. I'll be honest, if success is only boiled down to those three areas of life, then I am failing pretty miserably from the outside. Noticed how I used the word "outside". Just because I may not have a solid career path or a boyfriend and a bunch of friends, it does not mean that I am failing miserably as a whole.
The author of this book puts this concept in to perspective really well. This is how he explains it. When we were learning to walk, did we give up after that first time we fell? Let me ask it this way: did you walk to your front door this morning? Yes. Then you didn't fail at learning to walk, even after the multiple times you fell down. Success in adult life can be looked at the same way.
For some reason, growing up has made us so sensitive and when we fail once, it's hard for us to get back up. What if we changed our perspective a bit and looked at it like how we looked at learning to walk? When we decided as a child that we wanted to walk, there was no "try". There was no "maybe". There was only a definite "I will walk". It didn't matter how long it took for us to get there.
Now, what would happen if, as adults, we looked at life that way? I'm pursuing financial stability and independence (per my New Years Resolution) and I can tell you I have failed more than once, but that doesn't mean I'm never going to walk. We have so many chances at failing but to be honest, the real success is in that first step we take to get to where we want to go, even if we do fall. And we most likely will, but that's okay.
There's a reason the first step is harder than the second. It's because the first step starts from sub-level zero. Your first failure on a journey starts from nothing. I take that back, it starts from the comfort of your safely constructed world. Whereas the second step builds upon the first. Let me put it another way. I don't know about you, but I have a hard time working out. It's not that I'm physically incapable of working out but I have the hardest time getting there because most of the time I'm coming from the comfort of my home. Getting there is ALWAYS the hardest part for me. But once I'm there, I'm fine and I can bust out a pretty decent work-out. Even if I didn't make it to the gym but made it to the car with the intention of getting to the gym (yes this has happened before) I still succeeded that day because I turned my intention in to action. And next time I can build upon that momentum I already started.
Success is an active word. It doesn't always take an arm and a leg to complete and just because you might not have reached your ultimate goal the very first time, it does not mean that you failed. Quite the opposite, in fact. It means you succeeded. And all it takes to reach that ultimate goal is to build upon those little successes and failures until you get there. Stop putting a deadline or timeline on yourself and just focus on the little successes that accrue over the course of you continuing to pursue your ultimate goal.