Success is the accomplishment of an aim or a purpose. It sounds simple enough as is if what we want is a college degree, and we actually go get a college degree we could consider that success. Or if we write a letter, because we feel like our aim or purpose in writing that letter is that the other person will feel loved and by reading the letter the other person actually does feel loved, we can say that we succeeded.
However, we need to simplify the concept of success even further by looking at a more Universal objective perspective. The reason is that we may accomplish an aim or a purpose that we don't actually want and that is not in alignment with a more objective Universal definition of success. Please pause and read before you watch this video: What is Success?
I'm gonna give you an example; A person may not actually want a specific job, but they may apply for it and because they set it as an aim to get that job, when they actually get the job, by a standard definition, that would be success. However, the attainment of that job did not add to a person's well-being or sense of personal success in any way. So, here it is: from a more Universal objective perspective the definition of success is to achieve what one wants.
And guess what? This is why nobody can actually agree upon what is and what isn't success. Because,#1: People disagree about what aim or purpose is good and right.
And #2: Not everyone wants the same thing because people have different values, needs and desires. I'm gonna give you an example: Many people in the Western World feel that having a mansion and a penthouse and multiple businesses and five luxury cars and a closet full of designer clothes and constantly traveling on your private jet means that a person is experiencing success. However if you are Amish, you wouldn't think so.
You would believe that living a modest and simple life is good and right. Therefore your picture of success might look like a simple home with no electricity, home-cooked meals, a horse and buggy, spending quality time with family, friends and community and enjoying the natural world. Or, for example, one person might really want and value quality leisure time.
They would see success as someone being able to have lots of enjoyable zero pressure down time. And another might really want and value achievements. They would see success as someone who is proactive and busy so as to produce and rack up awards and reach goals.
I should say that a person's picture for success tends to change over the course of their life. Not only because our perspective changes over the course of our life, but also because so do our values and so do our needs. I don't know if you remember from an earlier video, but, needs are what creates our sense of values.
So if values change and desires change, so does our vision of success. Nevertheless, we as people love to do something; We love to project. And when we project around success, what we do is that we love to think that other people definitely should or do have our same sense of what is good and right.
Therefore, what's good and right to achieve. Not only this, we also tend to project this idea that somebody else should or does have the same desires, needs and therefore values that we do and therefore definition of success. We think our own picture of success is absolutely superior, so everybody else should definitely agree with it, and if they don't, we're somehow superior to them and then we definitely need to convert them to our picture of success.
For humanity to progress, we need to be able to recognize all forms of success, rather than minimizing or negating some, while exulting and revering others. Regardless of whether or not we specifically want that aim or purpose and therefore, type of success. Imagine a world where you have two people.
One is a Thespian who is usually short on cash and who moves to whatever city has a part in a show to offer. One as a lawyer with tons of money to burn and who will not take any real risks in life. It is obvious that these two people have different desires and values.
Their picture of success, that is the success they want, is different. But imagine that the lawyer can genuinely recognize the Thespian's ability to tell stories and confidence in front of a crowd, and dedication to ruthlessly following through on their passions, as success. And the Thespian can genuinely recognize the financial security that the lawyer has built up and the business they have created and the legal knowledge they have attained, as success.
When we say: "I can't recognize that person as a success", what we really mean is: "I can't say that that person has achieved anything that I need, desire or value". All this being said, it's especially hard to recognize something as success when we watch that somebody attained whatever goal or purpose that they had in mind at the expense of somebody else. Meaning, them achieving that goal was done in a way that brought harm to somebody or something or was against the best interest of somebody or something.
But here's the thing, it actually is success at that goal or aim. What they didn't succeed however, is something like harmony, or at creating safe relationships, or at creating system health, or at enhancing the well-being of the other. Here's the problem though: that's not gonna matter much unless that person wants those things.
Unless that person wants harmony in the system health and the best interests of the other, for example. So, what most of us are left with is this desperate desire for the other person to desire that. And by doing so, to be able to accommodate the best interests of all in their picture of success.
Now, that all this has been said and you understand just how many different types of success there are and just how individualized the picture of success is for all people, it's important to know the following: You are not going to succeed at accomplishing something i. e. succeeding with someone, unless your picture of success and theirs, is a match.
You have to agree on the picture of success. If not, you're opening the door super super wide for all kinds of conflict. A person's picture of success is a big element of compatibility.
And here's something interesting: You may share all kinds of values with somebody else, meaning you and the other person may have the same values. The question is, in what order? Because life has a nasty little habit of pitting one of our values, against another one of our top values and when this is a case we have to prioritize.
And in relationships when we have to prioritize like that, it's an issue if you prioritize this way, and the other person prioritizes this way. If someone else that we are trying to accomplish something with would prioritize those same values that we have in a different order, it's guaranteed that they will not agree with the decisions and actions we take and vice versa. Suddenly their values and our values will be juxtaposed.
And believe me, when it feels like, to begin with you're super aligned with somebody's image of success and then suddenly you aren't, it's a very confusing process. So that you can understand all of this, got an example for you; Max and Richard own a business in healthcare for seniors together. Both of them love financial success and both of them really care about helping people who need care, so starting a business in healthcare was the best of both worlds.
A few years back their company got sued, as a result, they needed to make enough money to afford a court case. This situation caused both of their top values to be tested against one another. Max decided that because his top value in life is financial security, money was the bigger value and therefore, should be the priority.
Meanwhile, Richard has always had family money. He decided that helping people who need care regardless of money should matter most. Both simply assumed the other was on the same page instead of directly communicating, and suddenly, they were disagreeing on literally everything.
Max wanted to sever relationships with insurance companies that were difficult to get payouts from and discontinue some of the programs they had for seniors on low incomes and consider murder deals with much larger competitive companies. Richard wanted to bleed their accounts dry for the court case and even do fundraisers if necessary so they could continue business as they had always done. Especially their programs for seniors on low incomes.
Now you, sitting here at home with your definition of success based off of your values may look at this situation and in your mind think: "Well it's obvious who the better and more moral person in the situation is, it's Richard". But here's the thing, in this situation even all the accountants agreed that Richard's course of action could put them entirely out of business. Not only does that create huge issues for them personally, both Max and Richard, it also means that inevitably there's a situation where all of the seniors that they're caring for at this moment suddenly have no care, and have to go search for other providers.
And some of them have families that can do that, and others really don't. The point of the story actually has nothing to do with morality. Has nothing to do with what you think is right or wrong.
What it has to do with is highlighting this idea of how important it is for two people who are trying to accomplish something together to share the same picture of success. Not only that, for them to have compatibility relative to their values. And this is especially important in a situation like we just explored where somebody gets into a situation where their values have to be prioritized.
When you are trying to establish compatibility so as to achieve anything with someone else, whether that is a good relationship or a business goal, it is important to make sure that you are on the same page with them about the picture of success and also, should the need arise, the prioritization of values. Long story short, success is to achieve what one wants. And it is pointless to do what we usually do which is to sit here and argue all day long about whether somebody is successful or not, or something is success or not, based off of whether they have achieved something that WE want or not.
But to make it all more grounded. . .
If someone wants a millionaire lifestyle because a millionaire lifestyle is what represents their values, a millionaire lifestyle is successful to them. If someone wants to be awakened because everything that comes with Awakening is in alignment with their values, being awakened is successful to them. If someone wants a close family because that is what will provide their needs, therefore it's what they want, and it's in alignment with their values, having a close family is successful to them.
If I were to tell you my picture of success and therefore my definition of success it would be based off of what I want. And even if I were to share with you today a more objective universal perspective of what the universe at large thinks success is, it would be something that's in alignment with what that overall amalgamation of subjective perspective therefore, universal consciousness wants. Your picture of success is going to evolve over the course of your lifetime because your perspective will change, so will your needs, so will your desires and so will your values.
It's okay to let them change. Now that you know all of this, the most important question that you can ask yourself is the following: Is the way that I am thinking, are the decisions that I am making and are the actions that I am taking actually bringing me to what I actually want? Have a good week.
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I'll see you in the next video.
