Success...Happiness...Preconceived Notions....Letting Go
I am not really sure where I am going with this but I have been toying with this idea that success doesn't lead to happiness but it can sure enhance it. So what exactly is success and really shouldn't I define success for me and ignore what "others" define as success?
I have been thinking about this a lot and not really going anywhere partly because I am afraid of the answer. But really I need to think about this for my own happiness, I get to decide what is right for me. I also need to accept that I do not live in an ideal world so my vision of what I thought was success, probably isn't going to exist in the real world. I need to adjust my idea of success to match reality and not what I wish, I have done it in other areas...
So I had this idea of how I would be as a parent before I had children, in fact I was an amazing parent and then I had kids. The the kids came into my world and life changed in so many ways that I expected but there were more unexpected changes so I had to change how I parented. I moved from the equivalent of an academic exercise and moved to practical experience.
I am not the same person I was when I originally defined my ideals of success that was well over 20 years ago, so why do I expect them to stay relevant as I envisioned them? I am not saying that I have to lose them and change them all, but maybe it is time to look at them and do an honest assessment of them and decide are they keepers, should I just toss them out, or do I need to adjust my metrics?
I want to have a good life I think that is pretty much a universal ideal but how exactly you define that is where the work comes in. I don't feel the need to have huge fame, money is great and if it fit my parameters of what I am willing to do I won't turn it down but I don't see it as the end goal. I want to be happy and I want to do the best thing for my family and myself.
I feel it is important to define this idea of success because my life has changed pretty darn drastically in the past two years. Am I fighting the changes because they are bad? Or am I fighting them because they go against a popular notion of success and I want to get outside approval? Am I fighting them because they are pretty much the opposite of what I said I wanted when I was a teenager and I really fear letting go of something I have had so long even if it is no longer important to me simply because I am used to clinging to that idea?
When I can answer some of those big questions I will be happy with my progress.
I have been thinking about this a lot and not really going anywhere partly because I am afraid of the answer. But really I need to think about this for my own happiness, I get to decide what is right for me. I also need to accept that I do not live in an ideal world so my vision of what I thought was success, probably isn't going to exist in the real world. I need to adjust my idea of success to match reality and not what I wish, I have done it in other areas...
Example of shifting expectations and ideals
So I had this idea of how I would be as a parent before I had children, in fact I was an amazing parent and then I had kids. The the kids came into my world and life changed in so many ways that I expected but there were more unexpected changes so I had to change how I parented. I moved from the equivalent of an academic exercise and moved to practical experience.
I am not the same person I was when I originally defined my ideals of success that was well over 20 years ago, so why do I expect them to stay relevant as I envisioned them? I am not saying that I have to lose them and change them all, but maybe it is time to look at them and do an honest assessment of them and decide are they keepers, should I just toss them out, or do I need to adjust my metrics?
I want to have a good life I think that is pretty much a universal ideal but how exactly you define that is where the work comes in. I don't feel the need to have huge fame, money is great and if it fit my parameters of what I am willing to do I won't turn it down but I don't see it as the end goal. I want to be happy and I want to do the best thing for my family and myself.
I feel it is important to define this idea of success because my life has changed pretty darn drastically in the past two years. Am I fighting the changes because they are bad? Or am I fighting them because they go against a popular notion of success and I want to get outside approval? Am I fighting them because they are pretty much the opposite of what I said I wanted when I was a teenager and I really fear letting go of something I have had so long even if it is no longer important to me simply because I am used to clinging to that idea?
When I can answer some of those big questions I will be happy with my progress.
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