Where are you right now?

A lot of people are unhappy where they are right now. Most have given up on themselves, and on life. They’re unhappy because success eludes them. They have tried all sorts of things: changed careers a number of times, and are no longer ‘employable’ due to a bad reputation of ‘job hopping.’ They might have tried the entrepreneur route, failed, and because of all that, they feel that life is not worth living anymore. Although all the challenges could be attributable to a number of reasons, the reality is that the business failure, the multiple career change means that a person feels, seems like a failure. This person simply does not care anymore. This is a ‘dead man walking’.

What is success?

Different people have different definitions of success. However, the dictionary defines success as ‘the accomplishment of an aim or purpose.’ The key words here are ‘accomplishment’ and ‘aim/purpose’. Accomplishment means ‘to fully achieve’, and aim/purpose means ‘have as one’s intention or objective.’ What does this mean? You are successful when you achieve that which you had the intention or objective to achieve. To be able to achieve you have to implement your intention/objective. Implementing your intention means doing something, taking action.

 What does it all mean?

So, it goes without saying that for you to be successful, you need to:

• Have an ‘intent’ to be successful. This is the first and most important ingredient of your  success.
• It means you need to understand what success means to you.
• It means you need to define what success is to you. In your own terms. Because there is no right or wrong answer in terms of your definition of your success. And your definition is your own.
• It means you need to identify and confirm what it is you want to achieve.
• It means that you are responsible for your success.
• It means you must do something, and you must take action.
• It means you must have the will to take action, and to take risks.
• It means you must understand that success is a journey, and cannot be achieved overnight.
• It means you must understand that on your journey, you will encounter setbacks, challenges, and roadblocks. You might become a failure. And when you have experienced failure, your intent must be strong enough to pick you up and propel you towards the action you need to take.
• It means you must have courage, and resilience.
• It means you must have faith, hope, and a strong sense of self belief about yourself that you will achieve, no matter what happens.
• It means you never, ever, should quit pursuing your success.

 It starts with you

The list above is not exhaustive. I have just highlighted a few key points that you need to consider for you to start thinking about your success. The bottom line here is that your success is your responsibility, and yours alone. This means that only you can define, it, take action on it, implement it, and achieve it. Only you can achieve your success. It is your choice. And, it starts with you.

So, do you want to be successful?

 ‘Success is an art, not a science. You have to want to be successful to achieve success.’ Morongwa Makakane