The Success Conundrum
By Kerryn Vaughan
12th January 2022
What is success?
This is a loaded question and I don’t think there is a perfect, or agreeable answer.
Some people think success is money. As the host of the Get Off The Bench podcast, I am often approached by ‘successful’ people who brag about making 6 figures and try to convince me that my audience would love to hear their formula, which is often a well disguised sales funnel designed to draw hopeful people into debt and never actually find their 6 figures.
I get cranky with these people. Firstly, my listeners care more about inspiration, and second, a lot of these ‘6 figure’ people (not all), are making money by taking money!
Personally, I think success is when you’re happy and feel good about yourself. That’s enough, and nobody should be shamed for that.
I googled a few definitions of success and here’s what I found…
Cambridge dictionary - ‘the achieving of the results wanted or hoped for’
Collins dictionary - ‘the achievement of something that you have been trying to do’
Merriam-Webster dictionary - ‘the fact of getting, or achieving wealth, respect or fame’ and ‘the correct or desired result of an attempt’
So other than the bit about wealth, respect and fame (which isn’t helpful), they’re all basically saying that if you don’t achieve what you set out to do then you haven’t succeeded.
The Google definition from Oxford Languages agrees - ‘the accomplishment of a goal or purpose’
But what if we don’t achieve or accomplish the thing we’ve been trying to do?
The Google definition from Oxford Languages goes on to give an example of using success in a sentence. Here’s the sentence:
‘There is a thin line between success and failure’
Herein lies the next part of the conundrum. We have juxtaposed the word ‘success’ with the word ‘failure’, so every time we don’t reach our target, goal, aim, objective, or purpose, we believe we have failed.
What if success could mean that you gave it a go?
What if the thing you were trying to achieve was just to have a crack?
Every entrepreneur knows that you have to keep trying things over and over until you get the right formula. But good entrepreneurs don’t see themselves as failures. They see themselves as having succeeded in yet another learning opportunity.
Further, what if we could replace the word failure with feedback. Even better, we could completely remove the negative narrative that comes with the word failure. How many people give up way too soon, simply because they feel like a failure?
On that point, the word failure should never be assigned to a person, only to an action.
And the only people who can even claim to have had a failure anyway, are the ones who had the courage to give something a go. Doesn’t that make them successful?
Words are funny things, and because of the rigid definitions and the outdated and unhelpful perceptions we place on certain words, we can feel like crap about ourselves, when in fact, we should be feeling great about ourselves.
We need to take chances and give things a go. If we don’t achieve what we set out to do, that doesn’t mean we didn’t succeed. It means we’ve had the courage to put ourselves out there.
The next time you, or somebody you know, finds the courage to attempt something, give a cheer and a high five, and think (and say) “You bloody ripper!”.
Kerryn Vaughan is the author of ‘Magnificent Kids!’ and ‘Get Off The Bench!’, founder of One Planet Classrooms, co-founder of Girls With Hammers, and host of Get Off The Bench Podcast.
Kerryn is also a DISC ADVANCED® accredited consultant.