How do you define success?
I’ve had this one on my list for a while to talk about on the podcast. When I work with businesses, large and small, one of the things I try to find out is how you define your success. It doesn’t matter how I define it, as you’re the one that has to do the work to get there. And when you get there, you want to feel satisfied with wherever that is. Too often we let others define success for us, and then we feel unfulfilled.
Listen to this new 8-minute episode for some perspective on what success can mean for you, and how to tune out the noise.
If you have any questions about anything in this, or any of my podcasts, or have a suggestion for a topic or guest, please reach out directly to me at [email protected] or visit my website Podcast.AlanBerg.com
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How do you define success? Listen to this episode, see where I’m going with this. Hi, its Alan Berg welcome back to another episode of the Wedding Business Solutions Podcast. This was I think this might’ve been a listener’s suggestion. I don’t remember. I have this note down for a while. I’ve been wanting to get to this one here.
And it’s really just how each of us defines success. is different. And there are people that try to impart their idea of success on other people. And then it’s hard for that other person to live up to that because it doesn’t come from them internally. It doesn’t come from your personal motivation. It’s an external motivation.
And Then when you achieve that success, whatever that definition was, it’s not fulfilling because it wasn’t your idea of that. Now, some people have that because it came from a parent, right? Your, your parent wanted you to do a certain thing, have a certain job, have a certain career path, and you ended a different way.
Some of you are definitely shaking your heads there. Like your, your parents, you know, didn’t send you to college to become a fill in the blank, right? I remember when I started selling cars, I was a Magna Cum Laude college graduate. My parents Probably didn’t think they should pay for college, have paid for college for me to do that.
Then again, my mother bought the first car I ever sold. So, but I also excelled at that, right? Because it’s whatever I’m going to do, I’m going to do it to the best of my abilities and then move on to something else. If, if I don’t love that anymore, if a different opportunity comes by. And I think we also have to understand that our definition of success changes throughout our lives. You know, what does success mean to you when you’re 20 versus 30 versus 40 80 and 90? What does it mean? What is your definition of success? I think it’s also because of those life experiences, we realize that things that we maybe used to think were important aren’t important anymore.
I remember a younger me starting out in business at a college. Making money, starting a life with my wife getting a house and starting a family and all those things, that was important. And maybe the fancier car or maybe whatever, more important. And then as you move on, you realize different things become important.
Like, like now at this point in my life, the size of my retirement fund is certainly more important to me than it was when I was 20. I remember actually when I was, I don’t know, 20 or 21, and IRAs, somebody said, well, if you open an IRA, and I think the most you could put in at the time was 2, 000. Now it’s six or seven, depending upon your age, per year.
And there were no Roth IRAs or anything at the time. And they said, if you put 2, 000 away every year. from now, when you’re 21 until you retire, let’s say at 65, you’ll have a million dollars just by putting 2, 000 away. The problem was I didn’t have 2, 000 to spare at the time. How many of you can relate to that? Right. And then when I have kids, so, you know, you can have kids or you can have money. That’s another thing I learned along the way. You. Realize at different points what’s important, like right now having a new car is not important to me. I, I drove less than 5, 000 miles last year. I probably flew 100, 000, but I drove less than 5, 000.
So, paying to have a new car sitting in my garage when I’m not there, not important to me, right? Was important, there was a time it was important, I didn’t fly as much as I do now. It was right. A bigger house is not important to me. A second house is not important to me. Those type of things might’ve been a goal at one point.
They’re not right. The house is more than big enough for my wife and I probably too big, but you know, children come back and grandchildren and grandpuppies and things need room for those things. Right. So how do you define success? Is it a number? Is it a number? Another thing that COVID proved to me and a lot of people was that I can survive very well on less money than I was making before.
If I want to change my lifestyle and say what’s important to me, successful is having more time for something, and I’ll sacrifice some money because of that, right? The number didn’t matter. I think as a business person, Bottom line profitability becomes more important to you as a definition of success than early on when top line sales you think are the most important thing.
And then you realize it’s not what you make. It’s what you keep. So what does successful mean for you? Having more time for your family? Is that your idea of success? Is it having a more prominent place in your industry? Is it having a more prominent place in your house of worship? What is it that you define?
And that’s okay for you, as long as you’re defining your own success, you’re working towards that success, not at the expense of other things that are important in your life, such as if a personal thing is important in your life, you still need to pay the bills, right? You still need to do things. So you still have to have those things, but it’s okay to say that I’m not chasing the money.
I’m chasing this, whatever this means to you. For me. Constant learning is important. I’ve started learning languages and things like that. That’s important to me. Reading more when I do audiobooks. I put out onto Facebook not that long ago. Audible sent me all the books that I read. I’m air quoting read because I listened to them last year.
And I started a few that I didn’t finish. I finished most of them, but it was 44 books. I can’t remember ever. reading or trying to read 44 books in a year. I couldn’t read four books because I just never found the time for that or made the time for that, I should say. So what’s important to me now is I’d rather listen to the books, even though I love reading a regular book, I’d rather listen to them because I get to more of them.
I’m, I’m expanding myself more on those and they’re not all business books. Some of them are the languages is a thing traveling more with my wife. That’s a definition of success for me. I think COVID really gave me a wake up call. I think it did to a lot of people that when your income gets cut that much.
And you’re still surviving and you’re still putting food on the table and yet it’s a struggle and we made it through it, but yeah, you know what, I’m okay if I travel less and make less money because I’m okay with this, I’m still saving and we’re having the lifestyle that we want to have. My definition, not yours.
You have to pick your own. So who made your definition of success? Are you imparting somebody else’s? Are you, are you trying to co opt somebody else’s definition of success? And then when you get there, you just don’t feel satisfied. You don’t feel like you’ve, you’ve achieved what you thought it would feel like for that because it wasn’t really your definition in the first place.
So think about it. What, what is your success? Where did that definition come from? If you achieve that, when you achieve that. Will that be satisfying to you or will it be, there’s always a dissatisfaction because there’s always more? You know what? There’s always going to be more. Unless you’re Jeff Bezos or Warren Buffet or Bill Gates or Elon Musk, somebody’s always going to have more money than you.
So, you’re never going to have it all. And, can you have more? Yes. What will that mean to you? Will that be satisfying? Again, up to you to decide, not me. I just want you to sit back and think, what is my definition of success? Where did it come from? And when I achieve that, will I be fulfilled or will I be unfulfilled?
Because I’m just going to feel like I, I, there’s just more that I can accomplish. I think it’s okay to say I’ve accomplished this, feel that success, then set yourself another goal. That’s okay. But that’s different than feeling unfulfilled because it was just a hollow goal in the first place. I know this is kind of a little more esoterical, but thanks for listening.
Hope it gave you something to think about.
I’m Alan Berg. Thanks for listening. If you have any questions about this or if you’d like to suggest other topics for “The Wedding Business Solutions Podcast” please let me know. My email is [email protected]. Look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Thanks.
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