Yahoo Finance How do you define genuine success? Here’s what some of the world’s greatest minds said
How do you define genuine success? Naturally, the answer will vary depending on who you ask.
But if you put the same question to some of the world’s brightest, sharpest minds: what would they say?
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In his new book Authentic Power and Greatness, J Rodarick Corporation CEO and chairman Joseph Rodarick Law interviewed some of the leading experts in their field to find out what success looked like in their eyes.
How would you define genuine success?
Love what you do, and serve others at the same time
Jack Canfield, best-selling author of Chicken Soup for the Soul
I think genuine success comes from discovering what you love to do and finding a way to do it so that it serves yourself and others at the same time. Every one of us was born with a set of unique talents and abilities.
We have inborn preferences and natural styles that we need to honour. Some of us are natural leaders; others are happier in support roles. Some are natural salespeople; others are born to be creative in the arts. The trick is to pursue your greatest interests. When you discover your true purpose and develop a vehicle through which you can express it, you will experience a great sense of success. And if you can find a way to make money doing it at the same time, then all the better.
For me, success is having the ability to create the conditions that allow me to do all of the things I love in every area of my life.
I have created a staff, colleagues, offices, the infrastructure, the financial resources, and the time I need to pursue my professional interests and make a huge difference in the world. I have created the family structure and the friends I need to enjoy loving and fulfilling relationships. I have created the time and the resources I need to keep my body nourished, healthy, and fit. I have created the resources I need to surround myself with beautiful art, furniture, and music. I have created the resources and contacts I need to travel comfortably to any place in the world that I want to visit. I have the time and the money to pursue any educational and personal development experience that I want to explore.
Whatever it is, don’t compare yourself
Dr John Demartini, author of Count Your Blessings: The Healing Power of Gratitude and Love
Genuine success, or what I prefer to term fulfilment, is the result of setting goals and objectives that are truly congruent with your true highest values and living in a state of appreciation for what life offers along the journey.
Whether you are barefoot and living on a beach or surrounded with all the extras that often, accompany wealth, you are truly successful when you know your life is in line with your vision of what “success” means to you.
Comparing yourself to others who you imagine to be, do or have more than you will probably distract yourself from your own achievement of success.
Fulfil your desires
Fred Alan Wolf, quantum physicist
Learning to fulfil your desires is the real secret. Having the patience to learn the skills necessary to fulfil those desires establishes you firmly on the road to happiness. I am personally happiest when I am learning things, especially if they are not easy things to master.
While engaged in the process of discovery I am truly happy. If you have learned something so well that things no longer capture your interest, you can easily become unhappy. If you feel you have nothing more to learn in your life, and you are unhappy as a result of this, then the key is to learn how to use your talents to assist others in learning your skill.
Keep your eyes on the prize
Bill Bartmann, billionaire business coach
One of the simplest, and yet most important, secrets of achieving an objective is to keep it in sight. We have all heard the expression “keep your eye on the prize” or “stay focused”. Of all the secret of success, this one is the most overlooked, most underappreciated, and most misunderstood. By staying focused through reinforcing our desire to achieve, accomplish or obtain this prize that has become the object of our promise, we enlist our mind to help us become the object of our promise.
The mind is a marvellous and powerful device. We have discovered that the human brain has over a hundred billion nerve cells. e total number of synapses in the cortex of one person is 10th to 15th power (10,000,000,000,000,000), or about 200,000 times the population of us humans on earth.
Although we don’t fully understand how it does what it does, we do know that the human mind is more complicated than any supercomputer ever devised and is faster and more efficient than any as well.
Work towards your goals – but they have to be holistic
Siimon Reynolds, high achievement expert
Success is all about progressing toward worthwhile goals. But those goals need to be holistic in nature. If you are making progress toward your selected physical, mental, spiritual, career, and relationship goals, then you will be uncommonly successful. If you only excel in one of those arenas, however, then genuine success and certainly authentic happiness will elude you.
Too often our society worships someone who is excellent in only one area yet may be performing terribly in all the others. at may be focus, but it isn’t genuine success.
Of course, holistic success takes very careful time management and organisational skills, just to get everything done. Few people treat these skills seriously, and they soon find they don’t have nearly enough time to make substantial progress on all of their goals. The cold, hard truth is there are always two aspects to achieving anything: The goal itself and organising yourself so that you can be highly productive in achieving it.
Fortunately, time management is a science, with many effective techniques developed over centuries. It’s a science well worth mastering if you aim to be truly and holistically successful.
Feel good in your own skin, and be at peace
Sonia Choquette, professional life coach
Genuine success is the ability to feel good in your own skin. It is the ability to live creatively, make choices that reflect love and authentic intention, be open and generous with everyone you encounter, and go to sleep at night with peace in your heart and loved ones in your life.
‘Success is only genuine if it is good for you and others’
Mingyur Rinpoche, Tibetan Buddhist meditation master
It’s important to understand the meaning of success. Some people think that dating, having money, fame, or a little peace is being successful. However, I think success is only genuine if it is good for you and others. Everyone should be able to experience peace.
How can that come about? We need to ripen the qualities of mind and heart through the development of wisdom, loving kindness, and compassion. Of course, this could be difficult, but we all have great potential abiding naturally within us. Although not everyone recognises it, we have wisdom, loving kindness, and compassion within us. Once you realise these inner qualities, our relationships, family, health, and work will benefit.
If you are simply motivated by material gain, in the short term you could be successful, but your emotions will fluctuate with changing external conditions. You might have plenty of money and things, but you’ll always feel busy and restless.
A very rich and famous person once came to me for meditation advice because he wasn’t content. He said that money had given him a better life, but not a happier life. If you don’t find real happiness, you won’t have real success.
The meaning of success is to achieve happiness, to achieve inner joy. If your success brings you more suffering, then it’s not real success. If you have a lot of stuff, will it necessarily make you content?
These extracts have been republished with permission from Joseph Rodarick Law’s new book Authentic Power and Greatness.
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