Improving Our Lives By Practicing Success

By Yosef Solomon on Apr 20, 2010

Does being average have any real benefit? Going to school, earning your degree, getting a job, having a family, retiring at 65 and dying a few years later. Is that the course of life that many of us want to take? I don’t mean to sound pessimistic, but this is how the majority of us live our lives. We work hard for the majority of our time here on earth to enjoy the fruits of our labor, but how can we enjoy something we don’t have time for. Chris Rock put it nicely when he criticized our countries taxable wages “You get your check, money gone. That ain’t a payment, that’s a jack. Got all these taxes City Tax, State Tax, Social Security tax… You don’t get the money until you’re 65, meanwhile, the average black man dies at 54.” Blunt? Yes. True? Very.

Lately I’ve been looking at alternatives to living the “normal” lifestyle. What I’ve found is that by striving for “average placement” in a society, that rewards remarkable individuals is a lost cause. A couple weeks ago I blogged about “How Being Different Pays…Literally..” In the post, I discussed that in order to be successful, we most go against the grain and establish our own lane. We must embrace new opportunities, and allow ourselves the potential for optimal growth in any field we choose. In essence, I was basically saying that we should not let our current situation influence our idea of success in the future. Being promoted may be a step up from our current situation, but that shouldn’t be the only step deemed successful

We must break away from what society defines as success. Since each one of us measures it differently, it would only be appropriate it that we figure out what success means to us individually. Once we are able to establish our goal of success, we can start prioritizing our lives and optimizing the best way to reach that point. It takes time, planning and discipline, but it is quite achievable. I honestly believe that through hard work, commitment, discipline, determination and persistence we can reach any goal we set out for.

In the mean time, I take this idea of success and I embrace it. I practice being successful everyday because it improves my confidence, decision making and overall creativity. Like everything else in life, the more we practice, the better we get.