Success is a very difficult thing to discuss or debate, because everyone sees it differently. It is very subjective: everyone colours it with a different brush.

How you define success and how others see it might be wildly different: yet we all use the same word for different things, at different times, and for different levels. Then there are all the different areas in which success can be gained or not: work, school, sport, relationships, money, careers... the usual list, seen from a usual perspective. Your perspective.

So you have to look at success and whether you can get it not as an overall blanket that covers everything you do in life. That would be silly and somewhat childish. You need to divide the elements of your life into their own sections, and determine the level of success in each.

You need to be clear and fair with your expectations of achievement, and either write them down or fix them clearly in your mind. For example: I want to save $35 dollars this fortnight, rather than I really should save more money.

You have a clear expectation, and success can be defined. Ambiguity only leads to confusion and disappointment. (And a perceived lack of success.)

Every day we do things to fit into the 16 or so hours we are awake. Then some of us look back and try to decide whether the day was successful. But because the day is filled with stuff that runs from the simple and inane - like tying your shoelaces - to the complicated and risky - like changing the hay in a leopard's pen - lumping it all into a 'day' doesn't work.

An example came today when I met a friend and her little daughter. 'I've had a shocking morning,' she said. 'But Mom, you found my lost necklace!' pipped her girl. For Moira, the day was shot because of a comment her partner made, but looking at her daughter's face showed her that there was a bit of success there too.

Dividing it up into sections is good. And it's also good to remember who you are, and at what stage of life you have arrived. Tying shoelaces for a little tyke can be a major success!

Here's how to look at the sections of your life and decide whether you are successful at them.

Let's divide your life into sections. Let's imagine your whole life can be placed on a grid of nine sections. Each section belongs to an area: Home, work, appearance, money, holidays, socialising, relationship, house and friends.But they don't HAVE to be those: make your own sections.

You can also section each part into nine again: partner, children, colleagues, teachers, in-laws, parents, neighbours, sports team and manager, if you are looking only at the relationships in your life. Or housekeeping, groceries, mortgage, car loan, school bills, transport, taxes, holidays and services if you are looking at the money section.

You can't really give up and define your success with money as hopeless if you are good at paying bills but not so hot with saving for holidays. You have a bit of success in that area of nine sections, don't you?

Put the area that concerns you most at the moment in the middle.If you are seventeen and having your first crush, love will be in the middle. If you are a new grandmother dying to babysit, you could put relationships in the middle. If you are worried about your mortgage, put money in the middle. If you can't get your head around whether to change jobs, put work in the middle.

Success is an abstract concept, like love or determination or fear or happiness: you can't bottle it, you can't throw it out with the garbage, you can't give it to your brother if you don't like it, and you can't lend it to anyone. It's not concrete, it's not material. But its effects can be very concrete and material. And it can hurt, or it can make you over-confident, which is tricky.That is why you are being unfair to yourself if you lump all aspects of success into one, without dividing it into sections.

Now, you must remember that it is virtually impossible for all the areas in your life to be failing at the same time. Just like Moira and her daughter, there is going to be one section AT LEAST that is going well for you. So even if your bills can't be paid, you are not doing too well at work and you can't imagine when you will next have a holiday, there is probably someone who loves you deeply, or your pesky neighbours have just moved away.

All sections can't be successful at once, either. Mind you, inside each section, you might find one of those nine compartments ticking away quite nicely. So even if you aren't doing well at work, installation of their new air conditioning is a plus.

If you haven't figured out your taxes yet, that's not very successful in the money department... but you might just have got a nice suprise with a lower electricity bill.

So measure your success in nines, and sub-sets of nine. Out of the 81 possible sections, you are bound to find more than 27 going well at any given time.

When you have clearly defined your expectations, divided things up into their rightful sections, and examined each one separately, you are bound to have quite a few ticks in any given element, day, week, year or endeavour.

Tick the sections when they go right.

Count the ticks, and pat yourself on the back.