Avenue to Success

We all are enamored by success and all that it signifies. Even as small kids, we have been trained unknowingly by our elders to value success. So, we look up to people who are successful. Accordingly, we get inspired by successful people. Often we try to emulate them. Quite soon, we realize that being successful ensures material comforts in life. There are no frustrations, no depressions, and no disappointments. All our wishes are fulfilled easily. Moreover, a successful person enjoys social recognition too. Being an achiever, a successful person stands out in a crowd.

Inevitably, we all wish ourselves to be successful. However, not many people become successful in life.

Suppose I ask you to close your eyes and focus on the people you personally know and interact with; they could be your immediate and extended family, your friends, your colleagues, and your close acquaintances. By your own standards, how many of these people, would you classify as successful?

I did it myself and also asked a few serious people to do the same exercise for me. We defined success in material terms, as attaining certain level of financial stability plus some recognition. This was defined within the context of the known circle, by the person doing the exercise. To our surprise, the count of successful people was not even 5 out of an average of 50 to 80 people considered.

The results set me thinking. Why do so few people succeed and why do so many fail? It is so distressing to see the majority of people around us barely scrape through the drudgery of life. When everyone wants success, why does not everyone succeed? Or better still, why do only a few successful ones succeed?

Those who had helped me with the data, as mentioned above, sat down with me to brainstorm the issue. We discussed the findings and exchanged our thoughts. Soon, it became clear that although everyone desires to be successful, only a few people take the road to success. For many people, the road to success is unknown territory; but strangely, even those who know about it fail to succeed in life.

For people who are unfamiliar, the road to success connects a person’s dreams to his/her achievements. Converting desires into achievements is a two-step process.

• Ø Frame goals according to your desires
• Ø Work hard relentlessly till the time you achieve the goals

Success then is repeating the process at every stage of life, with different goals at each stage.

We need to define our goals in the context of success which is stage-specific or is related to the desire we wish to achieve.

For an average student the goal would be clear an exam, while for a student aiming at admission in a particular college the goal would be to obtain a near 100% score.

Similarly, from the career point of view, the goals for getting a dream job would not be the same for setting up one’s own business.

The definition of success changes at every stage of life with every new dream. It is important to formulate clear goals as the first step toward success. If your desire is to succeed as a student your goal would be to score above ninety-nine percent. To achieve that you would be required to have a thorough knowledge of your subject. The required tasks would then be to study meaningfully for a fixed time-period with specified portions covered daily.

The next important step in becoming successful is to work to achieve your goals. Are you able to sit down with your books for long hours and study? Are you actually getting hold on your subject? To succeed, you need to be brutally honest and work really hard till you gain thorough knowledge.

Even then, actually writing the exam successfully remains. You need to ensure that on the day of the exam you are physically and mentally fit and reach the exam center in time and write the exam satisfactorily.

Those who are able to identify their goals and work hard to achieve them are the ones who become successful.

We closely analysed the lives of the people we had studied above. It became very clear that success came to those who had a strong will to succeed and continued to work through thick and thin. They did not give up in adverse situations or temporary failures. Conversely, the people who failed were the ones who lost focus easily and gave in to situational setbacks.

This is the single most significant factor, which is the turning point in the journey that leads to either actually living your dreams or failing and becoming bitter. We do not realize, but attaining success all about conquering external setbacks with the determined will to work for your goals. This is what success coaches keep telling us. This is what the lives of successful people corroborate time and again.

Now, the road for success is in front of you to traverse and embrace success waiting for you at the other end.

Bon Voyage!