Success Is Not a Destination

Thoughts and Advice for My Younger Self

“Success is a journey not a destination. The doing is usually more important than the outcome. Not everyone can be Number 1.”― Arthur Ashe

At the beginning of this year, I decided to pursue a full-time copywriting position and I have gone through several rounds of interviews so far in 2020 as I search for full-time employment. It seemed a little bleak at first—making a career shift and searching for a job on the brink of a pandemic. But I trekked along as I am wont to do.

I have dabbled and experimented with a few different professions since leaving school—first when completing my undergraduate degree and then later when I finished graduate school. I have been a server, an administrative assistant, a teacher, a tutor, the front desk person at a gym, a baker, and now a freelance writer, editor, and copywriter.

Thankfully, throughout my job search thus far I have gotten to the second and third rounds of interviews a few times. In one such interview I was asked my favorite interview question I’ve ever been asked:

“What do you consider success?”

This question completely took me by surprise, partly because the job I applied for was a contract position (that I ended up getting—yay) and it wasn’t a guarantee that I would be around for the long haul, so why did he care?

I also was not expecting such a deep question from my interviewer. He struck me as more of a numbers guy, so it was refreshing that he strayed from the typical “what are your best strengths” form of questioning I’d gotten used to since January--and actually since I started applying for jobs since I was 16.

I honestly don’t remember the exact answer I gave him at the time since it’s been a few months now. I remember telling him what a great question it was and obviously my answer was sufficient enough since I was able to secure the position.

But the question has stuck with me over the past several weeks and from it, many other questions have sprung. How do others define success? How do I define success for myself? What does it mean to be successful—now in 2020 when it feels like priorities are shifting—and more generally?

I’m going to nerd out for a moment here and admit something. I look up words on a weekly (if not daily basis). I do this because I think it’s important that we use the words we mean to use. Sounds pretty logical, right? But often words are misused, overused, or misinterpreted—so I do my best to be precise.

And along this line of thinking, I looked up the word “successful” in the dictionary and there are two definitions.

successful (adjective)

1. accomplishing an aim or purpose.

2. having achieved popularity, profit, or distinction.

And after mulling these definitions over it seems to me that we have been taught, intentionally or otherwise, to focus on the second definition more than the first. Popularity, profit, and distinction supposedly outweigh aim or purpose.

When I was younger I had a lot of ideas about where I’d be when I reached my early 30s. And after working with teens at a very competitive charter school, when I would ask them about the future and what they hoped for, they had very specific ideas of how they saw their lives unfolding. The younger students were obsessed with being things like famous athletes or YouTube stars. The older ones were more focused on careers like becoming a doctor or lawyer.

To them, and in part to younger me, success was hitting milestones within a certain, socially-expected time frame or achieving some sort of celebrity status. A part of me admired their plans, hopes, and goals and their stubborn assuredness about the specifics of how they saw their plans unfolding. In fact, it made me feel a little nostalgic because I was just like them once.

But as I've grown and watched the world shift, specifically this year, my attitude has shifted as well.

To be perfectly honest, I’ve felt pressure placed on me by society or other people’s expectations at various times in my life. I am the remaining single daughter out of three daughters and several people said “you’re next” to me at both weddings even though I have an older, and also single, brother. Obviously I’m the next daughter to get married because I’m the only one left.

This is just one of many examples, and it tends to be the one that annoys me the most.

But lately, I have realized that none of those expectations have compared to the pressure I put on myself.

And freeing myself from the pressure (perceived, real, or imagined) has been a challenge and something I still grapple with from day to day, month to month, year to year. In fact, right at the beginning of my job search, I was struggling a lot with direction and a sense of purpose.

I'm not the first to say this, and I certainly won't be the last, but we now live in a world dominated by social media where we compare other people's highlights reels to our behind-the-scenes. And there is so much more that goes on behind closed doors that we have to remember to keep in mind.

So, here are some things I wish younger me knew, or maybe they are just things I wish she considered before she judged herself too harshly.

For a lot of people, success boils down to what they have been able to buy or what job they have. And these things are wonderful but limiting. Success is more than money and milestones.

Further, we are more than the work we do, which has been more and more apparent since the workforce is drastically shifting during these times of COVID-19.

Let go of other people’s timelines for you. Figure out what makes you happy outside of anyone else’s opinions or expectations. Trying to please everyone all the time is exhausting and impossible anyway. Success is learning whose opinions you value and ignoring all others.

“I can't give you a sure-fire formula for success, but I can give you a formula for failure: try to please everybody all the time.”― Herbert Bayard Swope

Deciding what you want to do and doing it despite the challenges you may face is its own form of success also (thank you to my dad for this one). Once I decided to pursue writing instead of a baking company it didn't feel like I achieved anything--it felt more like I failed. But success is continuing to try when you’ve failed in the past. Success is tenacity.

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”― Winston S. Churchill

Doing what I love is my version of success. For me, I've come to realize that involves writing in some capacity or another. Now, figuring that out might look like a string of consistent failures to younger me, but trying and failing and then failing better is how you achieve goals. (Thanks, Beckett.)

I’m successful because even when I fail I try again. Even when the path gets rocky or difficult, I keep going. And what's more, at least I tried in the first place. There are worse things than failure--among them is a life full of regret, missed opportunities, and phrases that begin "I should have..."

“Success means having the courage, the determination, and the will to become the person you believe you were meant to be.”― George Sheehan

Another thing I have come to prioritize along the way is how I add value to a situation—professional or otherwise. I never pursued a career thinking to myself, "I'm going to be so famous and make so much money ". I was an English major. I just wanted someone to pay me some money to do something relatively wordy.

“Try not to become a man of success. Rather become a man of value.”― Albert Einstein

Listen, I'm no expert. I'm still learning. But if I have any advice for the younger generation-- particularly based on how almost every industry has been affected this year--be more concerned with how you add value to a given situation and hopefully success will follow. As the tides shift and the water rises, we will rise or sink together.

This year has been particularly strange, unsettling, chaotic, and a million other adjectives, but I’m hoping it can also be transformative. For me and everyone else.

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