How Do You Measure Success?

When I was young, I thought being successful meant making lots of money or being famous – or both. I always looked to people who I thought were successful. Many of my childhood friends lived in fancy houses, had cool designer clothes, and plenty of spending money.

I remember in high school, I never had any money for going out to lunch. Of course, I could have brown bagged it, but how un-cool is that! Especially when all your friends are going off campus for fast food. At first, my friends would lend me a few bucks that I struggled to pay back. Finally, sensing my lack of funds, they just started buying my lunch. Hey, they were my friends and they loved me! But I always wished I could buy them lunch, and vowed that someday, I would be successful (rich) and would be the one buying lunch.

So, I’m not rich and probably never will be. Nor am I famous. I CAN buy lunch for a friend though, and that gives me some sense of satisfaction – but my whole idea on being successful has changed.

Success (to me anyway) isn’t about money or fame. It is about doing something you love, and doing it well. I like to think I’m a pretty good photographer and I love making people happy. I design web sites too, and it satisfies some techno-geek thing in me as well as helping out small business owners. So by my definition of success, I guess I’m pretty successful. But that’s not all!

I also love being a wife and mother, and despite a few mistakes along the way, I think I do a fairly good job too. I get no complaints from Mark on the wife part, but I have always wondered about how I was doing being a mom. It’s hard to tell. How do you know? When do you know? What criteria do you use to judge?

Leave a comment, and let me know your thoughts on success.

And, because any post is better with a picture, here is Miss Jane camping out on the clean laundry. She’s not too successful at choosing a sleeping spot, but she is quite successful at being a great wiener dog!