How to Be Happy and Successful
Guidance for and from the mildly incompetent on how to be happy and successful.
How to Be Happy and Successful
Ep. 3: What Is Success
Success of course means different things to different people, and it is very important that you take time thinking about what it means to you. I'll talk about success in two ways: 1) With the straightforward, practical meaning of setting goals and achieving them. 2) With the higher meaning of designing your life and working toward your potential.
Hi, my name is David Murphy. Welcome to how to Be Happy and Successful, the podcast you've been waiting for. Greetings, and welcome to the third episode of how to Be Happy and Successful, the episode titled what is Success. Now I'll tell you up front what you might already be able to sense that my voice is not quite what it should be because I'm recovering from a really lousy case of the flu. But, as we say in the business, the show must go on and, furthermore, I don't think it's my smooth voice that's bringing back my five friends to listen. So let's carry on Now.
Speaker 1:Unlike the what is Happiness podcast episode, I don't really have any big revelations about understanding success. It's not the same sort of bombshell where I say you have such a misunderstanding of success that you're likely sabotaging your efforts to be successful, which is what I say about happiness. So nothing as big as that, but a few thoughts I think are worth hearing about success before you jump into success work. And I do understand that some people will come to this site or this podcast and they're not going to care about the happiness stuff. Blah, blah, blah. You know happiness comes from people who care about happiness. I'm here to succeed at things, and so that's what they're working on, great. Let's talk a little bit about success and then we'll jump into that.
Speaker 1:Let's talk for a second about our images of success. Now, most of us have a bit of a vague idea of success. Or if you ask someone what does it mean to be successful, you will often get kind of vague answers you won't get. Well, success is earning $175,000 a year and having a commute car and having a sports car and having one week every year in Hawaii, et cetera, et cetera. And yet the images that come to our minds are often something like that. It often has to do with having wealth or, at least you know, good, solid, upper middle class financial success and a life that is considered kind of admirable by people around us, by our peers. We should never underestimate the impact that status has on our desires and our decisions, and here, when I say status, what I mean is the desire to be valued by the people around us, by the group that we're in, and this is a simple truth of being human. You don't have to feel bad about it. You are made to be a social creature. It is only natural that whatever view you have of success, it involves being successful socially as in being successful in front of your group. Now it's easy to say, well, that's not me, or else I'm not going to let that be me. I will not let what other people think of me affect my decisions. And okay, it is good not to make pleasing others the primary motivation of our life, for sure. But to say that you are not going to let this kind of influence ever influence you. It's a little bit like saying, well, I'm going to be the kind of person who never has to eat food, I'm going to be the kind of human being who does not have to use the bathroom. It's like I don't know good luck. I don't to be the kind of human being who does not have to use the bathroom, it's like I don't know good luck. I don't think it's possible for you to live your life and not have that somehow affect your motivation.
Speaker 1:Here at H&S we're going to talk about success in two versions, two ways One, simple and straightforward and that can do you your whole life. That's fine. And the other is sort of a larger perspective on it, which I already did mention in the very first podcast episode. That simple way to look at success is simply the ability to set and achieve goals, and that's it. You know, if you can set goals and you can do the work to go get them which generally means setting, you know, intermediate goals along the way, achieving them and finally achieving the bigger goals, you're going to be successful. And you can apply this simple view of success in one single aspect of your life. You know, maybe you are here to do that. Maybe you're here to say I want to improve my income, or I want to lose weight, or I want to earn a college degree, so some single aspect of your life and you say that's what I want to do, I want to set that goal, you're going to help me get there. Okay, great, and it is totally common. It's almost surprisingly common.
Speaker 1:How many people do apply the ideas of success you know, this idea of setting a goal and successfully achieving that goal to only one or two aspects of their lives? They're very good at something like their career, let's say, and yet they don't know how to apply the sort of the same ideas to other parts of their life. Now, just because something is straightforward does not make it easy it's not easy all the time to achieve any of these big goals that we have and certainly saying you know well, I'm good at my career. Therefore I should be able to apply the same strategies to having, let's say, good relationships. You know it's not as simple as that and yet, as an aside, having good relationships is in fact, not that complicated. It has to do with you treating people well and expecting people to treat you well in return, and maybe you're ready for that and maybe you're not, and maybe they are ready for that or maybe they are not. But all that is for another episode. For now, just stick with the point. Success in the straightforward meaning is setting goals and achieving those goals.
Speaker 1:The other larger sense of success is what I talked about in the very first podcast episode. Very first is way two episodes ago, that idea of happiness with your life. So the other kind of happiness, eudaimonic happiness, which has to do with the idea of achieving your potential, the idea of a sense of flourishing where you say what makes me live to my potential, what makes me live the best and happiest life I can live? This takes a lot of work and it takes a lot of of thought and you're not going to be able to figure it out today where you're like I never heard this idea before, but I'm going to sit down today and figure out how the next 60 years are going to go, where I'm going to live my life for its greatest flourishing. It's not that actually sitting down and trying to take on that projection is not worthwhile. Actually I think it would be worthwhile, but really it's a process that takes years. Actually sitting down and trying to take on that that projection is not worthwhile. Actually, I think it would be worthwhile, but really it's a process it takes years.
Speaker 1:You should use it to set big goals for yourself. It's always going to be about setting goals, but Because the path towards getting to that eudaimonic happiness will still be setting goals and achieving them. But now you're setting your goals in a way to think what is the best use of my life? So you set goals and achieve them and as time goes by, you start to evaluate okay, is this moving me in the direction I wanted it to? Or, now that I've moved this far, do I want to keep going this direction? Is that the best use of my time and my energy?
Speaker 1:You know, and it's a long process and, to be perfectly honest, I don't think there's ever a way to reach your actual potential. I cannot say what anyone's potential is. I assume it's just absolutely remarkable. Anyone's potential is I assume it's just absolutely remarkable. You take a single person what their full potential is? It may very well be that only one out of a million people reaches their full, full potential. You might say it might seem strange to say it, but eudaimonia is actually more about persistently seeking our potential than ever achieving, ever crossing some finish line. That is not the case with our goals. You know, if your goal is to, you know, get to medical school or to, you know, buy a house, you know it's not about forever seeking those things. You want to get those things. But when it comes to achieving your highest potential, it's about just always asking the question what can I do to live my life to the most? And then working towards that end, and that is how you can achieve eudaimonia.
Speaker 1:You also don't want to have in your head the idea that achieving your eudaimonia means that you have to strive for the pinnacle of success in whatever career you're in or whatever activities you take part in. In other words, you don't have to be someone who runs ultra marathons in order to achieve your highest potential. You don't have to be the CEO of a company. You don't have to be the most published writer or the most published scientist in your research lab. That is not required. It does not always require that you strive and strive and strive. That's not what achieving your highest potential means. Again, it has to do with you being inquisitive about what matters to you, being inquisitive and honest about what matters and about how those values, those priorities, change with time.
Speaker 1:Eudaimonia means going after things as they're important, and that can mean great. I've achieved this much in my career. I'm happy to be at that level, and I want to expand my abilities more in this other field of my life, with my family, or with running ultramarathons, or with learning how to cook. Whatever it is. There are many ways to achieve your potential and does not mean, you know, hitting peak after peak after peak in life. That is not the idea, unless that is the idea for you.
Speaker 1:Now I'm going to reiterate a point that I made in the first episode, both so I can drill it into your head more if you've heard it already, or for those of you who just jumped to the success part of the podcast and said I don't care about the other stuff, I care about success. You jumped right to this episode. This is the most important point to learn when it comes to success, which is that we don't hold back on our happiness or our sense of personal value until we've achieved things, until we've achieved success, until we've achieved those goals that we're setting for ourselves. The achievement of goals does decide whether or not we are successful in life. It does not decide whether or not we are valuable people or whether or not we should be happy, and this idea, I know, is very strange to some of you.
Speaker 1:I talk about the reasoning behind it somewhat in that first podcast episode. I don't want to go into that now. Just take it as a given. You've got to take this on and just tell it to yourself as many times as you have to to start to make it true for yourself you have value right now. I mean this isn't a mantra, right, you have value now and you could be happy now.
Speaker 1:Again, we are taught in general the opposite that, oh, I will get to be happy when I have this and this and this, and when I have done this and this and this. That's when I'll be a worthwhile person who can be happy with himself or herself or themselves. Forget that. You've got to let that go, as hard as it is to let it go and I'm not saying you can let it go all in a moment right now, but you've got to do that work. I completely encourage you to go after goals, right, that's what I'm talking about here, but I'm not saying it's because that's how you're going to achieve your happiness in life. That's how you're going to become a worthwhile person. That's not the case at all.
Speaker 1:Now, I'm not forbidding you ever praising yourself for getting to a goal. That's terrific too. Praise yourself, give yourself a pat on the back or a high five. And there are some goals that are clearly meaningful to the world. The number one goal on my list of life goals is give $10 million to charity. That's a big goal and it should help a lot of people if I ever get there. But while I can tell myself that that goal has value for the world, I'm not telling myself that I will finally have value for the world once I've achieved that goal.
Speaker 1:I just grant myself value starting now and, as I talked about in the last episode, free yourself also of the idea that you need negative motivation in order to go after your goals, in order to want to achieve anything, that, if you're not unhappy, if you don't have poor self-esteem before you've achieved things and therefore you won't go after and try to achieve things? That is not the case. People who believe in themselves and like themselves and are happy in their days and like their lives still go after goals. In fact, they're generally better at it. Some people aren't very good at letting anger and, you know, maybe envy or just a feeling of inadequacy drive them, but most people actually aren't very good at using those negative motivations as persistent motivators. So just let go of the idea that being kind to yourself is for quitters.
Speaker 1:All right, we're actually getting ready to wrap up this episode. It's a short one. Maybe. I just want to give you a break, because the next couple, on gratitude and setting goals, will definitely not be short. So let's just quickly review that mantra before we get out of here.
Speaker 1:So remember the mantra from the first episode you matter, this work matters and you can do this work. You matter. We talked about this a couple minutes ago. Accept it as a given. You matter, you have value. Two this work matters your ability to set the goals you want and achieve those goals. That matters in this world. And three you could do it. You could do the work, however many times you have failed to achieve your goals. You can set goals and achieve them as you move forward, because it's all about behaviors and we can adjust our behaviors. We can with work.
Speaker 1:All right, the next episode is the first real episode from the happiness side, the first real piece of advice on the happiness side of the site, and it's about gratitude, which I consider to be an excellent foundation for anyone's happiness. So I hope you make it for that. One Bye. Now here comes the outro. So hope you make it for that. One bye. Now here comes the outro.
Speaker 1:All right, this has been the how to be happy successful podcast. Thanks for listening. Hope you enjoyed it and found it useful, or just one of those things. I would just take one. That'd be great.
Speaker 1:As I said, we don't need to be perfect all the time. We'll just do our best. Hey, if you're already a subscriber, thank you, I really appreciate it. If you're not, if you're interested in becoming one, go to the website. You can sign up there. If you have any questions or comments or complaints, go to the website and send me an email. I will do my best to respond, though frankly, I barely have time to put this thing together, so I won't promise, but I will try. I feel like I'm kind of dragging out this outro, but here's the truth. I think this music, which I got free on a site called Pixabay and it's by an artist or music creator named Iko Licks Iko Licks, I'm not sure how to say it, it's I-K-O-L-I-K-S. Anyways, part of me thinks this music might be the best part of the whole podcast, so I'm kind of dragging it out a little bit so I can play the music longer. It's upbeat, it makes me feel good. Okay, bye now. I'll see you next time.