How to be Successful

It seems that most of us, have this idealized version of ourselves. Sometimes we actively try to work on parts of ourselves that seem like we can shift to make 'better' in some way. And sometimes we succeed! However, sometimes, we hold this image of what success means for us in our minds eye. Every day we are trying to live up to this image, and every day we may find ourselves falling short. We judge ourselves for not being who we absolutely expect ourselves to be. When this happens over and over again, we feel like we are running into a wall. And it's hard to even want to try.

The good news is, it's possible that you are the only one who expects that idealized version of yourself. It's possible that others expect exactly who you are at every moment, because either they know you--or they don't and they really wouldn't know what else to expect. So actually, we can cut ourselves a little bit of slack. Our success doesn't rely on us becoming that idealized vision of ourselves. Our success relies on just being true to ourselves, in each moment. Our success relies on showing up, just being present in our lives. The moment that we stop showing up, that's when we have not succeeded. When we continually think of what 'good' work is or 'accomplishment', it's easy to be hard on ourselves, especially on tasks that we have never done before to expect the 'best'. The truth is, we can't expect perfection, but we can embrace doing the next best thing in every moment, whatever that may be, and 90% of the time, it's just showing up.