Three Tips for Being Successful

I’ve been thinking a lot about success lately. By most people’s definition, I would be considered a failure. I didn’t finish college, I’m not working a traditional 9-5, I’ve never run a business that actually made any money, I’m not a part of any thriving friend groups (or friend groups at all for that matter.) I have a bad haircut, am out of shape, and am exhausted most of the time. I don’t consider myself a failure, though. I consider myself very successful. My thought process on success has drastically changed over the past year. How could it not?

Every “guru” or influencer says that you can turn around your life with just a simple change in mindset from “I can’t” to “I can.” Most times, this refers to how much you can make for your suffering bank account, but an increase in the number you see in your accounts doesn’t mean that you are suddenly successful. Sure, it can be a byproduct of success, but in my experience, it doesn’t make me feel better about myself or make me more intrinsically valuable.

So how do you define success, then? Capitalism has so skewed our dreams and goals to make us think that, in order to be successful, we must attain and retain wealth… at any cost. Anything else makes us the American nightmare. Americans are going into thousands of dollars worth of debt to try and make other people think that they have it all together, that they can afford the newest and the best, that they belong. The worst part is that the other people don’t even care. We are psychologically murdering ourselves to try and impress “them” and it will never be enough. Individuals who work minimum wage jobs to try and survive are looked upon with disdain. I’m sure we’ve all heard the phrase, “You better go to college so you can get a good job so you don’t have to flip burgers for the rest of your life.” What’s wrong with flipping burgers, Steve? Someone has to feed your ever-clogging arteries.

Most adults today would look at someone who works at a fast food joint and think little of them. If anything, they would likely think that the minimum-wage-overworked employee isn’t succeeding. After all, we can’t have our burritos going up in price a few dollars, so we had better keep the minimum wage low so that those same employees need at least three full time jobs to be able to afford rent, food for their children, and daycare expenses. “But they could just get a better job.” Sure. They could compete against silver spoon-fed Ivy League tennis players who will get the job instead simply because their parents were able to pay for their bachelor’s degrees.

But I digress.

Success is not defined by your net worth, social standing, or how many people pity-laugh at your sexist, racist, homophobic, and transphobic jokes at work. It is not measured by the zip code you live in, your aesthetic, or if your body can or cannot produce offspring. Success does not equate to having an “attractive” partner, staying at a certain BMI, or driving a car sans dents and rust. If there’s anything I know for sure, success is certainly not staying in a job that slowly sucks the life out of you to be able to afford payments for all the above mentioned characteristics.

To me, success is relaxing every muscle in my body and finding the areas where I’m holding stress so I can relieve it. Success is getting up off the couch to make a nourishing and life-giving meal for my partner and I and being able to clean up afterwards. Success is snuggling with my dog and petting just the right spot to make her happy. Success is finishing a book that I’ve been wanting to read for forever. Success is folding the laundry. Success is leaning my head out the car window in another state and breathing in the new air after road-tripping there. Success is seeing a change I’ve believed in and advocated for, come to pass. Success is when I can make my partner genuinely laugh and forget the world for a moment. Success is spending quality time with my loved ones.

To me, success cannot be defined by anyone but myself.

So here’s my three tips to being successful:

1. Don’t listen to anyone who says they can sell you the “secret” to success. It’s snake oil, and they themselves wouldn’t achieve the capitalist idea of success unless they scammed people out of their money. They don’t care about you, and they never will.

2. What makes you happy? What fulfills you? What makes you proud? Do that.

3. Unlearn the idea that you must make X amount of figures to be happy. I guarantee that you won’t be happy once you get to that goal amount because money will never be enough to make any person on this planet happy. Do the best you can financially and don’t sacrifice your mental health to please other people who don’t care.