How to be an overnight success

Success means different things to different people – obviously!

Success also tends to be a moving target. For example, what success might represent at any given time in our lives is often determined by what we have already achieved, OR….. what we haven’t achieved in those areas of our lives where we have important needs.

The type of success that people aspire to can be related to literally about any part of life, such as:

• In job or career
• Money and lifestyle aspirations
• Health
• Family
• Relationships
• Sport or athletic success
• Graduating from college or university

The emergence of the desire to succeed

Everybody aspires to experience success in their life in some form or another – it’s fundamental to human behaviour.

The way that I personally have experienced the desire to succeed usually starts with a feeling, something like “Ooooh yeah – I’d really like to have that….or do that, or be that”.

This is accompanied by lots of initial excitement and energy and getting started on working towards the goal. Time passes, the work doesn’t get any easier, impatience sets in…….give up.

I know that I’m not alone in doing this. What I’m curious about however is why people quit.

Society rewards winners

I think that part of the problem is we live in an age where we expect instant gratification of our needs – basically, I want it…..and I want it now!

Then there is the way we are conditioned from an early age by the ‘rewards’ that society gives to people who are successful.

I was prompted to think about this whole “success” thing because of a podcast I was listening to today.

It was put together by one of my mentors, Ilan Ferdman of SatoriPrime. Ilan points out that everyone loves/admires a winner. The accolades go to the winner for the fact of winning, or being successful…...but not for the journey or process they undertook to get there.

The ever pervasive media reinforces this focus on winning, not the journey. People who are in the process of learning, doing the training, slogging it out day in day out aren’t the ones who get interviewed on prime time TV.

When we see someone who is successful we usually have no knowledge of what they had to do to get there.

Given these types of societal conditioning and recognition of the achievement of the goal rather than the effort required to achieve it, means I think, taking a close look at the mindset we need to maintain if we aspire to be successful.

Success is a journey

I know this, you know this – we’ve all heard it before, and deep down we all know the truth of this statement.

The video below which is entitled “Overnight Success” is the story of entrepreneur Gary Vaynerchuk who tells about what it took him to succeed. He is described by Wikipedia as being “an entrepreneur, investor, author, public speaker, and internet personality”.

Gary builds businesses. After leaving college he took charge of his family’s wine business and grew it from a $3M to a $60M business in just five years. Now he runs VaynerMedia, one of the world’s hottest digital agencies.

I urge you to take a look at this guy. He tells it exactly like it is, he doesn’t pull his punches, and you’ll find out exactly how his ‘overnight success’ actually came about.

I found his story to be quite inspirational and highly motivational. I’m sure you will too if you are on a pathway to achieve something important in your life.

I fully intend to watch this many times in the future – simply to remind me of what it actually takes to succeed at anything that is worthwhile in life. And…..to give me that push I sometimes need to come back again tomorrow, to keep going with my own pathway to overnight success!

My reflections and learnings about success

First of all, the title of this post is certainly misleading.

There are no secrets to becoming an overnight success. No successful person ever achieved a major goal without putting in both time and effort.

One helpful definition of success I came across in Earl Nightingale’s book “The Strangest Secret” is:

Success is the progressive realisation of a worthy ideal!

Yet, social conditioning helps to create a mindset that all it takes to be successful is that you simply decide the type of success you want, and it will magically happen.

But because success is a journey, involving the continual investment of time and action, you must have a way to manage your attitude, your mindset. Sheer willpower, or hard work alone won’t get you there.

This means:

• Daily focus on your goals, and visualisation of success
• Daily investment in learning and self growth – reading, audio, podcasts, video etc
• Maintaining close association with like minded people
• Working with a mentor

Some things to think about

Do you know what you want?

Why is it important to you?

What are the rewards you are expecting from your success?

What price are you prepared to pay to achieve success in terms of time, effort, money, other….