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This week I stumbled across something once stated by Winston Churchill:

“Success is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm.”

Stumbling across these words was one of those perfectly timed discoveries. I was sitting in a moment of frustration…on the verge of adopting a temporary defeatist state of mind. Those words pulled me out of my defeatist attitude and encouraged me to think about how I was defining success.

We live in a world driven by success, a success that is often defined by societal standards:

1. Graduate from high school 
2. Attend college
3. Graduate from college and either: (a) work at respected fill-in-the-blank or (b) attend graduate school
4. Marry before your pool of eligibles is nonexistent
5. Have children
6. Maintain perfection while balancing work/marriage/children/life

What happens, though, if we deviate from these standards? What happens if we define our own success…one that includes the failures that we will inevitably encounter?

Surely, the standards of success are driven by ideals that we all uphold. It would be a fallacy to state that there is no truth to the standards that our society has created and upheld over a number of years. But…deviating from these standards or failing is not a declaration of defeat. Rather, it is a declaration of being human and of being an individual who has your own goals and perspective of success.

What are your thoughts about breaking out of the mold and defining your own success?

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