I work across two industries in which success is marketed as the most important part of what we do. With blogging, discussions around numbers of visitors and unique views become the focus of most get togethers. In building, discussions around subcontractors and the value of contracts are how your success is measured. But why?
Why do we allow others to define our success, why are numbers and values used to define us?
On my recent trip to the ProBlogger conference I watched and learned from some of the worlds top bloggers. I listened to what they had to say, I was in awe of the amount of social media followers they had, by their lengthy email subscriber lists, by their huge amount of unique views per month. I left the conference feeling quite defeated, really low. I felt as though after putting so many hours into what I do each week, I was still on treading water.
By comparison I have a very low amount of followers in every aspect of my blog. I haven’t cracked my first 1000 Facebook fans, still only with 2200 Instagram and I have quite a low readership. But I am OK with that.
I chose a long time ago to define my own success. I blog for a very different reason to most people. I rarely accept sponsored posts as I do not need to make money from my blog. My interest comes in the form of reaching the right reader for me. I want to educate and inspire. My aim has always been to use my blog to build a digital profile for myself, The Builder and our company. My aim was to define to our clientele the exact kind of work we are looking for, and in these endeavours, I am successful, in fact very successful. But if I let the general blogging world define me with their big numbers and followers, I would be a very small fish indeed.
Defining success is a little like the comparison game,when we look to others for inspiration, we will nearly always fall short within ourselves.
I strongly encourage you to take you power back, and define your own success. For some of us, a successful day may mean making it through to dinner time, for others it may be managing a multi-million dollar business, but when defined correctly both are as successful for the people involved. This theory is not to be used as a cop out, quite the opposite. It is meant to empower us to find out own success in the every day, to take a little time out to understand exactly what your aims are. Define them, then work hard at whatever it is to reach them.
We are all capable for such great things, and for each of us that greatness looks very different, and that’s ok!
Tell me all about your version of success? What does it look like for you? Do you feel you live in the shadows of others?
Nicole xxx
