The not-so-secret to what you may label a successful life is little more than persistence. You’ve heard that you only fail when you give up. It’s true. You don’t succeed at anything that you give up on. Which means that, as long as you’ve breath in you, all of those lifelong dreams can be better seen, not as unsuccessful, but just as not yet complete.

Persistence. Perseverance. Stamina. Tenacity. Pluck. Balls. It’s about a willingness and determination and ability to see it through, no matter what. That’s all it takes.

More than you can handle

You’re always going to come up against something that’s a little more than you can handle. But that shouldn’t surprise you. You’ve been coming up against obstacles all your life and you’ve figured out ways around them or through them. Or perhaps you have already given up more time than you want to remember.

When we are faced with a challenge, any challenge, whether it’s getting an extra cookie or, I don’t know, spreading food more evenly around the world, we can either shy away, and decide we can’t achieve that particular goal, or we knuckle down and figure it out.

Until we either succeed or give up. And that depends on whether the task is perceivably more than we’re capable of. Of course, determining that we’re less than capable requires its own level of self-awareness.

It’s simple. If what you’re doing isn’t giving you the results you want, change what you’re doing.

The issue is that most people change the results. They decide, “oh well I haven’t succeeded yet so this must definitely not be for me so why try any further. Instead, I will settle for something less than this but that’s more attainable.”

On the surface, that makes sense to a lot of people. They think, “instead of struggling for longer than I’d want to, to achieve this really big thing, it makes sense to struggle less for a shorter time to get this not as big but still relatively nice thing.”

And it’s a decent approach to life. Until it isn’t any more. Because you won’t be satisfied with your new achievement for too long and, if you aren’t prepared to keep at it, you’re going to stagnate and become a little bitter that you settled. Maybe. Maybe you don’t mind. Either way, know yourself well enough to know what you want to fill your time with now.

Achievement is not an end goal

Achievement is an ongoing experience of existence. You never stop growing. You never stop finding new challenges. You never stop wanting more out of life.

Life never stops. Look around your world and witness the consistent progress in technology, in expression, in experience, in mindsets, in lifestyles, in ways of doing things. Who knows what this world will look like next year? And will you be up to speed or not?

The more up to speed you are, the more options you have access to. And you get to decide this, too. You get to decide what defines your success in life. Only you. And the moment you retire the ideas of what other people think your life should be, is the moment you make peace with your life. Let other people worry about their own goals and definitions of successful and unsuccessful lives. You just focus on your trajectory.

Whatever you put your focus on is what you will live out. Determine what is important to you and give that the time and energy it deserves. There is no time limit. It doesn’t matter whether you hit your big dreams in your teens or in your seventies. Nobody is going to waggle a finger at you and scold you for taking being too quick or taking too long. In fact, people will praise you and revere you and be a little envious of you. So, what stops you from living a successful life today?

It’s only you

To state the obvious, it’s only you. You are the one who is stopping yourself from dreaming bigger or living larger. If you want more out of life, go out and claim it. Life waits for nobody and no matter how much you may want that to be different, it is what it is. The sky is blue, snow is cold, and life keeps steamrolling onwards.

Things will continue to evolve, and you will continue to have opportunities to live in a way that you want or not, every moment of every day.

Choose each moment for your betterment. Move towards those things that please and excite you. Pick yourself up when you trip and learn to walk better. Pay better attention to your environment. Improve your balance and steadiness. And you will find you trip a lot less. And then you’ll find you’re skipping more often than walking. Next thing you know, you’re parkouring all over the place.

Baby steps tho. That’s where it begins.