What is Success?

Unfortunately according to my American friends&#x27; colloquial definition of &quot;success&quot; it is simply $$$.<p>Yup money. &quot;She became very successful&quot; = &quot;She made lots of money&quot;. Sometimes I am a jackass and ask stupid questions, &quot;well what if she is unhappy, is she still successful?&quot;. And people look at me like I am from Mars ;-)

What I found most interesting about this was the the concept of success changed over time. Success seems to be deeply personal and is perhaps a reflection of a deeply personal fear.<p>In our society the fear of not having enough money seems to be very prevalent thus often success is tied directly to the concept of having enough money because it is a fear a lot of people share.<p>In this light perhaps the path to success is just a way of working through our fears.<p>The interesting question then becomes what does success look like to the person who no longer has any fears. Perhaps then success is motivated by compassion?

True wealth is confidence..<p>Quote from George Foreman about longshoremen:<p>Mr. Foreman, who stared down financial collapse as an adult despite a troubled, impoverished childhood, said he knew real wealth when he saw it. “If you’re confident, you’re wealthy,” he says. “I’ve seen guys who work on a ship channel and they get to a certain point and they’re confident. You can look in their faces, they’re longshoremen, and they have this confidence about them...I’ve seen a lot of guys with millions and they don’t have any confidence,” he says. “So they’re not wealthy.”

On skim, I do not see any hard definition of the &quot;outstanding success&quot; you envisioned for Nickler. If you never defined it, you cannot achieve it or know if you have. What gets measured gets done but, also, you need a measurable goal to know when you are done.<p>So I think what you had in your van were easily achieved and easily measured or recognized goals. Things get harder to see when the goal is larger and seems nebulous. You need to make it tangible somehow.<p>Best of luck.

Success is not about finding what you think you want to have but realizing of how much you already have.

I reckon it&#x27;s probably happiness.

<i>Tell me what an idiot I am on Hacker News</i><p>You brag too much in that post and come off as somewhat douchey, but reflective and intelligent. Also, you&#x27;re one of the better writers that I&#x27;ve read (and I&#x27;ve written professionally) and that&#x27;s not an easy skill for most to master, so kudos on that.<p>Also, it looks like Nickler is solving a real (and unsexy) problem. So, respect.

Why can&#x27;t it be subjective?