Hey, creative, what does success look like for you? You ever answered that question for yourself, like really answered it in detail. What does it look like? What does your life look like specifically to know that you are successful, your definition of success. I was taught that question when I was working, uh, for an ad firm years ago. And we would ask clients that because clients would want to, you know, do do campaigns or whatever, we’d always say, well, what does success look like for this? And it was shocking to me. Most people didn’t know, like, how many sales are we getting? How many new customers? How many of this, how many of that? By defining that question, by answering it specifically, what does suc paint a picture for me? Tell me what specifically your life would look like if you were successful. The way you define it.
It’s a powerful and comforting thing because I, and I’ve, and I’ve taught myself to do this because when I do this for me, and I’ll tell you what I, what, what success looks like for me, uh, in just a minute, um, when I did this, it was, I was able to relax because we all know the human tendency to compare ourselves to others and judge ourselves by others. Comparison is the thief of joy. Isn’t that the phrase? Something like that. And we look at other people and other creative businesses and we go, oh, they have more clients. They have bigger clients, they have this, they have that. Yeah, but what if that’s not what you really want? And by falling into that trap, a lot of times we make ourselves miserable. So what does success look like for me? Because I have an answer. I’ve, I’ve, it took me a while to kind of nail it down, but I have an answer.
Uh, mine is, I want to pay off all my large liabilities. I wanna pay off my house. I wanna pay off my car. I already have one of ’em paid off, but I wanna pay off all my, I’ll pay off my bills. I, that’s one, I wanna make enough money, have enough income stream to pay my basic bills without me having to work, you know, hours and hours and hours. So pay everything off. Basic income stream to cover my bills. I want to be able to have enough money to travel whenever I feel like it. And I want to be able to go to Disney World once a year. That’s it. Seriously. That, hey, you see my, my Splash Mountain poster back here behind me. I have, I have Disney. I’m a Disney guy. I like Disney World. Always have. So I want to have my life to the spot where all my big stuff is paid off.
I have enough income stream to pay on my basic bills. I can travel with my wife whenever I feel like it. I can go to Disney World at least once a year. That’s success for me. I swear that’s true. And if that way, it, when I look around at my friends who have more money or more clients or bigger businesses or whatever it is, I can be happy for them and go, good. That’s awesome. That’s what success looks like for them. And understand that if I had their life, even if it’s easy to think you wish you had their life, even if I had it, I would be happy. Cuz that’s not what I want to do. <laugh>. I don’t want to have a business with 700 employees, make a billion dollars. I don’t, I used to think maybe I did. I promise I don’t now I’d be miserable. So I think being specific with ourselves and making answer that question, what does success look like for you? Describe it. Describe what your, your life looks like if you’re successful. And then one, you know where the gaps are. You can go try and chase after them and to fill them up. Two, you know, when you’ve made it and you stop comparing yourself so much to other people. Give it a try. Let me know how it works. It worked great for me. All right, y’all can do this. I love you.