You can be successful and still be living somebody else’s version of success and that can be quite a difficult thing to recognise. You work really hard to build a business or develop a career and achieve the awards or certificates. In fact, you feel that you are creating everything you thought you wanted or needed, to be successful in life. From the outside, everything might look pretty good but what about deep down? Is it you celebrating or those around you? Are you burning out in the process? Perhaps there’s a sense that you should be happier with what you’ve achieved, and inside, something doesn’t quite feel right.
Whose definition of success are you living?
We pick up messages about success throughout our lives, what did your parents value? What did you see others doing and achieving and how did people react around them? What have you noticed in your industry and your peers? It can be stored in our subconscious without us even noticing and if we felt a particular emotion around these events that will be there too.
I was having a conversation about this very recently as a client of mine reflected on their journey. Imagine a business owner who has built a £500,000 turnover company, then rather than reflecting and pausing to see where things are aligned for them, they immediately start thinking about the million-pound business. Why? Because that feels like the next marker of success.
But what happens when you talk and reflect? Then you see what they really wanted was actually very different. Yes, the money helps but they want a profitable business that doesn’t need them every hour of the day. To take a holiday where they can switch off, to spend every Wednesday afternoon with the kids and to be home to walk the dog. To finish work early like they used to, have dinner with their partner and enjoy the life their business was supposed to help them create.
And do you know what, that definition of success might not require a million-pound turnover at all! That doesn’t mean they are less ambitious, or not as successful, it is simply how you view success.
The problem I see is the outside influences that put pressure on what it means to be successful, of being busy all the time, faster is better – we all need to find time to pause and reflect on what is important to us. Not our parents, our peers, our boss or the next award but in terms of what lights us up, brings us joy and fills our heart to the max.
My experience
I often think about success as a ladder, you can be incredibly focused on climbing it, working harder and harder to reach each rung you set your sights on. In fact, others congratulate you on how far you’ve come.
Then something happens to make you stop and pause, and you stop long enough to realise the ladder is against a wall you either never chose or from which you don’t like the view!
I started out as an engineer and quickly moved into manufacturing and quality, a born problem solver. I was employed in my first job as a continuous improvement engineer; a role they made for me. But alas the priority for money saw improvement at the bottom of the list and I got made redundant. Having made my mind up that Quality needed more influence I started to set my sights on a manager role so that I could have more authority to create lasting change. So, I got it. Then in my head I decided I wanted a Directorship and set my sights on owning a company. I got these opportunities, but I was so focused on this ladder that I put up with other things that were not right in my environment. Deep down things constantly crossed boundaries and did not align with my values. But I had set my sights on that rung of the ladder and I needed it. When we are not aligned with our purpose the universe has a habit of ensuring we take notice and change direction, my story involves a lot of titanium rods, pins and cages in my back. These experiences have taken time to let go of, but they made me who I am today, and I understand that everything is relevant to where I am now. My passion is helping others stay on their true path and something I explore in the Inner Edge work.
“You can climb the ladder and still have it against the wrong wall.”
Your body often knows before your head catches up.
Your body keeps the score, and we know far more than we sometimes give ourselves credit for. For example, which feeling when something looks absolutely right on paper, but something in your gut says no? Or that wave of tiredness washes over just as you start to plan something. Or when an idea lights you up before you can logically explain why? In fact, in a recent collaboration meeting, I made a suggestion and instantly we both lit up and could feel the energy of it, for me I also got my confirmation goosebumps!
The problem comes when we block out these signals, get too busy to even acknowledge that we have intuitive wisdom. We can even become very skilled at overriding those signals and tell ourselves what we should do. We compare, rationalise and worry about what other people might think. Fear and fear of judgement can be an incredibly powerful force.
So, we edit ourselves and continue to fit in.
I know this from my own work, not just from being a female in engineering (I will even admit to wearing a tie to fit in). But through my own business journey from decades working within manufacturing and engineering companies. I loved using my Quality expertise alongside a very logical, process-driven side, loving systems, planning and solving complex business problems. But I also have a deeply intuitive side, in fact I light up every time someone asks me for an Angelic Oracle card reading because they are stuck and need guidance.
For a long time, I believed those two parts needed to sit in separate boxes, and I became a different person depending on where I was and the people that surrounded me. Afraid to open up to my full potential or share other skills that I felt didn’t belong in that other world. Fearing being judged or affecting the credibility I had built up.
But they are all me.
I can remember being in an organisation talking about mentoring, then the owners realising my Quality knowledge and asking about their ISO9001 system. Over lunch the conversation changed, and I ended up doing a reading with my Oracle cards, it was spot on and they were very grateful. That evening the lightbulb moment happened, the lightning bolt struck, I was in my engineering world doing all of my services and bringing all of me. Guess what? Nothing happened, I won the work and things went really well. My perspective changed and things were reframed.
It was exhausting being different people, at one point I felt like I was running four different businesses, and don’t get me started on how difficult marketing messaging had become. Now I am just me bringing all those different gifts together and it is so powerful in creating results for people.
How do you shine brightest?
This, for me, is where things get interesting. What if shining your light isn’t about becoming somebody more impressive? What if it is about stopping editing out the parts of yourself you were always meant to bring? Bringing your gift in the way only you can. Embracing the things that bring you joy, because playing and having fun is all part of living fully in my eyes.
Think about the qualities you may have dismissed because they come naturally to you, maybe you thought nobody would pay for these but actually someone else struggles with what you find easy. There is only one version of you with your particular combination of experiences, strengths, ideas and gifts. When you constantly compare yourself with other people, you can lose sight of that, and you start wearing someone else’s shoes to fit in and wondering why walking feels so uncomfortable now.
You define what success looks like for you.
When you truly align with the life you want to lead and define your own vision of success, something shifts. The pressure outside reduces, you look at everything in a different way. You can appreciate what you’ve achieved rather than immediately measuring it against somebody else’s achievements. The goals have a deeper meaning and start to support and align with the life you want to lead, taking you towards your goals instead of further away. You can make decisions based on what feels right for you and trust your intuition again. And perhaps most importantly, you can start liking the person you are rather than continually striving to become the person you think you ought to be.
That creates a very different energy around life and business.
My work has always been rooted in helping people find more joy, freedom and peace, while creating businesses that work for the lives they want to lead.
My Inner Edge course work takes that thinking back to you. To who you are beneath all the expectations. To what you know brings you joy and to the gifts you may not yet be allowing yourself to fully own. Because when you show up with all of those gifts, you can help people in a way that only you can. You are not here to be somebody else’s version of you.
“You are here on purpose for a purpose.”
So the question is:
