What Is Success?

This week we discuss the idea of success! What is it? What does it look like? How can you determine what success means to you?

Transcript

Welcome to Life,

Lessons and Laughter with your host Glenn Ambrose.

Hello welcome to the podcast.

This is Glenn Ambrose and we have a special co-host today,

Dave DeAngelis our producer.

Hey Glenn.

Hey Dave.

How are you?

Good,

How you doing?

It's an honor to be here.

Oh thank you,

It's an honor to have you.

Oh thank you.

Ben is not able to join us for this one so Dave's stepping in to help us out.

And today we are talking about success and what success looks like.

And I heard,

Well I actually saw this video,

I forgot who recommended it to me.

But for,

I can't say that I would have guessed it would come from I guess any celebrity,

Let alone Ashton Kutcher.

No.

But you know,

Nothing against him,

I don't know him.

No.

But it just seemed like it was not the norm we'll say.

It was at a Kids Choice Award show and he was.

.

.

Oh yes,

Yeah I think I saw this.

It was really a good speech.

He talked about a few things and one of the things that he spoke to the kids about was what success looked like.

And he said it looks a lot like hard work,

Which I found to be very interesting and insightful.

And he also said that he was never too good for a job.

So what I got out of that was success looks like moving towards your goal.

That's the hard work aspect of it.

If we are walking towards our goal,

Doing the next right thing,

Taking the next piece of action that we're capable of taking,

Then opportunities come and then we take those opportunities and we move forward and we're working hard and then more opportunities come.

And that's the type of flow we get into.

And everybody looks at it.

The most success that I've had in my life,

There's nine times out of ten somebody that comes up to me and says,

Oh Glenn,

You're so lucky.

And it's like,

No,

No,

It's not luck.

It's moving in the direction of what I want to achieve and then eventually achieving it.

People don't see all the hard work behind the scenes.

What do they mean by you're lucky?

They just think,

You know,

A lot of times people who aren't achieving their dreams,

And let's face it,

That's a large portion of our society,

They kind of think that they look at people who do achieve their dreams as lucky.

So they get all the breaks.

So you're lucky that you're doing what you want to do?

Right.

I kind of get that too sometimes.

Yeah.

They think it's just luck.

And it's like,

Oh,

You're doing a podcast?

Lucky.

You get to play in a band,

You're lucky.

Right.

I acknowledge the fact that I'm fortunate,

But I'm also working hard for it.

Exactly.

That's what it is.

They don't see the hours that you're practicing the guitar and singing.

They don't see all the things that you've done behind the scenes to get yourself in a position where you're capable of doing what you do.

And that's the hard work.

And it doesn't necessarily need to feel like hard work,

Especially if it's something we enjoy.

But it's just a matter of taking the action and moving forward.

People sit around and they go,

Oh,

I'd do that if I could.

Yeah.

But no owner of a bar has knocked on my door in the last three hours and offered me a singing gig.

That's not how it happens.

You need to go out there and go ask for jobs in that type of situation.

And seeing how I'm not in that field,

I'm positive there's six million things that go into it that I'm unaware of.

But I do understand the concept that it does take work.

Things aren't just handed to us.

When opportunity rises,

It usually arises out of something,

Out of us taking action,

Not us just sitting around.

So it's when it,

You know,

And doing your best,

It's like they say,

The cream rises to the top.

It does.

And when I was younger,

When I was younger,

I swore that that wasn't true because I was so much living in the victim mentality of of no,

You know,

This it's,

You know,

This person's lucky.

And,

You know,

Why did this person get a job at my work that I could have gotten?

And,

Oh,

The foreman just doesn't like me and all this crap.

And,

You know,

It was just a bunch of my mindset.

I was in the wrong mindset,

You know,

And these other people were doing a job to the best of their ability,

Even though they hated it.

And the foreman would be like,

Wow,

This person's a hard worker.

I think I'll give him a shot at this.

And they'd give him a shot over me,

Even though I was more qualified,

You know,

Because they're like,

Well,

I know what I got with Glenn,

A crappy worker.

So let's give him an opportunity to add a better job where he can be a crappy worker there.

It just doesn't make sense,

You know,

But with this other person,

They know they have a good worker.

So if they put them into a different position,

They're probably not going to instantly become a crappy worker because they got a better job.

That's not usually how it happens,

You know.

So it's,

You know,

When I got older and I understood that,

And it's,

I kind of learned it backwards.

I learned it by doing the right thing.

I just got to a point in my life where I shifted a lot,

Where I was just going to do the next right thing.

I was going to do a job to the best of my ability,

No matter what it was.

And I,

You know,

That was a big change for me.

I had a good work ethic.

I was a hard worker,

Like underneath it all.

But I would cover that up with my attitude a lot.

You know,

So when my attitude shifted and it was explained to me,

I said,

You entered into an agreement when you took a job.

The agreement was you do this job to the best of your ability and we give you a paycheck.

That's the agreement.

Now,

If you don't like that agreement anymore,

You've been there for a while,

Well then you can renegotiate.

You could go in,

You could ask for a raise,

You could quit,

You could do several different things.

But it should not be affecting the agreement you initially made unless you come to a new agreement.

And if you don't like that agreement,

You have the right to leave that agreement.

They can't hold you at the job.

So once I kind of went in with that attitude,

All of a sudden it was just,

You know,

I just kept being handed opportunities.

And a lot of them I found out I didn't even want,

So I didn't take them.

But boy,

It's nice to be in the driver's seat.

You know,

It's nice to turn down the offers instead of sit there and complaining that you're a victim because you don't get them.

You know,

So it was in my own experience,

It was a very,

Very dramatic shift.

So,

You know,

Understanding that success,

That the cream does rise to the top,

That opportunities do come.

And it does look a lot like hard work.

When you're out there doing your best,

Things come to you.

People notice that you don't even know are noticing and offer you things.

It's,

You know,

The other thing is it's taking those baby steps towards your goal.

We've got to stay busy,

You know,

Stay busy moving towards it.

Usually with some structure.

One of my favorite quotes,

And I may have said this before,

Lack of direction is the problem,

Not lack of time.

We all have 24 hour days by Zig Ziglar,

I think.

So it's we look at all these successful people.

And if what we just discussed is true,

That it's not luck,

It's hard work and we all have 24 hour days.

So we all have the same amount of time.

Yet there's some people that are successful and some people that aren't,

Then what's preventing them from working hard and moving towards their dreams?

And it's direction.

It's the lack of direction,

You know,

And that's one of the bit I have that on my Web site right on the home page,

Because that's such a big part of what I do with my life coaching is giving people direction.

Right.

It's it's that outside perspective.

Generally,

We're good at some things and we're not so good at other things like I'm I'm good at staying busy.

I do.

I take a lot of action and I'm a doer.

Yeah.

But the problem is sometimes I can get off task now.

As long as I'm doing,

I feel like I'm accomplishing.

And that's not always the case.

Sometimes I get caught up in the busy stuff or something that looks shiny and catches my attention in the corner,

You know,

And I go off there and I go do stuff over there and it's actually not accomplishing things.

So it's with me being accountable to my life coach or or even other people in my life help and getting outside perspectives helps me to to keep a handle on that.

Yeah.

You know,

Because it's hard for me to see because it's my stuff.

So right.

So if I discuss it with somebody and get that outside perspective,

Then it's like,

You know,

Then I can fine tune and narrow down my direction.

So it's the most I accomplished the most with my time instead of just looking busy.

Right.

I like how you said,

Though,

Because I had heard that quote before from you and I really like how that kind of puts it in perspective of like,

Don't think that some people can do things that you can't.

Right.

You know what I mean?

I made me think of a story I heard.

It was about a guy who was running.

He was it was an inner monologue of him running a long distance.

Oh,

Yeah.

And he was a long distance runner.

And he was thinking back to conversations with people that say,

I could never do that.

I could never do this.

I always hated when people say that you could do it.

You could actually.

Sure.

It's not impossible.

I'm not doing something that's impossible.

I was like,

That's true.

Since then,

I've actually tried to not say,

Oh,

I could never do that.

That's good.

Because I feel stupid now saying it.

And that's you recognize that as being true when you heard it.

It clicked something inside and you're like,

Oh,

Yeah.

And it's true.

We do that with a lot of things.

It shuts the door.

Yeah.

So as soon as you say,

Oh,

I can never do something,

Then you just made sure you can't.

Yeah,

It can't happen.

Yeah.

That's because the only thing that can stop us is ourselves.

So,

You know,

So right there,

It's,

You know,

What does that other quote,

Whether you think you can,

Whether you think you can't,

You're right.

And that's,

You know,

That's true.

Yeah,

It's completely true.

And it's that that's like the basis of things.

That's why I like one of the things that I do is I never I try to stay open to all possibilities.

Just not because I necessarily think they're going to come true,

But I do not like the idea of limiting myself.

I want to stay open to whatever wonderful possible thing could come,

Even if I can't even conceive of it yet.

You know,

So it's like my mentality is kind of like,

You know,

Everything is made up of matter.

So really,

The only difference between a piece of gold and a rock is the vibrational rate that's going on inside the molecules.

You know,

Yeah,

Very.

Hopefully I didn't get too deep there.

But really,

It's all it's made up of the same stuff.

It's just molecules are vibrating at a different rate and makes it a different thing.

So in theory,

Like quantum physics type theory stuff,

Take that a stepfather and say,

OK,

Then if some way I could change the vibration,

I could turn a rock into gold.

I could just put it in my hand,

Focus on it,

Change the vibration and boom,

All of a sudden,

The rock's gold.

Now,

Do I expect that to happen?

No.

No,

I don't.

However,

I was going to say,

Glenn,

I like entertaining the possibility that scientifically,

Someday it might,

Could be possible if we were able to learn how to manipulate vibration inside molecules.

To me,

That's interesting.

To me,

It's just enough to keep my mind open to possibilities and not shut the door on anything that could happen.

Yeah.

You know,

I like that stuff.

It makes a lot of sense when you say it.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Believe it.

Now,

Check that out.

I just said that I could turn a rock into gold.

No,

No,

No,

Not that part.

And you believed me.

No,

No,

No.

I'm just kidding.

But I like that.

You know what?

It's like,

You know what?

Maybe I should be open to the idea of that.

Yeah.

And that's all it is.

It's staying open to the idea.

It's not saying,

Yes,

That will happen and I agree.

Not even that I agree it's possible.

Just I agree that it's not impossible,

Maybe.

In a way.

Yeah.

And that's actually one of my favorite things about Buddhism is that that's what they use.

That's what the Buddha used in a lot of his statements.

What he says is he says a negative.

He explains things through the negative.

So instead of saying,

You know,

That this is possible,

He'll say that it's not impossible.

You know,

And because as soon as we label things,

Then we bring them into like our little reality and we minimize them.

So like,

You know,

Just by saying what what something is not,

It kind of leaves it a little bit more open to what it is,

To our own conception of what it is.

You know,

So like my conception of what something is might be a little bit different from yours.

And we stay open to that so we can be true to ourselves.

It's just I think I'm going to end up doing like a whole podcast on that.

The Buddhist perspective on that negative.

Yeah.

Because it's I don't I mean,

That wasn't the best example,

But it's very it's an interesting way of phrasing things because it does.

It doesn't allow your mind to grab on to something and judge it because it's just telling you what it's not.

You know,

So and I think that that's,

You know,

To bring it back to what we're talking about today,

It's staying open to the possibility of success and not.

Not putting a cap on it.

You know,

The.

The it reminds me of something we're talking about a couple of weeks ago or a month ago or something,

And it's just not.

Not putting a block on what the future holds.

Yeah.

You know,

Staying open to it.

I'm not sure it's escaping me now,

But anyhow,

We'll move on.

Do we have a question today?

Yeah,

We do.

We're going to actually do one for me,

Actually.

OK.

I'm going to ask you a question.

OK.

OK.

Me anonymous.

Yeah,

It's from someone.

I don't know who it is.

It's a friend of a friend.

A friend of a friend.

No,

But we actually talked about this.

Oh,

The phone's ringing.

I got it.

Our secretary will get that.

Don't worry about that.

So anyways,

We were talking actually.

I'm interested to hear about what your thoughts are of.

I,

I feel like a big problem for me with going for my goals is the time period in between starting and seeing results.

Yeah.

And that's where I seem to quit constantly.

Yeah.

And that's a tough time,

Obviously.

I know that.

Everyone knows that.

But I'm just saying,

I feel like that's the part where you can get very defeated.

And you can go,

Well,

I'm not seeing any results.

Why am I working so hard?

And it's like,

Well,

You have to in order to see the results.

Right.

And it's like,

Yeah,

Don't give up before the miracle happens.

Is that the,

Would that be just like a bear down situation?

Actually,

It's kind of the opposite of bear down.

Okay.

It's more like an open up.

Because it's,

Yeah,

If we're forcing something,

Then eventually we're going to get sick of forcing it.

Okay.

You know,

So it's,

It reminds me of,

I heard,

I believe it was Eckhart Tolle talking about people who,

Who volunteer,

Not volunteer necessarily.

Sometimes it's volunteering.

But that work,

These wonderful,

Wonderful jobs like nurses and in general.

But not only that,

But what people who go over overseas to impoverished countries and people who really devote their lives to working on eradicating poverty and just these wonderful things.

And what happens a lot of times is they get burned out.

You know,

They do.

It's exhausting.

And the way he says it is he says the reason that they're getting burned out is because they're going in there and they're actually trying to change things.

They're do the actions that they're taking.

They're taking the actions so they can get the result at the end of the day.

And so if they are working,

Let's say they go over to another country and they're working with AIDS.

Now,

If they go over there to try to help the AIDS epidemic in Africa,

And if their mindset is that they are going to solve this issue or make some huge difference,

That they're finally going to feel fulfilled.

And that their life is worth something,

They're going to get burned out because they're focused on the end result and they have expectations of that end result,

What it's going to look like.

So that's why they're just constantly working and pushing through and eventually they are right there forcing it.

And then eventually they get burned out because you can only keep pushing for so long.

And a problem like that is so gigantic that it's not that we can't make a difference in it,

But on a day to day activity,

If you go into that environment,

You are going to see very sick people on a daily basis and you're going to feel overwhelmed and frustrated at times.

It's going to happen.

You know,

So,

But he says that the people who do go into that work and they do that work because of the love of the work and they get day to day fulfillment out of helping people,

They never get burned out.

In fact,

They could actually get stronger the longer they do it because they're not there to eradicate AIDS.

They are there to be helpful in a loving way on a day to day basis with each person.

Well,

They get their feedback then,

You know,

If that's what they're searching for and that's what their energy is putting out,

They are receiving that on a day to day basis.

So they never get burned out,

You know.

So that's that's where it comes back to staying in the moment,

Living in the now.

You know,

It's such a huge part of the answer to happiness and it comes into the conversation on so many different ways.

And this is one of them.

If you're going if you're doing your job,

You need to do your job and walk work towards something in a way that you enjoy it.

You know,

You it's sometimes we have to do things that we don't necessarily enjoy doing.

Like,

I don't like doing a lot of the business end of my work.

I want to just do podcasts all the time.

I just want to talk to people about this type of stuff.

So when I have to do the business end of my job,

Sometimes that's not my favorite task to do.

But if I go in there with the attitude like,

Oh,

My God,

Look at how blessed I am that I get to I have to put a little bit of time into this.

Because it's my business.

It's I get to do what I want for a living.

And this is just part of it.

And it's how lucky am I that I get to do what I enjoy for a living?

And this is just a little piece of that 90 percent of the time I'm doing what I enjoy.

This is 10 percent of the time that that allows me to do what I enjoy.

How lucky am I?

And if I go in there with that attitude,

Things go so much smoother and I get right through my work and I swear it's actually joyful.

And it still surprises me to this day.

It really does,

Because it seems so out there.

Like,

How the heck can your attitude mean that much?

Your perspective mean that much.

Yeah,

Really.

But your perspective is your reality.

It's 100 percent of your reality.

It's how you're looking at things,

How you're viewing things is what you experience.

So and I know that because in the situation I just described,

I can jump on a computer and just dive right into my work and kind of just not be in the moment,

Not have the mindset that I should.

And very often I end up working too hard,

Too fast.

Things start going wrong.

I get frustrated.

I'm irritated.

And I'm like,

You know,

How did I get here?

It's like,

Well,

Because I'm going at it all wrong.

You know,

I'm not feeling blessed that I get to do what I like.

I'm irritated that I have to do this and I don't feel like it.

Well,

Change my attitude,

You know,

If I change my perspective on it and say this is just this is a step that I need to take to allow me to do even more of what I love.

Then it's like it's a joyful experience,

You know.

So how would you say that applies in your situation?

It definitely that works.

A project that I'm working on,

A tedious one,

For instance,

Like editing video or audio even.

And not in not cursing and freaking out and getting all overwhelmed and mad that,

You know,

Why am I doing this?

This is taking forever.

This is stupid.

And then there's no,

Wait a minute.

No,

No,

No.

This is what you wanted.

You want to be doing this because what is the alternative?

You know what I mean?

Right.

Either not doing anything or doing something that you don't want to do.

Whereas if you do think about it,

It's like it is fun.

If you if you think about it like that,

It's like you're saying if you change your perspective,

Because I feel like a lot of people that do get to do what they want.

It's kind of like we were saying earlier today,

Baseball players complaining.

And it's like,

Yeah,

You're playing a game.

Yeah.

Be grateful for that.

Right.

You know,

I feel like even musicians who tour,

They complain.

It's like,

Come on,

Man,

You get to play music all over the country.

Yeah.

That's your job.

Yeah.

How many people would want that?

And and were you sitting on a couch 10 years ago going,

Oh,

If I could only.

Right.

And now you're there and you don't enjoy it,

You know.

And that's that's that's exactly.

And this just blows it up into the big picture.

It's that's what I mean when I tell people that you there is no happy ending at the end of an unhappy journey.

You said that to me.

Yeah.

And it's it.

That's what happens is we say,

Oh,

You know,

I'm miserable,

But I'll be happy when I make it.

And then they make it and they're complaining about what's going on in their life when they make it,

Because it's that's what they do.

That that's the perspective they're in.

They're in the complaining,

Poor me mode.

So even when they make it,

They just make problems out of wherever they are.

So if you can make joy in wherever you are.

And I know this to be true because I've experienced it.

Not only does your can you be happy on every step of the way to accomplishing what you want to accomplish.

So if it takes me five years to accomplish something,

Well,

I'm happy for those five years walking towards that accomplishment,

Which is cool in itself because I just didn't walk around pissed off for five years.

That's freaking wonderful.

You know,

That should be a prize enough in itself.

But on top of that,

I know for a fact that when you get there,

You appreciate what you've attained or achieved even more on a deeper level when you get there,

Because you're in that mode of appreciation.

You're you know,

So when you get there,

When you finally do achieve it,

It's like it becomes part of you.

You feel it's like,

Wow,

Look at look at what I've achieved and look at how I've grown along the way and what a wonderful journey that was.

And your self-esteem rises.

And I mean,

You get happy on such a deep inner level that it's it's mind boggling.

That doesn't happen when you just bust ass,

Bust ass,

Bust ass,

Finally get somewhere and then go,

OK,

Now I'm supposed to be happy.

Yeah,

Well,

You haven't changed the person that's been on a journey.

If you put a pissed off person on a plane in Rhode Island,

You get a pissed off person getting off the plane in Florida.

It doesn't matter where you are.

You take you with you,

You know,

And it's the same thing with it,

With a journey towards success.

If you're miserable all the way to it,

When you get there,

You are going to be a miserable,

Successful person.

And then what?

That's that's one of my other.

We keep stumbling onto a lot of famous like quotes and things that I've heard.

And Tony Robbins says you can anybody can survive failure,

But can you survive success?

You know what happens when you achieve everything you want to achieve and you're miserable?

Then what you look around and you go,

Well,

I did everything I set out to.

I have everything I wanted and I'm miserable.

Now what?

Now,

That's when people that's when people end up suicidal.

And I mean,

Fall into even deeper,

More severe depressions.

Because if you fail,

You look around and you go,

Oh,

Well,

That sucks,

But I'll have to pull myself back up and try to if you succeed.

You achieve everything.

It's like,

Well,

What are you pulling yourself up from?

Yeah.

You know,

Now you're really screwed because you're like,

Now I really don't know what to do.

Yeah.

Because I've done everything that I've known to do and society tells me to do and I'm miserable,

You know.

And I mean,

You can obviously see it in celebrity.

Oh,

Yeah.

When they reach a certain level and they have everything that they could possibly have.

And then they start turning to drugs,

The relationships fall apart.

And,

You know,

We know that whole scene.

But one thing that's interesting is nowadays we are actually seeing people turn in other directions and turning to a philanthropy.

Yeah.

You know,

There's a lot of famous people right now turning to philanthropy that never did before.

Yeah.

You know,

Because they're getting to that pinnacle of fame and success.

And they're going,

I'm not happy.

Now what?

Oh,

Well,

Maybe maybe there is something to this helping others crap.

Yeah.

You know,

And then they go try it and they start feeling fulfillment.

All of a sudden it becomes a life mission,

You know,

And we're seeing that in celebrity more,

More and more.

And I think that's because our perspective is starting to shift collectively.

Finally,

That's a good thing.

Oh,

My God.

Yeah.

That's the thing that gives me hope for us.

Yeah.

Because I don't think we're going to run around fixing every little problem in society.

However,

If we shift our perspective as a whole,

We got a good shot at this thing.

That's good.

So for people that want to send in questions,

Glenn,

Where can they send them?

They can send them to me at my website,

Life-enhancement-services.

Com.

You can find a link on that website to email me or my phone number and also on my Facebook page and the life enhancement services Facebook page.

Cool.

Heck yeah.

So send them in,

People.

Send those in.

And I guess that will do it for for today's show.

Dave,

Thanks for stepping in.

Thank you for having me and having.

It was a great show.

I enjoyed that.

Yeah,

Me too.

So we will wrap it up and we'll see you next time on life lessons and laughter.

This podcast is presented by New Shore Productions,

Executive producers,

Glenn Ambrose,

Benjamin Barber and David D'Angelis.

Reviews

It's all definitely about the mindset of how you go into something that determines how it'll go. Good chat. Thanks Glenn and Dave 💜x

The part that was said about how someone telling someone else they could never do what they do resonated with me. It's not impossible. It can be done. It's a matter of intent. If I think I can, I will. Determination, perseverance, tenacity! Bammm boom bada bingggg!,

Such great insight on success! Loved your perspective!

Interesting podcast, but not a meditation

This was a great podcast! I'm a regular listener and particularly enjoyed this one! Thank you 🙏🌈❤

Very good podcast...a good explanation of what success is...

Success is really listening to this podcast❤️ thank you Glenn 🌟great guidance
Attitude - is the difference between an Ordeal and an Adventure 🙏🏼💕