Hi friends,
todays thoughts came from people vocalizing that they enjoyed the "What is Success?" blog a couple months ago.
First, wow! People are actually reading these things.
Second, everyone that's reading these blogs, bless your soul for the encouragement and sharing.
A few of you wanted me to expand more on the idea of "Success". With "Success" comes this idea that floats around a lot called "Making It". I want to talk about this today.
“Making It” is strange. Like success, it’s a moving target. "Making It" could mean having millions of dollars. Some may view it as paying your bills by doing what you love. One might view it as being in the social spotlight. "Making It" could look like achieving a certain position in your current job. "Making It" could look like having your name associated with someone else who is famous. It's kind of this created idea and lifestyle that fluctuates from job to job and circle to circle.
"Making It" looks different for everyone…. and that’s ok.
Where it gets confusing is when everyones idea of "Making It" gets projected onto you. They start to create these fantasies or expectations of what you should be accomplishing or doing and the ego can fall into the peer pressure of them.
Years ago, my personal view of "Making It", was being able to pay the bills by doing what I love. I have zero issues with working. I enjoy working. The only issue was that my ego wasn't fully on board with that. When I would talk to people about what I was doing in the music industry early on in my career, I really had not accomplished anything that was publicly recognizable. This was fine for me until someone would ask... "Have you worked on anything that's on the radio?" or.. "Who is the biggest artist you have worked with?"... My honest response at the time was "no" and then I would name a few people and strike out on the third try.
This was always devastating to me personally. The other person did nothing wrong. I just had a big insecurity and lacked real clarity on what "Making It" would mean for me. Reflecting on how I reacted, on paper I had a noble idea of "Making It", but my pride longed for some sort of personal spotlight or recognition. I want to note, that there's nothing wrong with wanting to be known for your work, it just shouldn't be your identity and often those two things get deeply woven together.
We often glorify those that have accomplished things that are publicly known. It often paints this picture that unless you are known by the public that you're less of a person or less successful. Many people associate "Making It" with being popular and I have to disagree with that on a foundational level.
I have a friend in the industry who is “Making It”, but by someone else's standard he would probably be a starving artist or a failure. He exist's in his lane, in his niche, and he is fulfilled, joyful and is rich in life.
Do you have that?
"Making It" for me is now about being confident in myself and finding my fulfillment in knowing that who I am as a person is truly "Making It". Being true to myself and those around me is "Making It". I can lay my head down at night knowing that I was fully faithful to my wife, family, friends, and clients. I served them - this is "Making It". This is fulfilling. This makes a lifetime of work not seem intimidating but a joy to be apart of the process.
“Making It” will require you to let go of what other people think. You'll have to re-organize your life a bit, you'll have to make sure you're mentally prepared. You'll have to really figure out the "Why" behind what you do.
Let me encourage you that you don’t have to be a millionaire or anywhere close to that in order to do what you really want to do in life. You don't have to have a million followers online or be on TV. You don't have to be a household name in order to "Make It". You can accomplish all of those things, but unless the "why" behind those things are pure, you will personally always feel like you have never "Made It".
So here's my challenge to you, take the next few minutes and write down what "Making It" would look like for you and why.
Is "Making It"…being Scrooge McDuck rich? (Forbes list's his worth at 44.1 Billion… google it) Why?
Is it paying for all your bills by doing what you love? Why?
Is it spending endless time with family and friends? Why?
Is it being on TV or the Radio? Why?
Is it giving puppies to everyone in the world? Why?
Hopefully this helps lay down some of the burden that we often feel in life. No matter where you're at you can always adjust and change, that is the beauty of life.