One of the most important lessons I’ve learned in life is the difference between winning and success. Winning is something we’ve all come to know. Last night, The Golden State Warriors won and the Cleveland Cavaliers lost. You close the sale or you don’t. You get the job or it goes to someone else. Winning, is somewhat binary.
Success on the other hand is a more nebulous, and thus harder to define. In fact, if I were to ask you right now what success means you may or may not have an answer.
Since success is more nebulous than winning, what you determine as success is going to be different than what someone else might view as success, which is why defining success for yourself and focusing on making collecting wins that drive towards your version of success is important. Unfortunately, some people end up chasing wins and on paper they are “successful” only to find out that their wins were geared towards someone else’s version of success. In the end, they feel empty because the success is not their own.
This is not meant to knock winning, or success. The point is that A) it’s important to understand the difference, and B) to define success for yourself, so you can work towards achieving wins and success on your on terms, not someone else’s.