Your Recipe For Success

By Ray Bertani

If you are like most people, you tend to judge your success by comparing yourself and your situation to other people, usually within your inner circle of friends and acquaintances. You have more than this person, but less than that person, and so on. This "keeping up with the Jones's" mentality leads to nothing but more stress and less contentment. More importantly, it does not increase your chance at attaining true success.

Success is not about having more than someone else or being better than someone else, true success comes from having more than YOU had and being better than YOU were. If you measure your success on whether or not you have a better situation (according to you) than other people that you know then sooner or later you will have a rude awakening. The most accurate measure of success is not in relation to someone else but in relation to you. Are you in better shape this year than last? Is your financial situation better this year than last? Are you spending more time with your loved ones, or less? Are you becoming a better father, son, sister, brother, friend or employee? Are you giving more of yourself than you used to? As long as you are constantly improving based on your own definitions and values, then you are a success.

There are those self help guru's that preach the message of freeing oneself from all material things. That the pursuit of money and luxuries will lead to our ultimate demise and that we should only be concerned with our spirit and inner peace. I'm not one of them. I do however believe that it is misguided to base success solely on material things. The same goes if you measure your success based on any one factor. True success is based on balance. Balance is the key to success. If you have a billion dollars but no one to share your life with, are you successful?

If you have loving relationships, but can't clothe your children, are you successful? If you have a great career, but no time to enjoy the benefits of your hard work, are you successful? If you have money, a great career, close relationships, but are in poor health are you successful? True success is having a life of balance based on what you define as being most important to you. Look at all aspects of your life and find the balance that works for you. Balance doesn't mean that you must have equal amounts of each of the factors. You may put a greater importance on your health and personal relationships than on finances and leisure time or you may put a greater importance on giving back to your community than on making a buck, or you may put a greater importance on financial abundance because you feel that you will be able to give more if you have more. That's for you to decide.

Having said that I believe there are six areas that we need to balance in order to feel truly successful. These are (in no particular order).

  • Finances/Career
  • Relationships
  • Health & Fitness
  • Leisure time
  • Personal growth
  • Giving back

Each of these six areas needs to be accounted for in our experience of life. Take each of these areas and decide what your success formula looks like based on your values and desires. Give each area a weight, a percentage of importance. The percentages should add up to a hundred when you're finished. This is your balance, your success formula; this is what a successful life means to you. Look at it as your recipe for success.

For example,

  • Finances/Career - 15%
  • Relationships - 20%
  • Health & Fitness - 25%
  • Leisure time - 15%
  • Personal growth - 15%
  • Giving back - 10% = %100

In the above example, which is hypothetical and for illustration purposes only, 100% success is achieved by the realization of each and all of these factors and in accordance with this balance or weighing of each factor. The maximum success level which can be achieved without strong relationships is 80%. The maximum success level which can be achieved without personal growth is 85%, and so on. If this hypothetical person was putting all there success eggs in the finance basket, even if they achieved financial abundance, at the end of the day would still only be 15% successful. These are the people who are sitting in their beautiful homes, driving there fancy cars and wondering why they feel empty and unfulfilled. The reason is that they don't have enough ingredients in their success recipe...they don't have balance.

Ray Bertani is a Human Resources Consultant, Public Speaker and Leadership and Personal development Trainer and Coach. He is the Managing Director and Founder of "Cura Solutions", a Professional and Personal Development firm located in the Metro Vancouver area of British Columbia, Canada, dedicated to helping great people achieve their potential.

For more information on how "Cura Solutions" can help you achieve your potential, visit them at www.curasolutions.ca and click on the personal development icon. If you would like to inquire about Cura's Coaching and Training Programs or book Ray to speak at your next Corporate or Association Conference or Event, he can be reached by email at ray@curasolutions.ca or by phone at 604-802-4490 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting 604-802-4490 end_of_the_skype_highlighting.

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