A few years ago I was really struck by the definition of success penned by Earl Nightingale.

“Success is a progressive realization of a worthy ideal.”

He reported this definition in his book the “Strangest Secret”, and I think it is the best definition I’ve ever heard to describe success.

Success is not about:

How much you have

How much you are doing

Who you are hanging with

What you can buy

Who you are wearing

What deals you can make

How many followers you have

How many likes you get

It’s not about acquiring and accumulating.  It is about working towards a WORTHY IDEAL.

What is a worthy ideal you may ask? Something you believe in, something that you think about positively, something that keeps you up at night in a good way!

It’s your contribution to something greater than you.

And by the way the opposite of success is not failure!

I would argue that the concept of failure as we often identify with it is not the opposite of success but really just opportunity.

Think about all the things that may not have turned out the way you originally planned, or desired. Think about what happened afterwards, what life is like now, compared to then!

In most instances, when we “fail” we create an alternative conclusion, and this alternative conclusion can often result in consequences, although unforeseen or predicted, that end up being very desirable.

Real failure is perhaps the essence of making a mistake, and not learning from it.  Not having the awareness or reflective process to turn it into opportunity.

I was working in New York as a performance coach for the New York Rangers in the spring of 2001. I got called into the General Manager’s office one day and drove the long drive into Manhattan so I could be told I was going to be fired.

I remember it like it was yesterday. The legendary Glenn Sather leaning back on his chair with his hands behind his head, cigar in his mouth, looked at me and said, “Scotty, I’m not going to fire you, I’m just not going to re-hire you.”

Wow, the first time you get fired, well it is a strange feeling. Leaves you feeling quite empty. 

What had I done? What had I not done?

The loss of my job with the team appeared as a failure to me at the time, but several months later, when I was available to come home to Montreal to take a job with the Montreal Canadiens, the team I had dreamed of working for since I was in university, well it didn’t seem like a failure very much anymore!

My epic failure in a marriage, which happened at the same time as being fired (yes, all kinds of fun!) resulted in my finding the best partner I could have ever wished to have, and the consequent creation of my wonderful daughter.

So when you are beating yourself up about so-called failure, realize that it is really just opportunity.

Understand that the opposite of success is really the absence of  a worthy ideal.

Instead of burning your life candle with no intent, concentrate on establishing who you are and what you want your contribution on this earth to be, and set your life up so you are invested in that ideal.

There is no such thing as failure as it has often been labeled, the alternative pathway called opportunity is simply a part of the process of life.

My mom was born in 1930.

It was right in the thick of the world’s worst economic disaster, known to us all now as the great depression.

Her father and mother, like so many at the time, struggled to make ends meet.  The family was everything, and her family lived all around her, uncles, aunts, grandparents, and everyone supported everyone else.

She nearly lost her leg and arm from infectious diseases no one had the medicine or solutions for, resorting to putting maggots in the cast on her leg to eat the dying and diseased flesh.

Her sister had to have her leg amputated to save her from disease.

Her mother lost two boys in pregnancy, and the girls grew up without the brothers they might have known.

Untold hardships, things my mom has never told me most definitely live behind her eyes.

She grew up through the time of the most devastating war in the history of the world.  Every other war pales in comparison.  

Her father served in the Canadian Air Force as a mechanic, away on the airfields of Britain throughout much of the war.  Spared the trauma of serving on the front lines.

My mom was 15 years old when the war ended, the same age as my only daughter is today.  Different lives they have lived.

We sometimes think what we are living with and through today is quite destabilizing, but perhaps much of what we feel is our own self-doing. Focused too often outward to find our compass, stuck in comparison and judgment.

There was no time for that when my mother grew up.  All she had was the immediate requirements laid before her, where to sleep, what to eat, what was the next task to complete.

No time for self-pity, or worse, looking around at others to see who you are.  Simply faced with getting each day done.

She married an Air Force pilot in the 50s.  

My Dad was searching for his own medium of expression. Himself a victim of a father jailed, a mother overwhelmed, and life growing up in a church-run boarding school (knowing what we know now about those places, who knows what challenges he faced).

He soon found identity in higher education, studying political science, and then joining the foreign service.  Not the life my mother expected.  Strange foreign lands, travel, cocktail parties, and no community. She was a small-town girl with small-town thoughts and these were people not of her tablecloth.

My mom had lost a battle with cancer that left her unable to bear children.  She instead chose to adopt, and I was the benefactor of that decision. Who knows who or what I would be today if she had not chosen me?

She was immediately whisked off to figure out motherhood in Singapore, a new life, and new love, and no family or friends to support her…..but she was strong.

She figured it all out, not without her share of mistakes and missteps, just like all of us.  We are imperfect you know…….we sometimes forget to respect that about ourselves.

She came back from overseas and they soon added my brother, he was not like me, and she struggled with that.  She struggled for the rest of her life because of that, and so did he.

Not many years later, the strain of a life misunderstood, and the misalignment of two people’s growth, my parents began a very challenging time.  There was an ever-growing crack in the foundation.

A lot of pain, a lot of yelling, and a lot of misunderstanding and harm.

And one day it was all over.  I was sixteen years old, and I was relieved.

There she was now, alone, a mom of two boys, trying to find a way to make a living, be a mom, and find a way to be a dad too…..

Her work ethic was never something you could challenge.  I never saw my mom complain, or give up, it just wasn’t in her DNA.  Her dad was a fierce workhorse, and she had his genes.

She did what she had to do, and I grew up like there was nothing missing.  My brother struggled, and she struggled with him.

He spent some time with my father, which didn’t work out, then boarding school, and then he found his birth parents, and life began anew. 

I know that hurt my mom…..she couldn’t figure him out.  She has always carried that with her, another emotional scar to add to the many over the course of an uneasy life.

Years after both my brother and I had become adults, my mother found a man who loved her just as simply and as honestly as he could. He cherished her.  I was happy for her, she deserved such love.

But true to the nature of my mom’s life, it would not last, he would pass away, 15 years older than her, he was struck by disease and lost the battle.  She would be denied her fairy tale.

For the last 30 years of her life, she worked, then retired, built a life of friendship with many, and remained steadfastly, and fiercely independent.

The scars of life with nothing made her a champion of saving, something that serves her life today in a way that is difficult to comprehend.  

She is financially independent, and that is something really important for a son.  I would be heartbroken if I could not care for her after all she has done for me.

In the last few years, she is now 93, her health and independence have deteriorated.  She is slowly but surely slipping away.

The Louis Armstrong song, “We Have All the Time in the World” made me lament my life with her, what remains is short, and not the same.  

Time is running out.

We have all the time in the world

Time enough for life

To unfold all the precious things

Love has in store

We have all the love in the world

If that’s all we have you will find

We need nothing more

Every step of the way

Will find us

With the cares of the world

Far behind us

We have all the time in the world

Just for love

Nothing more, nothing less

Only love

Every step of the way

Will find us

With the cares of the world

Far behind us, yes

We have all the time in the world

Just for love

Nothing more, nothing less

Only love

I wish I had more time, but that’s not what life is all about. It’s about being present, and recognizing what we are experiencing because it will not always last.

Sorry Louis, but we don’t have all the time in the world.

Cherish the time you have.

I had the honor of working with one of Canada’s great Alpine skiers. Near the end of his career he was fortunate enough to win a Super G World Championship race by .45 of a second, but the next day, he lost the top of the podium by just .12 of a second!

Think about that for a second (which is more time than the time he had to win or lose by the way!), how little time that actually is!

Take out your cellular phone and go to the stopwatch mode. Set it up and push the button as fast as you can to start it and then stop it.

How long did it take you to stop and start it?

I bet you could not stop it in under a tenth of a second. 

Probably the first time you were up around .3 or .4 seconds. Isn’t that crazy? In the time that it took you to simply start and stop a stopwatch, someone’s life will be in the winner’s circle and someone else’s will not!

Why is this important? 

Basically, it’s that time is of the essence, but not necessarily the way one would expect. You see, we would normally react to this concept by saying that in order to win, or to reach above your competitor, or simply be better at what you do, you have to go faster, do more, and just get after it. 

You need to succeed, not fail.

But that’s not what I am saying. In fact, I want you to think of it from the exact opposite perspective.

I want you to think of it not in a manner that should cause anxiety, or stress, or a sense of urgency. Don’t think of it as a win or a loss, or a success or a failure, but think of it as an opportunity.

Life is about every moment. Every moment has an effect on our lives.

In the movie “Sliding Doors” when the main character played by Gwyneth Paltrow arrives at a train she needs to catch, the movie plays the moment out in a tale of two choices.

In one scene she catches the train, and then shortly thereafter, the scene plays over again and she misses the train. The rest of the movie is played out revealing what might have happened had she made the train, and what might of happened had she not.

The moment of catching or missing a train can change your life. 

More importantly, we understand these metaphoric forks in the road are happening every second of every day or every tenth of a second.

Neither story that gets played out is the best one or the worst one, they are just the story that gets played out. In every life story, there will be moments that we have been socially influenced to view as positive and moments that we might regard as negative, or as some would say successes or failures. 

You won or you lost. 

But are they really successes or failures, or are they actually just opposite sides of a piece of blank paper ready for the next line to be written?

In “Sliding Doors” catching the train, which would normally be considered a positive outcome leads Paltrow’s character to the disparaging reality that her partner is cheating on her, which would most likely be considered negative!

The point is to label the outcome as our failure, not the outcome itself. 

The outcome just leads to other moments, moments we need to embrace, live, and experience. 

Moments create the shape of our lives while we live them.

The paradox of .10 seconds is that the choices you make along the way change the outcome. 

Sometimes very slight course adjustments can be the difference between winning and loosing, or the difference between making the sale, not making the sale, or getting the project or not getting the project. 

So the key is not to overthink each moment or try to pre-define each moment but to spend more time in each moment. Live it rather than manipulate it because all of the above examples are neither successes nor failures but just further opportunities.

There is never just one race, one project, or one sale, there are many, and each one offers you an opportunity to refabricate your pathway, make choices, and find a new line.

Stop thinking about the one result or the outcome and start investing in the moments and the process. Understand that by beating yourself up about every choice you make, you slow down, and that by thinking too much about how you will get there or what you must do better to get there, you lose time rather than save time.

We get so focused on being first, or being the best, that we lose track of the fact that what separates first from second, or second from third is tiny adjustments, momentary risks, instantaneous challenges, and many things you can’t control. So stop trying to control them, stop trying so hard to win, and focus more on the process of getting there, and the feelings you have along the way.

Looking at life as a constant flow of opportunity and not as a journey to a destination, with hardened socially acceptable outcomes will allow you to live in the moment, live freely, and realize that life really is about letting go, not holding on!

In my career as a Performance Coach and Reconditioning Professional, I am always shocked at how often athletes think that they can jump the line and somehow beam themselves to a state of expertise or greatness. 

They don’t necessarily want to do the work or pay the price required to be great.

It seems this phenomenon is getting even more prevalent in life in general because of all the access to high-quality (and many times low-quality!) video and audio coaching living out there on every social media stream. 

People seem to believe these days that they can just watch a video, take a weekend course, or consult an online resource and they become……snap……experienced!

You need only Google how to do something, and there are 10 to 20+ how-to blogs, or videos available on YouTube that you can digest and become knowledgeable in a myriad of interesting topics. 

But you can’t YouTube or Google experience. 

You can’t WordPress a resume. 

You can’t be something you haven’t earned.

If you don’t pay your dues, you will eventually pay a price.

I worked in the National Hockey League where veteran players used to refer to rookies who thought their S-H-I-T didn’t stink as two-year ten-year guys. They would regularly joke about the character of rookies who thought they knew it all, carried themselves with plenty of attitude, and basically felt they were the man long before they had truly paid their dues. 

Paying your dues is a basic tenant of respect and trust in elite sports, and it is the same in the corporate world and life as well.

This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t aspire to be the best you can be, or shouldn’t have confidence in yourself, or dive in and learn as much as you can every day. In fact, it means exactly that; work hard, learn more, establish a plan and execute it daily, and go from average, to good, to great.

During that process, cultivate great habits, stay humble, respect those who take the time to mentor you, and be thankful for those who help you rise. Recognize that you cannot be great at something unless others who are greater than you take the time to show you the way.

No one does it alone. 

Anyone who tells you they did it alone, they did it all by themselves, is absolutely full of it. All great ideas are iterations of other great ideas, all great achievements are final steps in a long and meandering discovery process. 

There really is no such thing as “overnight success”.

And even when you can make a case that someone leaped rapidly to high achievement there is, generally speaking, always a moment of reckoning when a price is paid in some form for the skipped steps.

A few years ago, my daughter experienced her first sleep-away camp.  I didn’t know what to expect at the time, I hoped it would be an extraordinary experience that would in some way contribute to her growth and development.

To my amazement, she had a great time. It was so much fun that she lamented that she wished she could go back right away!

Even better, she wanted to go back every year, and every year since, it’s been a powerful growth experience.

What was really wonderful at the time though was to see that not only had she had a good time, but she learned some amazing life skills that will truly make a difference in her life for years to come, several of which I have only learned to practice myself most recently!

The first lesson that struck me was not being overcome by “What if?”

Sure, she went in with some trepidation about meeting new people, what if she didn’t fit in, or what if she didn’t know anyone?

But she fully embraced the opportunity.

The day we dropped her off, she simply accepted that she would explore this new experience and see what would come. There were no tears of fear and no clinging to mommy or daddy, just acceptance that what was to come would be a new experience.

The takeaway; “what if?” discussions serve no purpose. At the end of the day, you can’t control everything, so beating yourself up and churning over the possibilities only serves to create stress and discomfort with what is about to come, even if it is not about to come!

If you are going to get stressed, get stressed about what you do know, not about what you don’t know.

The second lesson was that even when you lose or fail in life there is a win or an opportunity that usually comes out of it.

She described a game called “freeze” that they played at the dinner table each night that saw each camper try to outstare the others.

One camper got to shout out “Freeze!” (he/she didn’t have to participate), and then everyone would have to stop moving and the first one to move was the loser.

As the losers, they had to clean up the table after everyone else. But, they also got to be the ones who yelled, “Freeze!” the next day. So losing always led to a little win the next day when you got to be the caller.

Opportunity is often a side effect of failing.

The third lesson was to never think you have won or succeeded until you “know” you’ve won or succeeded.

The camp had a game that campers played on a dock where each person stood at opposite sides of the dock, perched precariously on the balls of their feet while holding a rope between them both. Each had to pull on the rope trying to get the other to somehow fall in the water. 

You would lose if you let go of the rope, or fell in the water.

Well, she learned a hard lesson when she thought her opponent had put her full feet on the dock (against the rules) and as she went to point it out, she lost her balance, and the other person took advantage, sending my daughter into the drink!

Never believe you’ve won until you have solid proof!

The fourth lesson she learned was that sometimes you are going to reach higher than you ever have before, and it’s going to feel scary.

Don’t give up.

Pause, take stock, and keep reaching higher, it’s the only way to go.

She was climbing a climbing wall for the third or fourth time in her life, each time having aborted about halfway into the climb. She was scared but she was also only 5 or 6 years old at the time.

This time, being a little older she had developed a little more hutzpah and was going to give it a shot.

She described to me how she got about half the way up and then wanted to stop. She looked down towards the instructor who encouraged her to keep going. With one over-reaching thought of ringing the bell, she pushed through her fear and kept climbing.

She was so proud to tell me she had rung the bell at the top!

She overcame her fear of the unknown.

Did she grow another inch perhaps?

The last lesson she learned is to reflect on and celebrate each day.

Each evening at dinner the campers had to tell everyone their thorn, rose and bud for the day. 

The thorn was something that hadn’t worked out for them, the rose was something they most enjoyed about the day, and the bud was what they were looking forward to doing tomorrow.

The opportunity to reflect and re-set for each new day is something we should all do every day, it keeps your subconscious focused on the positive, and not so much dwelling on the negative.

Mindset rules so make yours a positive one!

These five simple practices are life-changing, so wonderful she’s experienced them already at camp, but for those a little older it’s never too late to try.