Yo yo yo. Welcome back to the Further your Lifestyle podcast conversations on lifestyle passions and hustles. My name's Chris, I am your host and I'm super excited to be back here having the conversation with you. Episode 181 today, and I can't believe we're already about to jump into October. It just blows my mind how quickly this year is going and we've got an interesting topic today. This comes from a question that has come through once again.

I've been really enjoying this process of just getting some off-the-cuff questions and it's really testing and challenging me to think outside of the box. And this question that has come this week is what does success mean to you and how has your definition of success evolved over time? Now, we've spoken about this over the past, like in probably one or two episodes, but I think it's a really great question to reflect on where I am currently in my personal journey and on my goals and the values and how that's shifted over time, and there's probably a few bits and bobs that I'll pop on jump on in terms of topics into this episode, but I think it's an important question to ask yourself. I think it's a question that you need to understand what does success look like for you? Because it's going to be different for everyone, and maybe I'll pull out some information where you know there is obviously what society expects versus our own understanding of what that looks like. So that's the topic today. We're going to roll the intro, get comfy, get cozy and let's get into it.

So what does success mean to you and how has your definition of success evolved over time? Off the cuff. To me, it's happiness, right, it really is knowing and being comfortable with what you are doing and where you're heading and what you're working towards. I've gone through, I mean, I've had multiple businesses myself. This is my longest running business that I've got at the moment on eBay. But before all that, working the nine to five, my idea of a success was to get to a certain level by a certain amount of time, to have a house by a certain amount of time, to be married by a certain amount of time to all these different things. And that was kind of pushed down from a perspective of other people and the people that I was surrounded with and there's nothing wrong with that, don't get me wrong but I think it comes down to understanding what is your success, and for me right now, my success looks like happiness, being comfortable, being happy with what you have and not being stressed. I live a very simple life in terms of. I do have a couple of properties. They're rentals, but I don't currently live in mortgage home. I don't have to worry about that at the point. But that's a decision I've made at this point in time for what I'm trying to work towards in a long-term plan, and so for me, right now, my idea of what success looks like is working towards your dreams, your aspirations, and being happy and confident and comfortable with that.

When we get stuck on the compare game of seeing what other people are doing and comparing ourselves with what they're doing, that's not your journey, that's not your mission. You need to detach yourself from others in the sense of trying to be like someone else or trying to compete with someone else. The person you should be competing with is your older self or the person that you want to be, and how do you get to be that person as quick as possible? But if you're not happy doing what you're doing, then I don't think you'll be successful, because when we're not passionate, when we're not doing something with purpose and feeling fulfilled, then we struggle to be able to do our best. Results and success doesn't necessarily come to a money thing either, because I guarantee, if I won a million dollars, two million dollars tomorrow, I'm still going to want to keep working, because it's my purpose, it's what I enjoy doing, and that money does not provide me success. That money gives me an opportunity to maybe invest, to maybe step my business up to the next level, to speed things up a little bit. It gives me an unfair advantage, but it doesn't give me success. Up a little bit. It gives me an unfair advantage, but it doesn't give me success.

Success comes with me being confident, being happy, being comfortable and understanding that what I have is enough. Now I also understand, on the contrary, that we can get stuck with, we get to a certain level and then there's always something else. So you have to ask yourself what is enough? What is enough right? And I think that I don't know the answer to that until you get to it right. I mean, here I am four years into doing my business and I'm achieving things that I probably didn't really think about in detail, but I'm already thinking about things that I want better Like, and when I say better, whether it's higher profits or a better working space or a level of influence or connection so that I can have to be able to provide some level of insight or influence or consulting. That's some longer term ideas, and I'm not quite there, but that I don't think that defines me as successful, because right now I'm successful, I'm living freely, I'm happy, I've got everything that I need. I don't have everything that I want, but again, that doesn't qualify for success.

Success is you being happy. My opinion is that's what success means to me. So over time that has changed because, as I said, I used to think by coming from probably it's now changed from a career status to now a quality of life, status and personal fulfillment and being and what that impact looks like. And I think sometimes we kind of get stuck with how the world presents success, whether it's from you scrolling on Instagram, tiktok or socials and seeing what other people are doing, and it's very easy to see that we've got people around us that are younger or older or whatever, and they're doing things bigger and what seemed to be better.

But we don't always know the full story, we don't always understand the perspective. You know whether you've got a stock portfolio, maybe you've got a couple of rental properties. Maybe you don't right. It doesn't actually necessarily matter, because me having those things does not make me any better than you. It gives me opportunities to do things potentially but that doesn't solve, doesn't make me any better person. Just like some people have grown up with parents and some people were foster kids, does that mean one of them is going to be more successful than other? Or, because of that situation, that does not define you right?

We get to go out and create what we want, and there's I mean there's psychological drivers that come with this as well. When we think about why we do things and why we chase certain successes, whether it comes down to, is it a validation thing or is it authenticity? Are we trying to become our true selves or are we trying to be something of a mirror of someone else? And I think the other thing is is there's that driving force of fear of missing out or fear of regret If you get to a certain point, maybe? What if I did?

I want to be 25 and I want to. This is me. This is what I wanted to be. I want to be 25 and I wanted to have. I wanted to have my house, my first house. Now I did get my first house when I was 25 because I worked so hard for it. But then it was like, for some reason, when I was a kid, I wanted to be a millionaire by I'm 30. What does a millionaire look like? I mean, if I was to sell every single asset of mine, I'd be a millionaire 100%. I've got multiple properties. That does not define my success, but it was a status thing of me looking ahead of me when I was 20, where I wanted to be in 10 years and what kind of looked like a success, as a generalization or a cliche.

And I think that's where we've got to be super careful is that we don't get stuck in whether it's generational perspectives or what was taught to us from coming down from our parents, not saying our parents are doing bad but they're going to have their own traditional ideas. Or, as we've progressed, millennials seem to have more of a balanced approach and I guess Gen Z's probably have more of a social awareness or they want to make sure everything is authentic and transparent. So I think when you bring all that into play, it has involved over a long period of time, because obviously I'm almost 33. I've seen a lot of different things. My life has changed. I've changed the perspective of what I want and how I want to get there and what I'm willing to do about that. And redefining that for myself has been the best thing I ever did, because I've been able to let loose. I've been able to become a better version of myself because I've been able to take that focus. Now there are pain points which I've always struggled with, which is societal pressures, which I mentioned at the start of this.

When we refer back to why we did things let's call it old success metrics of wanting to have this by a certain age, or wanting to have that much money or have that car. I remember someone and I'm not going to bring up who or whatever, but back when I was 18, no, it must've been 21. And I got my job working in the city, really good, really good money, and I was still driving a car as old as me. And someone said to me why don't you get a new car? You're working now. You should do this. It would make you look really cool. And I'm like I don't want that. I don't want to look cool. I love my car, I don't need it. I'd rather save the money, and I was just really blown away by that perspective, especially from the person. So I've always had some sense of what is really important to me versus what isn't, but then also getting stuck in what I think is important, which really isn't that important.

So I think we need to be very careful of where we pull, I guess, our focus from, or maybe our inspiration from. Is it coming from other people? Is it coming from mentors? Is it coming from people in the news or in the media, people that are changing the world? We're inspired. I remember when Facebook launched, seeing Mark Zuckerberg do all these different things, he said how hard can it be? Let's do that. I want to be the next person to design this. You get all these ideas, but the reality is it's not you. It's not you, it's someone else's journey and someone else's dream.

So I think we need to really make sure that we redefine success on our own terms, and you might do this multiple times as you grow and as you further your lifestyle and as you change that, as you have more people come into your life, if you have people come out of your life. And don't get so stuck on external influence, because those success narratives are cliched, and one thing that I always struggled with is when you hear the interviews of the people that are successful, that have made it and that's usually millionaires or billionaires and they get asked how did you make this happen? And they usually end up saying, in short, a lot of hard work, but we don't know what that looks like. So I think maybe sometimes we need to shift our mentalities away from financial perspectives but more to what have you achieved? What have you accomplished, and that's not to put a baseline against other people, but it's a baseline of your own. Doing no-transcript, that was as big a deal as me trying to do my first marathon, but the marathon's four times longer, but it's because I did not know what I did not know, and to me that was as far as I knew, as this is a big achievement. So when we change those aspirations and when we change those perspectives, it really does help us redefine success into a shifting norm. Right, and it's really important that.

I think the other thing just thinking about it is making sure that you have your values aligned to what it is that you're doing and your success story. If I was to share what I've achieved to date, like maybe sometimes I might look at it and think, oh, it doesn't seem like a lot. It is a lot Like I should never, ever take that for granted. And understanding the values that have gotten me to here, but also the values of what I have now and where I want to be going, and making sure that, as I do that, that I stick to those values and stay true to it, because that's what's going to enable me, at a core, to be the best version of myself, and when I'm on the best version of myself, I'm able to be successful in what I do, doing my 100% best, and I think that's what's really important for you.

Listening is understand, and I challenge you, I encourage you to explore the new definitions of success. What does success look like for you? Is it coming from an external influence? Is it coming from a generational perspective? Is it coming from cultural or societal shifts? Is it coming from trends we're seeing? Is it coming from a generational perspective? Is it coming from cultural or societal shifts? Is it coming from trends we're seeing? Is it coming from stories that you've heard from other people?

My challenge to you is is like what do you want? Right, stuff all that. And then when I ask you that what do you want? Why do you want it? And how does that come to being Like, if you say, yeah, I want to be able to do this, I want to be able to do that. Why Is it? Because you were inspired by someone else or you've always had an interest or you want to? Maybe you want to prove to someone that you can do it, and that's okay. I'm just challenging because for me, it's changed. It's changed a lot, and now I want to create something that is going to give me the life of a bit more freedom of time and money, of course, but also for myself and Carla right and our family and extended families and things like that to be able to travel more, to be able to do all these different things. But I know that is going to take a bit of time. It's not going to happen overnight and it already is growing. Seeing the growth, I think we've done 60% growth year on year for the last couple of years, but there's still a lot to happen before all those things can fit into place.

And you ask anyone like businesses that have been operating for 20, 30 years, five years of that, 20, 25 years is nothing, but at the moment it feels like forever. So don't get confused by that. You really got to make sure you understand what it is you're trying to achieve, because the stuff you do today will not be a problem in five years' time. I guarantee it it's not going to be a problem. You'll have bigger problems, you'll have different things you're focusing on and the success you've achieved today are just mere steps to the success you're trying to achieve later. Really do appreciate you being here.

If you enjoyed this conversation one drop a comment down below. Let me know. Let's have a conversation. If you do have any questions or you want to continue the conversation, more than happy to do that as well. But if you were inspired by this or you think someone else could maybe resonate with this, please share it, send it to someone, tell them about it. You can take a snippet of it and send it to them.

That would mean the absolute world to me because it helps the podcast grow. But also my goal is to help people further their lifestyles. You cannot further your lifestyle if you don't want to further it. Right, it all comes down to you. I can share, I can put all these things out, but if you don't want to make a change, if you don't want to do anything about it, then nothing will ever change. But I'm trying to do my part in help encourage and influence and inspire others to aspire further, and this is my way of doing that. So I appreciate you being here. Yeah, I would love to be able to continue the conversation, so please do reach out, connect and, if you can subscribe and support the podcast in any way that you see fit, that would mean the absolute world to me. You have a wonderful day, cheers.