We’re bought up to think and believe that success is all about the car that you drive, the job that you do, the house that you live in and the amount of money that you earn.
Through our schooling system – you’re a success or a failure depending on what mark you get in a test!!! – how shitty is that for a kid by the way? – to the university that go to. Grandparents and parents alike love to brag about their family members that have got into Harvard or Cambridge.
This then carries on into the work environment.
When I started working, I was very much under the belief system that the harder I worked and the more sales I made the more successful I would become. These beliefs were then validated with promotions, nicer cars, more money, exotic holidays, more recognition etc.
This whole thing then becomes self fulfilling.
Certainly throughout my 20’s right up until I was exactly 30 years old, whilst working 16 hour days I felt successful.
Then something massive happened.
Something that changed and challenged this belief.
Something that revealed a part of me that I never knew existed……..
My son Harrison was born – 6 days before my 30th birthday.
I took a time out – 2 weeks off (this was unheard of at the time) to be with him and my wife.
I completely fell in love with him. Not a love that I felt for my wife. It was different. Difficult to put into words and I guess unless you have kids tricky to understand.
But when I went back to work, something had changed.
I didn’t want to work 16 hour days.
I didn’t want to sacrifice my time with my family.
BUT
I had set the bar so high, it was difficult to see how I could spend more time with them without compromising my own and my team’s productivity.
I didn’t realise it at the time but this was a serious conflict of my values and my perception of what success looked like.
I believed that in order to see more of my son I would have to sacrifice my success.
(Now I have since found out that I am not alone in this thinking)
This went on for a while and was eating me up inside.
I started to feel stressed. I got anxiety. I was sleeping poorly….and I started to get ill.
On top of this my company was in serious threat due to the credit crunch (it was a mortgage brokerage).
I couldn’t take any more of it and walked away from the company early 2008. I lost a lot of my and others people’s money as a result but I just didn’t have the fight to try and get us through that tough period.
I then went abroad – to Madrid and then Dubai in the hope of trying to ‘find’ success as an offshore Financial Advisor. Tax free income and all that! I knew guys out there earning hundreds of thousands of pounds. If they could do it then surely so could I.
The thing is though it was one of the most challenging times in my life. I was away from my wife and my little boy. Plus my wife was also pregnant with my daughter!
I was out in Dubai trying to chase riches while my young family was back home missing me.
Once again it started to feel like it was eating me up inside.
I was chasing this ‘success dream’ while feeling like a poor husband and father.
It was around this time that I started to challenge my perception of success. Could I be wrong. Could there be more to success than just the money, the house, the cars etc?
Nah!
Keep moving forward. I chose to block it out.
I did however come home.
The whole commission only tax free income thing was way too much like the film Boiler Room. Too many similarities with The Wolf of Wall Street as well when it came out!
I set up another company.
Still in Financial Services – selling insurance over the phone.
My daughter was born in the November 2008 and by the April of 2009 I was back to working my 16 hour days.
What the hell was I doing?
It makes me cringe when I look back but I genuinely thought that I was doing the right thing. I’m meant to be out there working. I’m meant to be providing for my family. Not seeing them is the price that I must pay in order to have all the things we want in life. – that’s what I kept telling myself anyway.
The thing is I sit here and write this at 4pm in the afternoon having just had a great conversation with my son about football.
My day today has looked like this:
5:30am: got up
6am: worked on my mindset and set myself up for the day
7am: content creation for my fitness business
7:30am; woke my wife and kids up
9:30am: went to the gym and had a workout
11am: prepared for my small group mastermind conference call for my members
Midday: online meeting with mastermind members
1:30pm: had some lunch
2pm: had a power nap
3pm: working on content creation and strategy for my businesses
Amongst all of this I will mess around with my kids.
We leave to go on holiday in 2 weeks time for a whole month in Spain.
My day will look very similar as described above. I will aim to get out 2-3 hours worth of content creation each day while away. This is not a burden though. I enjoy it.
The truth is I earn more now than when I was working 16 hour days.
But the big difference
is that I have designed things in such a way that I now only do things that I really enjoy and I get to spend absolutely loads of quality time with my family.
This post is about so much more than just ‘do what you love and the riches will follow’
It’s about getting in touch with your true self and understanding at a deep level why you’re here and then doing stuff that is in alignment with this.
I am now moving towards a version of success that is much more closely aligned with the real me and my deep rooted values.
Life rocks right now. I absolutely love it. I’m having an impact on the world in a really positive way. Changing lives in my fitness business and my coaching business and having an amazing lifestyle to support this.
I only hope that I can inspire someone else reading this to take a step back and may be question their belief system.
It’s about taking control back.
Yep there’s work involved but when you make a decision (that is non negotiable) it’s only a matter of time before it comes to fruition.
“Yeah Ricky, that’s alright for you. My business is different?”
To that I will just say that YOU have a choice. You absolutely do and don’t try and fool yourself by saying otherwise.
That choice is yours.
What version of success are you chasing?
There’s no right or wrong answer. As long as you’re living by a set of rules that are in alignment with your real values then that’s cool.
For those that feel like they are capable of more.
Or feel that they should be having a greater impact on the world.
Or feel that something isn’t quite right.
Then get in touch.
I’d love to hear from you.
Ricky