The life lesson: certain strategies improve your chances for life success! The successful woman: Alanis Morissette.
Morissette knows what she wants out of life – which means she’s on her way to getting it.
“Down the road I would love to have a full-blown family, but I am nowhere near ready to be married,” she said in Chatelaine, April 2008. “I have a ways to go before I am emotionally mature enough to sustain a healthy connection. I’m too much of a kid still, but I’m growing up. And I mean that in a positive way.”
Morissette is perfect example of See Jane Soar: a Canadian rock star who has reinvented herself several times. She’s gone from “mall-rat pop princess” to spiritual seeker, and she is the inspiration for these strategies for life success. For more info on getting what you want out of life, click on Creating Your Destiny: How to Get What You Want Out of Life by Patrick Snow.
5 Strategies for Life Success – Alanis Morissette
1. Enjoy your past achievements. Getting an education, finding the right job, raising your kids, or surviving a health crisis are steps to success in the future. The first strategy for life success involves reminding yourself of how far you’ve come and what you’ve survived. Use that knowledge to help you get what you want out of life!
2. Learn from your failures. If your relationships keep ending in disaster, be honest with yourself or go into counseling to find the truth. If you didn’t lose weight on one diet, try a new fitness routine (and read 6 Ways to Increase Weight Loss Motivation – Martha Beck). If you didn’t get hired for the first few jobs you applied for, figure out why. The second strategy for life success involves not ignoring your mistakes and failures! Let your past guide your current decisions.
3. Break your goal down into small steps. Whether you want to get a medical degree or welding ticket – break your goal down into smaller, easily accomplished steps. Get information. Collect applications. Put feelers out. This third strategy for life success involves taking action to avoid feelings of being overwhelmed and scared.
4. Tweak or abandon what isn’t working. You can’t get what you never had by doing what you’ve always done, my friend! How are you contributing to a situation you dislike? You can’t control other people’s behavior, but you can change what you’re doing. The fourth strategy for life success is about replacing what isn’t working with new (sometimes scary) behaviors. Or, take Alanis Morissette’s cue and put some life goals on hold until you’re ready to handle them.
5. Envision what you really want. The final strategy for life success involves visualization. Picture where you want to be: honored by your partner, earning a decent income, standing up for yourself. What you envision, you will achieve! Focus on getting what you want out of life – not what you don’t want. For more motivation, read Getting What You Want Out of Life – Angelina Jolie.
A final word from Alanis Morissette: “This is about as happy as I think I’ve ever been in my whole life. So much has to do with being able to take care of myself. Before I was looking outward. Now I know there is no way anyone else can parent me or love me in the way I have to do. There is a peace that comes with that for me.”
What do you think of these strategies for life success? I welcome your big and little thoughts below…
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I think these are good advices! But sometimes in life happens so that you really work so hard, break goals into small steps, every day and night, every week follow your goals… and in the end when you’re so near – something bad happen and drop you in other direction!
When we strain every nerve to achieve our goals we often don’t succeed.
And sometimes when we just do something and do not focus so deep things just happen!!!
Luck seems to be a big factor in life success. Some talented, hard-working, and skilled people don’t go as far as others…and it’s not always about how hard they try.
Haven’t you noticed that some women are just luckier than others? Some people seem to have it all without even trying.
Those are all great points, especially the last one on envisioning as by picturing it and feeling it with all of your senses, makes it believable to your mind and body and then it is much more likely achievalbe as beliefs are huge in affecting our lives.
But I would like to add something I’ve discovered about life success that has been huge for me and that is to re-define success in a way that feels good to you. If we look at success in terms of what our parents, friends, family or society want for us, then it might not match our heart and soul desires and we’ll end up disappointed even if we do ’suceed’ in achieving the goal. It’s helpful to look underneath at what is motivating the goals and dreams in the first place to see if it is what you truly want.
The other thing that is helpful for me is to look at success in terms of how I feel about my life, right here today, rather than the number of things I’ve achieved so far, or how close I am to my goal. If I feel content, happy and joyful right in the moment – that is success to me!
Gini, I just wrote and posted my “Letting Go of Other People’s Expectations – Maria Shriver” article, and then read your comment – which totally relates!
I think looking at what motivates our goals and dreams can be the same thing as bowing under the weight of other people’s expectations. Sometimes it’s hard to tease out what we really want from what other people want.
And, about defining success…I’m so bad for defining it in terms of what I’ve achieved! I love feeling content and happy, of course, but I don’t look at my feelings as a definition of success. Hey, it just occurred to me that if you feel sad, rejected, or bitter — you won’t feel successful. But if you define success in objective measures or accomplishments instead of feelings, then you can be successful no matter how you feel.
Interesting — thanks for your comment, Gini! If you or anyone else has further thoughts on what makes a woman successful, please feel free to share them here.
Laurie
I love that we can have this dialogue through your site like this – the topic of success and how to measure it is an important one for me and my clients. I think I need to redefine what I meant by judging success by feelings, because if you’re feeling rejected or bitter, chances are there are unmet expectations and judgments going through the mind, whereas if your feelings come from the core of your being where joy and lightness is natural, then it won’t matter as much if you don’t reach the goal or if someone rejects your work etc. as you feel good within and intuitively know another, better opportunity is most likely just around the corner.
If we only let ourselves feel good and successful by concrete measurements such as how many clients we have, how many articles we’ve published, how much money we have in the bank, we are giving our power away to external circumstances and will feel great some days and aweful other days.
For me, I don’t want to have to prove and measure my success all the time, but rather enjoy feeling successful simply because I’m alive here on the planet with wonderful gifts to offer others – which may or may not be seen, reciprocated or validated by others all the time. I see success as an inner glow of self-affinity and confidence that shines outward into the world to touch and ignite others’ inner success.
Yes, I love this form of dialogue, too! And I know others are reading but not commenting….I wonder what they think?
I think I understand what you mean about feelings of success coming from the core of your being – not transient feelings. And, I understand about the concrete measurements or yardsticks of success.
Your last two sentences are beautiful, Gini. Thank you. This is another reason this form of dialogue is so special — your words are alive for others to read and benefit from!
I still have to figure out my own definition of a successful woman. I just wrote “The Definition of a Successful Woman – Eleanor Roosevelt”, and that helped alot. The thing is, success can mean so many different things to the SAME person – and of course different things to different people.
Anyway, I really appreciate your energy on my blog, and I’m glad we’re here.
Laurie
“Yes, I love this form of dialogue, too! And I know others are reading but not commenting….I wonder what they think?”
I think you’re right… but as that’s hardly a “productive” comment, I usually don’t write just to say “I’m totally nodding my head at your words here on my computer screen”.
Also, I’ve just realised that since I’m in a stage in my life that is not exactly marked by economic success (starting up as a freelancer, living in a expensive Western European city, having less than 5 years’ professional experience), I’ve been measuring success by how I feel about what I’m doing and where I am in life, as mentioned above. And for the most part, I feel very good about it (I live in Europe! I work for myself! I’m at the beginning of an awesome career!). So that’s nice. Thank you both for articulating what I was doing/feeling.
I’ve also been putting certain goals “on hold”, though without realising I was doing that! As an example, some of my goals are: 1. Become fluent in another language. 2. Get married/Be in a fulfilling long-term relationship. 3. Become “successful” professionally. 4. Own my own home. 5. Have kids. … and I’m perfectly content with the fact that I’m not accomplishing them in that order.
I like the this quote from Ms Gini Grey very true in its essense: “If I feel content, happy and joyful right in the moment – that is success to me!”
Thanks for your comment, addicted to life!
My blog partner and I were just talking about that yesterday, about how hard work and straining can be an impediment to achieving our goals. A better strategy for life success may be to set our intentions and proceed in the direction of our dreams, without being all worked up about achieving goals or being a huge success.
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