What Does Success Mean To You?

As small business owners, we naturally concern ourselves with success. However, recently my 35-year-old nephew had an unexpected heart attack and died. His death made me look closely at what success means.

I remember years ago telling marketing people that my purpose was to create a world in which all people love their lives. The response I got was, “You may want to change that because most business owners and executives don’t really care if their people love their lives and they may dismiss you for such a lovey-dovey purpose.” I found this disheartening and at first worried I would not be taken seriously as a business person because I valued causing this above all else. I was also sad to think that those in positions of power and wealth would largely be cynical about matters of the heart and soul and could think them unimportant and irrelevant.

I decided I did not want to work with people who did not care about their employees, or feared emotions, or who might dismiss me for putting my lovey-dovey stake in the ground. This brings me back to the question about success. Many of us were sold a concept that success is wealth, power, good looks, talent and celebrity but is that really success? Last week, a 24-year-old Dallas Cowboy defensive end, died. He was to sign a $7million contract, had a beautiful girlfriend, was loved and respected by her, friends and family, and was at the top of his career. By all accounts, he was achieving success. Yet, while living the dream, he took his own life.

I think that almost everything we have been sold on about success is wrong. We think it means to be invulnerable, to win at all costs, to strive and prove things, even to live a long, healthy life. What if it’s not any or mostly these things? Each of us has to come to our own conclusions. Here are some things I think;

Integrity. To thine own self be true. In running LifeWork Systems I have not always stuck to my guns about what’s best for a client. Sometimes I have given way when leaders fear mixing roles in their CultureEX™ pilot projects or when people don’t like how much work is in our immersive change process. I’ve compromised to please or to win business I feared I’d lose. I stopped this; it’s NOT success to sell our souls. Success is integrity.

Goodness. My nephew’s dad has ALS. Over this past year, I have sometimes helped him, my sister, and both of my nephews (there is one still alive). What I learned from being around them so much more now, is how consistently kind, affectionate, humorous, authentic, loving and generous they have all been through the good times and the bad. Being kind and helpful and real is success; I feel it down to my bones.

Emotional Intelligence. Success is acting on feelings, not acting out. Many people think some feelings should be avoided. During the week my nephew died, I happened to be reading the book The Artist’s Way. During this week, we were to deprive ourselves of reading (books, social media, etc.), watching TV and listening to anything that would take us away from our feelings. You might imagine how hard this was. But I learned how to allow all feelings and learn from them. Anger for example, is here to help us realize what we want, not to use to attack anyone. I did not fully realize the importance of sitting with all feelings, even darker ones, without acting out on them but learning from them. Emotional intelligence has brought me success in loving self and others.

I know there are a lot of other lessons to be learned about life, death, and success. I encourage you to explore what really matters about all of it. You deserve a life (including work) that you love and for which you achieve great success. Just make sure you know what is of greatest importance about success and you will be one! LifeWork Systems is here to help you to help everyone in your organization be successful and to love their lives!

This article is published in my column The Extraordinary Workplace in St. Louis Small Business Monthly, December, 2025