Grow or Die

Making progress makes us happy

Everyone wants to live on top of the mountain, but all the happiness and growth occurs while you’re climbing it. ― A. Rooney

The Deep Desire for Growth

During the first few months of the pandemic when I first started working from home, I had some extra time. Getting “camera ready” for online meetings and getting “go to work ready” is a much different process. Yes, I am talking about a ponytail and sweatpants with a work shirt.

There were also other tasks that allowed me some extra time. I no longer needed to pack my lunch and my work bag and most significantly, my commute was now only to my spare bedroom, turned office. There were days when making the shift to distance work took a commitment far past regular work hours but for the most part, I was gifted a few extra hours each day.

With this extra time, I started writing and started several online courses and other distance learning opportunities. I remember pitching the purchase of one of the higher-priced courses to my husband with this: If we can’t invest in my education I might as well die. Yes, super dramatic. But, during this time I realized I had been drinking the nectar of lies about success and happiness and it was time for awakening my hazy subconscious.

I knew my subconscious held the clues to my ultimate success and true happiness. In the hustle and bustle of my fast-paced life, lies had hijacked my beliefs. I was waiting on things outside of myself to be “able” to take the next steps toward my own success and happiness. This gift of time made me say to myself, Now is the time. I have the responsibility and the power within me to create whatever it is I want.

On my first day back to work in person, I saw my desk calendar set on March 12, the day we left 18 months ago. It said: Do something today that your future self will thank you for. I am encouraged by this synchronicity. I am sure growth will be a more intentional and permanent part of my life from now on.

Success and Happiness Aren’t What We May Have Believed

My husband immigrated to America from Jamaica in his late teens. He had the impression that just being in America would afford him a successful life including the traditional family, the big house, and the white picket fence he had seen on TV. He immediately found out that was not the case.

Reading a story from George Blue Kelly, If you Take a Pig to America, It’s Still a Pig, reminded me of this aspect of the success and happiness journey. He speaks to some of these same points and uncovers many truths about what it really takes to move toward your own success and happiness. If you haven’t read George’s journey, you really shouldn’t miss it. He has made profound sacrifices and is deeply dedicated to his own growth, success, and happiness.

Changing Course

Sometimes success doesn’t turn out to be what we thought it would be and it doesn’t always bring us the happiness we expected. Sometimes by choice and sometimes by circumstances, we must change course.

Melanie J. shows us this in her authentic journey to her best self. It doesn’t include the corporate career she thought it would. In her story, I Lost My Job and Found My Freedom, she goes as far as writing, Rest in Peace Operations Finance Manager for she hath done what she could during this phase of her life.

The meaning of success and happiness sometimes gets hazy in our subconscious based on the nectar of lies we have been fed from our families or society. Melanie has broken through to gain clarity on what success and happiness mean to her.

True Feelings of Success and Happiness

I heard a Tony Robbins interview this morning. He talked about true feelings of success and happiness. Here is what I captured:

Knowledge doesn’t change you, action does. We are either growing or dying. Just having potential alone won’t lead to success, there must be action. The results of our actions increase our beliefs, confidence, and certainty which leads to the unlocking of our potential. Sometimes we may feel stuck. If we can’t take quick simple steps to create momentum sometimes we can rely on visualizing our results ahead of time to get the momentum we need to move and grow.

Success doesn’t make us happy. Achieving doesn’t make us happy. Succeeding at something we have worked long and hard for brings only short-lived happiness in most cases. In reality, that happiness comes from the growth, not from the achievement. The feeling of happiness will go away if we don’t continue to stretch ourselves and grow.

All of this solidifies the shift in my thinking, how I will experience my life, and how I will move toward the things I want.

My destination is no longer a place, rather a new way of seeing. ― Marcel Proust

Thanks for reading! I hope everyone finds the inspiration and tools they need to feel the happiness and success that accompanies their growth.

Thanks to Diana C. for the space to explore our growth and for the prompts: Drinking the nectar of lies and Awakening the hazy subconscious.