Custom fit

I am always interested in learning how successful people become successful. I was initially curious about whether I could find a common pattern. But, my experiences so far (with books, personal contact and interviews via the The Real Leaders Project) tell me otherwise.

There have been many intelligent people who have tried categorizing what successful people do – they do things that other’s consider difficult, they love what they do, they have grit, they have great habits, etc., etc. Skipping a more fundamental question that involves defining what success is in the first place (its definition definitely varies from person to person), all of these make for interesting stories and are always great for perspective. However, I don’t think there are any such common categories or patterns.

I think every story is a custom fit. It seems to make sense when you look backward and connect the dots but that could be true of any story. We are great rationalizers and natural story tellers. The only factor that is probably common is luck and even that varies in degree.

My learning is to look at stories of successful people as a source of perspective. They tend to open our eyes to something we might not have paid attention to or noticed. There’s always something we can learn from the story of someone who’s made a difference and its value lies in that learning and the inspiration that accompanies it.

So, what about us? We’ve just got to keep plugging away, continue making decisions and mistakes, attempting and failing till we get really good at what we do.. and hopefully then, we will be aided by lady luck to be “successful” in our definition. Whatever else our successful story may be, I believe it’s certain to be a custom fit.