Recently, I visited a place with free and left with three of them. One of those books was a success manual by the famous speaker and life coach Tony Robbins.

I won’t speak for or against Tony Robbins or his definition of success. Also, I have only read a small part of his book, so I am no authority with his ideas.

I am writing as a Christian, and I agree with one thing that I read in the book from Tony Robbins. You must know what success is before you work to achieve it. You always own the definition, for you. I think Tony Robbins and I agree on that one.

If you are curious about Tony Robbins, more information is available here: Tony Robbins, Wikipedia

probably keep reading that book. 

I also have my own stories to remember:

When I was younger, I went through a phase when education was my success. I studied hard and earned more than one degree, and then I graduated. I remember looking at my bank account, after graduation, and realizing that my education had taken all of my money, and I was broke.

After struggling through several temporary jobs, someone told me how to fix my money problems. I did what they recommended, and I achieved financial success. For several months I worked as driver on a cement truck. I delivered wet cement to construction sites.

Don’t judge me harshly for doing that. Those truck-driver paychecks did a great job of putting money back into my bank account, but I had this nagging doubt.

That job was not the life-success that I had struggled to find, when I pursued an education. I had a different definition of success from the managers in that company. But I liked that money so much that I just couldn’t quit.

If you wonder what happened, in the late fall, we were ‘laid off’ until the springtime because where I lived, winters were cold and snowy, and wet cement was not important in cold weather. In the spring, when the weather finally warmed up, I was not called back to work.

Later, I learned that my cement company was searching for its own success. In the autumn, they drove their trucks to Texas, where winters were warmer, and they liked that place so much, they just stayed there.

My friends and I lost our jobs permanently and we felt like failures. Have you ever had a job where getting hired and promoted by some important people was success, and getting demoted or fired was your personal failure? Their ladder of success can become a central meaning in the workers’ personal lives.

When I was jobless in the springtime, I had to search in my memory and reconstruct the success in life that I really wanted. Looking back, I am grateful to Texas for getting my life back on track, and I did have some money in my bank account.

I didn’t get sucked into someone else’s success, for me. I had to go back to my own purpose, for my life.

The cult of social success, as defined by others, has ruined many lives. It is important for us all to get focused, and stay focused.

We are warned about this in the Bible; “the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life” can take our focus away from the things that really matter. 

In a different translation: 

Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life, is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever. (1 John 2: 15 to 17)

In old Bible stories, it is easy to miss that people, in those times, were obsessed with personal success, as defined by someone else. The Romans, who ruled everything, had emperors and senators and centurions etc. And at the bottom, about half of the population was slaves who were owned as property, and they had no social status. Success for a slave was just staying alive. 

Other people, like the Greeks and the Jews had important people who dressed and acted out their success status. Ordinary working people could only look at them with awe and respect.

Into that ladder of success, a man named Jesus started preaching, and he spoke to two brothers:

While walking by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon (who is called Peter) and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Immediately they left their nets and followed him. (Matthew 4: 18 to 20)

Those two busy fishermen understood; that preacher wanted to get their lives focused on a purpose that mattered. Notice that they immediately quit their jobs. They had a new vision of success.

I am not telling you to quit your job, but there is a lesson here for all of us. Every life, including yours and mine, has a purpose, and God can help us to find it. The world didn’t give it and the world can’t take it away, but we can give it away, if we are not careful.

I hope we can be our own success coaches and learn this lesson for ourselves.