Why Success in Business Doesn’t Always Lead to Happiness & Fulfillment

So many people want to start a business because they think success in business is their ticket to a life of happiness and fulfillment. The reality is no amount of success can bring you happiness and fulfillment. Achieving massive success before fulfillment is so dangerous it could actually kill you.

If you think fulfillment comes from business success or romantic success, you’re at risk of spending your entire life on an impossible hunt. The key is to achieve fulfillment before you achieve success and this article will teach you how.

We’ll get more into mastering the art of fulfillment in a bit, but first, you need to learn to define success for yourself.

How do You Define Success in Business and Life?

For most of us, success is something defined by our parents, family, or friends. You probably never sat down and defined success for yourself. You’re living in someone else’s world with no guarantee achieving their version of success will even bring you fulfillment.

You have to define success on your own terms. What type of success best fits the type of fulfillment you seek? If you don’t answer this question, you’ll never be happy no matter how much money you make.

Even a Multi-Billion Dollar Deal Doesn’t Automatically Bring Fulfillment

I want to tell you a story about the founder of Minecraft. This game became insanely popular over a short period of time. He was eventually acquired by Microsoft for 2.5 billion dollars. Recently, he Tweeted the following: “Hanging out in Ibiza with a bunch of friends and partying with famous people. Able to do whatever I want and I’ve never felt more isolated.”

As an entrepreneur, he achieved every level of success you could imagine. He got acquired by one of the biggest companies in the world. Articles were written about him all over the place, yet he was still unhappy. In another Tweet, he wrote “The problem with getting everything is you run out of reasons to keep trying. Human interaction becomes impossible because of imbalance.”

This is a really interesting quote. The first part is saying he has everything. If I could coach him, I would ask if a 2.5 billion dollar company is really everything. I would suggest that it is only a small piece of the pie for him. Even billionaires can be unhappy if they don’t understand the art of fulfillment.

You Can Easily Learn the Art of Fulfillment

I am going to share the secret to easily learn the art of fulfillment, but I want to tell you how I learned this secret the hard way. I lived the mistake of chasing success before achieving fulfillment for years. Financial freedom was my goal and I achieved it as a 16-year old kid. I started a successful business at 16. It made me miserable and borderline depressed. Why? Much of the same reasons the founder of Minecraft pointed out.

I would call my friends to go to the movies, and they would say they couldn’t afford to go. I paid for their gas money and movie tickets. Eventually, they started to feel bad. It made me feel like I didn’t have friends.

Ultimately, I had to look in the mirror and realize the reason I wasn’t fulfilled was me. Once I had the money to do whatever I want, there were no excuses for me being unhappy. It wasn’t my circumstances. It was me.

Another excuse I see people make is thinking a successful romantic relationship will make them happy. Then, they find the person they’ve been waiting for their entire lives. They look around and realize they’re still unhappy. It’s an eye-opening moment when you realize the only person who can fill the void inside is you.

The Secret is Happiness and Fulfillment are Simply Decisions You Make

The key to achieving happiness before success is understanding happiness and fulfillment are only one decision away.
Using this secret to your advantage comes down to changing the things you focus on. Instead of focusing on the things you don’t have and what makes you unhappy, focus on the things you do have and what makes you happy.

 

When you focus on positive things, you give them empowering meanings instead of self-limiting meanings. This inspires you to take positive action.

You have to decide to change the things you focus on, and then assign empowering meanings to the things you do focus on. Fulfillment is a decision. Look for empowering meanings to the things around you.

Last night, I was driving home at 8 PM after being at the office all day meeting with coaching clients. I knew that my kids would already be in bed and I wouldn’t get any time with them. Instead of focusing on these negatives, I focused on how I was blessed to be able to run my own businesses and help people with their businesses for a living. Little things like this add up towards you making different decisions and taking different actions.

You’ll really benefit from the secrets I share with you in later episodes of the Titanium Life podcast once you master the art of fulfillment. They will help you achieve success in your relationship, finances, career, and any other areas of your life. These tools are useless, though, without understanding why you need to achieve happiness before success.

An Exercise to Start Working on Happiness Before Business Success

There will always be good news and bad news. My challenge to you today is to start focusing on the empowering things around you. Be the best you can be while also being happy with who you currently are.

One way to help you work on achieving happiness before you work on achieving new levels of business success is to keep a gratitude journal.

Each morning for the next 30 days, write down 3 things you’re grateful for. Gratitude and happiness are two closely linked emotions. This exercise will help you understand that link and realize you already have everything you need to be happy.

Achieving happiness before business success is just one of the core concepts I focus on with my business coaching clients. Schedule a free business coaching consultation with me to learn more of my secrets to business success.

This article was inspired by episode 3 of the Titanium Life Podcast with Arman Sadeghi. You can listen to that episode below: