Why Success Should Not be Measured in Money

This is a guest post from Umair Abid, a blogger I am mentoring who lives in New York who is one of my many regular readers and commenters whose native language is not English.

I encourage all people who have
something worth sharing to interact here.

Some complain about those whose English is not perfect and many bloggers delete their comments and do not publish their posts. To them I have this to say:

How many languages can YOU understand, speak, read, or write?

I believe in SUBSTANCE over appearances.

Umair has something important to say, and I for one do not wish
to miss out on that because his English is not perfect.

Even when I do not agree with all the points someone makes or they use examples that I would not have used – I will defend and facilitate their ability to express their opinions freely. None of us knows everything.

Wisdom comes to us all a little at a time over decades
rather than springing from us fully formed.

As celebrated writer Mark Twain wrote:
“It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble.
It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.“
(which, by the way, is really bad English.)

You can learn more from Umair by visiting his Internet Marketing blog and following him on Twitter @SeoAdviceSS.

Image Credit: Broke Grad Click Image to Read How To Establish Financial Priorities

SETTING PRIORITIES:

When our parents raise us, their first preference is usually our studies. They cut down the luxurious expenses from budget just to make sure that we study well, stood first in every grade, got admission in most famous university and finally get the luxurious job with exceptionally high pay.

This is exactly what our grand parents did with our parents and what may we do to our children.

I swear I will not do this to my children because of these two reasons:

1. First, I am a human who will give birth to a human – not horses which need to win the race of making more money
2. Secondly, because I love them and will not let them suffer like I did for opposing the rules and standards of my society.

When I was in school, I had much interest in the Internet –
not because of chatting, Facebook, Youtube or any other stuff
which can be used for wasting time – but due to my
interest in reading, exploring and creating things.

Apart from how I stumbled into the practical job of Internet Marketing, I started doing well in the very beginning for the company which hired me as an SEO. I remember my colleagues were talking about how to get projects from freelancing sites to make some extra bucks. I was not really interested in making money at that time I was only 19 and 110$ / month was well enough for me.

The reason I was not interested in making the extra cash was that
I had different goals compared to the people in my surroundings.

The people of our age have a very strange approach of getting inspired from a public figure. They don’t get inspiration from the creative skills, knowledge, and hard work of individuals like Bill Gates, Steve Jobs (R.I.P) or Mark Zuckerburg. Instead they get inspired by how much money their companies generate.

This is really very funny approach when we see that many such public figures are living a very simple life and their major goal is not simply to multiply their earnings. All they want to do is to create something new every day or keep trying it.

They actually do not enjoy earning – what they enjoy is working!
Working on something which they love to do.
Not on something only because it makes them more money.

Luckily I understood this thing at a very early age and right from that time I have worked to become something close to my ideal – not in terms of social status – but in terms of knowledge and skills. I do what I love to do, ignoring how much money I will make.  I will learn what I want to learn whether it has any obvious monetary benefits in the future or not.

I admit that I am not earning that much,
but the thing which makes me feel happy is that
I have been constantly learning and doing the work
which I have always dreamed of doing.

This is my success – this is actually what I consider success:
I have achieved my dream without sacrificing what is important.

Sometimes people say to me,
“But you can make more than what you are earning right now”

I want to ask them this question:
Can you limit how much you think you really need?

Corrupt people earn exceptional amounts of money daily,
but at the end of day they can’t sleep,
because all they can think about is how to earn more!

Many people earn the same amount of money,
but they don’t make how much money is in their
bank accounts so important.

They are not so concerned with how much they accumulate.

They focus instead on the work they are doing
and the level of excellence they have achieved.

They don’t worry about which car they are driving
or how big and impressive the home they live in is.
They live simple.

Really think about this! I truly believe
This is the secret of a successful life.
I have limited sources of income so I keep my expenses modest
And still I have fulfilled all my wishes.
That is what I call SUCCESS.

Hopefully, now you know why I felt that Umair had something important to share with us.  In editing this post I focused on making his important points more clear and helped them stand out and made a few changes to his English; however, I did NOT make his English perfect because I feel we all should learn to overlook such details and seek wisdom instead.

Now might be a good time for me to share that yes, I am aware that my blog is not polished and that highlighting text and boxes and especially red text does not look “professional”.

I consider it more important to make sure my readers grasp important
points and understand the concepts than I am about appearances.

Doing this has the added advantage of having those who care only about appearance and not substance leaving. They are not my target audience and would not agree with much of what is published here anyway.

If you liked the wisdom that Umair has shared with us, remember to follow Umair on Twitter and check out his SEO Advice and Social Strategies blog.