Anecdotal definitions of success

The definition of success depends on where you are, both in life and in terms of your geographical location. It takes a while before you understand that it does not have a static meaning attached to it. Rather, it changes over time like everything else in this world.

I find a lot of people are not comfortable with it being so fluid in nature and to be completely frank, I used to be one of them. But I am 28 years old now, living as an immigrant family man who will be raising 2 sons (second one is due any day now, wish me luck!) with my beautiful wife, away from my home country - and I feel like I am finally getting comfortable with the fluidity of what I think success is supposed to mean.

The definition of success is fluid in nature: it may expand in the empty corners of your mind; it may contract when life happens and your priorities change

1. The childish success

I was born and brought up in India. I remember when I was 5, we used to watch TV programmes like every other Indian household of the early 2000s. The recurring theme of success in those shows was someone who was either in the US or UK, or someone who recently returned from these countries after making a fortune.

“Lots of money” or “The American Dream” - nothing in between.

The Indian education system is notorious to peddle a very crooked definition of what success means - good grades, a good college, and that’s it. My elder sister and I quickly understood that getting good grades was enough to feel a sense of accomplishment so we used to study - a lot. Students who were not so good in academics but very talented in other fields like music, dance, art, karate etc. were never in the limelight.

Success was pinned to only doing well academically so that you can go to a good college and eventually make lots of money abroad, in countries like the US. Such a pitiful defintion.

2. The youthful success

In secondary school, I kept thinking that proving myself to others was directly proportional to how successful I was. I kept pushing myself, trying to achieve goals in life which would give me a sense of accomplishment. While this did work to my advantage — I was able to win international coding competitions, work on a startup in grade 12, and end up in my favorite university for my Bachelors degree — in hindsight, I really think the definition of success at this age was quite misguided. I have written more about this in an older blogpost: No, your child need not become a computer whiz.

During university, success was good grades yet again, plus internships at big tech companies. UWaterloo’s famous co-op program was the new angle. It was also the first time I was not the most successful amongst my peers. Rather, successful students from all aorund the world were now competing against each other. The (almost) daily loop was to grind LeetCode, chase referrals, and attend Hackathons or local tech meetups. Eventually, I did get the offers, did the internships but graduated into a full-time version of the same loop.If I am being honest with myself, a lot of that was me still trying to prove something to a version of myself from grade 8 - that I had made it.

Success was proving yourself - through the company name on your LinkedIn - so you could go and prove yourself all over again the next quarter. Such an exhausting definition.

3. The family man’s success

Now that I have my own family, the whole equation looks different. Success isn’t a goal I am chasing anymore - it is a series of small, unimpressive things which I have now become comfortable with, thankfully. Things like - did my wife have a hard day or a good one. Is my older son sleeping through the night or why not. Is the second one (still cooking, due any day now - wish me luck again!) okay in there.

The strange part is, the old definitions still sneak up on me at times. I catch myself imagining what my sons might “become” - top of the class, a good university, a stable career. The exact same script my parents had for me, perhaps. And then I remember how long it took me to undo that script for myself, how much of it I am still undoing, and I try to stop.

What I actually want for them is harder to put into words. Probably something like - figure out your own version of this question, and figure it out earlier than I did. And when the answer keeps moving, which it will, don’t be scared by it. The one thing I want to stay constant - for them, for my wife, for myself - is whether we are actually happy as well as content in our life, averaged across an elongated period of time we’ve spent. This is something I am not negotiating on.

Success is whether the people in this house are okay. The wife, the older one, the one still cooking. The first definition that has actually felt like mine.

None of these definitions ever turned out to be the final one. This one probably won’t either. And I think I am finally okay with that.