Every new day that comes will bring opportunities to improve on who you are and to be better. The success of an individual is not a measure of what they have achieved in the past, but how they continuously improved upon it and have become better over time. This is why I normally tell people that success is not what you just hit and it is over, it is something you work on on a daily basis. You may not be perfect; no one is, but the idea is for you to keep making advancement and putting conscious effort to be better daily.
One of my friends was telling me how, when he was in secondary school, he finished as the best in almost all the subjects - and this was many years ago. Of course he was celebrated at that time. He got admission into one of the polytechnics in the country, but for some reasons, he did not go beyond the Ordinary National Diploma. After many years, what they celebrated him for became as issue of concern. Even his family would tell him "the best student in secondary is not successful with anything." What they considered as a success many years ago lost relevance because he did not upgrade or improve on it.
I advised him that it is never late to go back to school to complete his education, at least he has an OND. With the OND certificate, he applied for direct entry into the University and got admission into second year. He went through it with dedication and commitment, and he graduated among the tops in his set. If he had not worked to improve on his last success, he would have gone into obsoletion. You stay relevant when you work to be better, if not, you may begin to lose value. The world is constantly evolving, and so also should you evolve with it.
In your place of work, even if you were employed with a particular certificate or qualification, or possessing a particular skill, it is expected of you to upgrade yourself over time. Your relevance in the organisation is tied to the value your create, but you can only create value to the extent at which you have upgraded yourself. The more you improve on yourself to get better, the more you will be sought after, and the more your worth will increase. Your today should be an upgrade on your yesterday.
In life, you are not in any competition to be better than anyone. In fact, if you have hustled to beat someone else's record but you have not improved on your personal best, then your success is questionable. What counts as an improvement is becoming better than you were. This is why you have to be focused on your own attempts to be better and not on what someone else has achieved. It is true that people can motivate you to take actions, but they should not become your standards that you have to pattern yourself after them. Their success should not determine your own because you are not in any competition with them. What concerns you is how to be constantly better.
At the end of each day, always try to take a review and do a self-appraisal of what you did for the day. This will help you to know if you have maximized the day - if there is something you should have done which you did not do, what to improve on, area to get better at, etc. Trust me, the truth that will make the most meaning to you is the one that you have told yourself. You need to be able to determine what aspect of yourself that you need to improve on and then work towards making it better and becoming a better person. You may not be where you had intended to be and you may not have achieved all that you have wished for, but by all means, you should try to improve on where you used to be. The kind of success that you want may not happen overnight but with constant efforts, you will get there.
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