Define Success

Can I share a story related to this? We had our orientation in a company and Country head asked this question. Everyone said something - money, contentment, happiness, growth, etc He heard everyone, and said No! You are all wrong. And clicked next slide, presentation has Success definition from Wikipedia 🤦‍♀️ it was something stupid. So I interrupted and said, success means different for different people. He said, No! And pointed at Wikipedia again 😑 Okieeee as you say, no one wants to lose job on first day. P.S. To answer your question, cannot define. It is different for you and me and others

What you said is true and what I meant to say is the same as what you said, like how different people define success for themselves!

Success is mostly defined by external stimuli these days. Eg. we study to secure good marks to get good colleges to get good jobs to get good money to get a comfortable life to get a nice partner to spend the life and time with. Now a very lucky person hits all these checkpoints successfully and is called a successful person by his ecosystem. Meanwhile most of use due to internal challenges or external influences miss these checkpoints outright or take a roundabout way to reach them, even out of order maybe. That means your self proclaimed goals are dependent on your external ecosystem as much as your personal efforts. And we being humans have a never ending desire to have more. Jealousy and envy are two main drivers here. Unless you’re a saint. This is partly the reason why super successful entrepreneurs and CEOs still have the drive to do more. They might be successful as per our yardstick but for them the finish line is still moving forward. If you want to set yourself up for success truly, learn to pivot and let go. You might or might not hit all the checkpoints in life but appreciate and celebrate the ones you did. I personally love challenges. So every achievement means a better goal setting than before. Eg. reached 40lpa, have to push for 50 lpa now even though I am comfortable in my life. But while talking to my dad last month about taxes and what not he mentioned casually that my tax liabilities are almost equal to his last take home when he retired. In his eyes I was a success while in my understanding I have still miles to go to be at the salary I wish for. Similarly out of my friend circle from undergrad, I am told that I am the most successful person out of us all, while my ambition and goals are much higher. There’s a meme going around these days of an ex Microsoft employee who served 20+ years and then quit to become a goose farmer. Some people consider it an achievement and a successful career culminating in a loved retierment. Wbu?

Success is having time and money optionality - i.e. you can choose to spend as much time as you like in doing things you actually love doing without worrying ever about resources it costs for you to do it or the tradeoff in terms of money now or in future (incase you were spending that time to do something which might have earned you a different amount of money).

Getting a job in Big Tech Company

TBH, this keeps changing, if you don’t have a career, people will start talking about the lack of that and if you are unmarried, then people will point out that. So, ensure to have a balance of both the worlds and you will feel successful.