The most important lesson for any new graduate, someone early on in their career or even a savvy veteran to understand is that success only works in a reciprocal manner. What that means is, our desire to succeed should truly be as great as our desire to help others reach their big goals.
Once we have this purpose and vision aligned, the sky is truly the limit. The opportunities and relationships we’ve always dreamed of begin to come to light. As an author and keynote speaker, I see this all the time with individuals that take time to do deep personal work.
Let’s start with the cold-hard truth: at our core, we want to succeed because we want to find happiness and satisfaction for ourselves. It’s only human to look out for our needs and focus on “our game” versus someone else’s. To a certain extent, this will take us far in life. But if you look at it on the flip-side, if we focus only on our path and our needs, we won’t get very far.
“The most accurate term for happiness…is the one Aristotle used: eudaimonia, which translates not directly to ‘happiness’ but to ‘human flourishing’.” — Shawn Achor
For one thing, none of us make it on our own. We need the help of others to advance our careers, our personal ambitions, and to find a life partner and satisfying relationships. We want to be happy. But in order for us to be both successful and happy, we have to recognize that the same people willing to help us are also looking for the exact same thing for themselves.
And why wouldn’t they? Isn’t that what we’re trying to do? So how do we get people to take an interest in us — to help us achieve our big goals and purpose? We respond by taking an active interest in helping others back. We don’t just do it as an obligation or because we think it’s the right thing to do. We make an active choice to become personally invested in another individual’s success and happiness.
That investment of time is always time well spent — because it has a compounding effect of interest that helps elevate us in our own pursuits.
Looking Out for Yourself and Others
In a constantly evolving world, we have to look out for ourselves and recognize what we need to do to preserve our self-interest. An emotionally intelligent person is interested in overall success and achievement — not just for themselves, but for their peers.
Their inspired leadership and passion, combined with their optimism, drives them to want to do best for themselves AND others.
Too often, we get so self-absorbed and concerned only with “WIIFM,” or — What’s in it for me? We have to be concerned about this. It’s a must, so don’t let anyone ever convince you otherwise. But in the same way that we should be focused on our self-interest, we should also maintain a spirit of desire and hope for wanting to see the people around us succeed.
Not only is this a brilliant safeguard against envy and greed, but it also revitalizes our passion and drives us toward achieving our next goal. It helps us gain allies and builds powerful relationships that come back to help us in a reciprocal fashion.