Successfully Unsuccessful

I have always insisted that success will never change me. Whether I become a rock star or a Nobel Prize winning author, I will not allow myself to become polluted and unrecognizable to all who have known me.

The problem lies with the fact that success typically requires hard work (or in some cases - working hard) and dedication; often even sacrifice. I am mellow-yellow personified. I can have focus and drive - but with limits. I would have to change who I am BEFORE I ever get the chance to become someone who I am not.

So what remains. A small handful of opportunities that hinge on a huge amount of imagination and an even larger amount of luck. It seems silly at first - aiming at the smallest targets and crossing fingers for success; however I am harnessing all of the energy that a successful person expends in their 14 to 18 hour day and magnifying it. Rather than droning through the day using much of my intellect on schedules and interoffice drama, I focus all of it on one idea - topic - or project. Six to eight hours a day, four or five days a week, throwing all of my energy into a singular subject for maximum imagination + creativity + productivity.

Not willing to become someone I am not, I continue to use imagination and life experience to become successful with who I am. I do my best work after midnight, I feel balanced when I go to sleep when the sun comes up, and all but require Sundays and Mondays be responsibility free. I'm taking the time in the evenings to fix dinner and then help my kids with homework instead of flying to [insert major metropolis here] twice a week for meetings or being in traffic till the kids are nearly in bed. I'm taking an hour at night to bowl in the living room with my family on the Nintendo Wii rather than staying late at the office.

I am of the belief that the hard worker pleases others, while the smart worker pleases others AND himself. It is this belief that is the basis for my belief that when you can no longer derive pleasure from a task or it's result; it is then that you should recognize that you are not on a road that intersects with success.

Imaginatively,
KW

oh yeah...
I really want to be telling the story of my recent reunion with my biological family, but I have to get some of this mental clutter out of the way before I can find the words.