Success

Live well, laugh often, love much


Memory is a funny thing, in the sense that a seemingly irrelevant or unrelated trigger can spark off a chain of recollection. But what is even more peculiar about memory is the conclusion that this chain of recollection leaves you with; an imprint of the past to face the future. When I walked into the restaurant to meet the godson for brunch yesterday, I could hear him shouting and waving to me, "Papapaaa Papaapaaa!" which is his equivalent of Godpa, as I have since learned that the guttural "g" is difficult to articulate (for now). This sight (and sound to be specific) reminded me of a pharse "Live Well, Laugh Often, Love Much" that I saw in a Sydney cafe a couple of weeks back. As there was WiFi available in that cafe, I Googled the phrase and was pleasantly surprised to find out that it is a line from a poem entitled "Success".  The poem is written very much in the same vein as Rudyard Kipling's "If" being prescriptive and setting out, commandment style, the author's definition of Success.  This started me thinking about the meaning of Success. But being on holiday (and due to the arrival of the food which was awesome), such thinking didn't last very long and was shelved until Arbite's second anniversary celebrations last night. Sitting here now, after having led you through a whole irrelevant chunk of words, I have come to the conclusion that I now have a better understanding of Success. And in a way, Arbite's 2nd anniversary celebration was a little celebration of this new perspective. I have in the past two years, through Arbite, Etienne and a myriad of experiences learned a tremendous amount about how Success should be defined. I have learned that Success is not about how high up the corporate ladder I climb nor is it about what I do for a living or what I have. It is instead, very much about who I am to the people around me and to those that mean the world to me; Do I feel like I have made them Lived Well, Laughed Often and Loved Much? It is not about the titles that I add to my name or memberships in professional bodies. It is about earning the title of good husband,  good father and being an active member of the most unprofessional body, the family unit. It is about trying to make a difference in this world that we live in, even if that difference is only on a personal level.  It has taken me two long years to reach an understanding or to get this glimpse of what Success truly means. Now, I have the rest of my life to achieve it.