2021 Cross Country Adventure

How Do You Define Success?

Here’s what Henry Ford said

On the eighth day of our eastbound 2021 Cross Country Adventure, I noticed some uneven wear on the front tires of our RV. We’d been feeling vibration in the steering wheel. I knew we had to get the frontend realigned. We found our way to the nearest Ford Dealer.

The service writer told me they couldn’t even look at our RV for at least a week. She gave me contact information on a couple of front-end alignment shops nearby. Just as I was leaving the dealership, I noticed inscribed in large, ten-inch letters above the showroom door, Henry Ford’s definition of success.

I have been defining and teaching success for over 50 years. I’ve never defined success in purely financial terms. I learned to think of success as the nature of the journey, not a place to arrive,

“The progressive realization of a worthy ideal.”

This is a good definition, but not as good as Henry Ford’s.

Since we all want to be successful, it is important to work out our definition of success. Just like you, from my first step I have wanted to succeed. We all succeeded at walking, or we’d still be crawling.

I have earnestly studied countless books and listened to many great teachers ascribe their definitions of success. My early learning in Sunday School and church grounded me in the importance of sound character. My first formal introduction to the necessity of goal setting came with Earl Nightingale’s The Strangest Secret. The challenge we face, as we discover that we “can get by” without trying that hard, without making sacrifices, without giving up immediate gratification, requires a longer look. A look beyond today. A look over the horizon. A look beyond our little world, and rationalized comfort with “good enough.”

We have a moral responsibility to make the best of what God created when we were granted life, to employ, not bury our talents. This belief, too, lacks the specificity of Henry Ford’s succinct definition of success.

“To do more for the world than the world does for you – that is success.”
Henry Ford

Mr. Ford’s definition is about giving, not about getting.

Many years ago, I learned this statement for understanding how life works,

“Service is the price you pay for the space you occupy on planet earth.”

So how can you succeed at ever higher levels, use all your talents, expand the quality and quantity of your service? Do more for your world! Give more to your world, than your world gives to you.