I don't think success looks like what we imagined it would. Personal success, professional success, any other kind of success.

I don't think success appears to us in the major ways. In the big things. I don't think success shows up in the major milestones. I think that we get true glimmerings of success in the little things. And I have learned this the hard way.

I have waited to see success in my job, in my life in the big things. In a certain number of people attending my programs. In consistency of work. In grades. In number of dates. In number of friends. In ability to be independent, in handling problems myself. In the amount of responsibility I am trusted with.

But recently, I've figured out this is never how we see success. I think success always is sort of disguised.

I've seen success disguised as:
-a 730 am phone call from a kid who missed the bus and had no way else to get to school.
-a 3 hour converstaion about life with a senior
- being the first person sought when a middle schooler got her heart broken
-having my office flooded at 330 every afternoon when school lets out
- being able to show grace to 2 kids who got in serious trouble and thought I would kick them out of the youth group
-finally getting one of the kids to speak more than 3 syllables to me after 4 years here
-fixing my own sink when it broke
-changing my own tire
-going to a party alone and being comfortable in that
-making the right decision even if it isn't what I want to do
-finally feeling great in my own skin and loving my own life.

Success is not found on the mountain tops, in big paychecks, or with having absolute power.
Success is knowing that you are doing your best.

And maybe I shouldn't call it success. Cause sometimes that makes it sound cheaper than it really is. Because these triumphs in my life are so much more than success. They are signs that I am on the right path. They are affirmations that I am pouring myself into the right things. They are the things that keep me putting one foot in front of the other instead of running in the opposite direction.

I think I would have felt better along time ago if I had expanded my idea of what "success" looked like.

And I'm willing to wager that success for me is not going to look like success for anyone else.