When you judge another, you do not define them, you define yourself.

-Wayne Dyer

I don’t normally post Quoteable posts on any other day but Friday. However, I saw this quote and thought it was so current. Over the last few days I’ve been researching how to make this site a better experience for my readers. I want a site that I am proud of, and one that my readers love visiting.

When times are tough and life is knocking us around a little too much than we’d like, a lot of us are negative. We mistakenly think that the reason success eludes us is because “things will always suck” or we’re “not meant to do this.” Funny thing is, the people who are wildly successful have also been where you are at your toughest moments. Unless you or your family is fabulously wealthy or connected, things don’t just “happen”. You have to work for them. (And even then, money doesn’t equal automatic success or happiness. Some of the most miserable people I’ve ever encountered were crazy rich). We need to worry less about what others are doing, and focus on our own success and well-being. We need to love ourselves first. We need to ban negativity from our lives. If you are consistently working towards the things you want most in life, and not just sitting back and doing the easy thing because you are too scared to try (or too scared to fail!), then you are making daily progress towards your dreams. It is the conscious daily effort to work toward your goals and improve your life that will get you to where you want . Even the most insanely successful people have tried and failed again and again. The difference between them and the negative nellies who prefer to sit back and bitch about others’ success is simple. The successful people kept trying, kept working towards what they wanted most. They had enough love, self-determination and confidence in their dreams and future success to keep going when everyone else around them had given up.

I’ve been reading about successful fashion writers/editors, those women and men who run really awesome, amazing & successful websites. For every person who loves their sites, there are at least two others who are judgmental, bitter and angry at these people’s success. There was one very-well-known fashion blogger in particular that the haters saved their most poisonous ranting for. They said the most hideous stuff about her. Some were dismissive, saying she lived off a trust fund. Some criticized her personal style, and said that her whole image was ‘just as fake as she is’. Others were blatantly offensive, saying she ‘really’ made her money by working as a prostitute. It struck me as so sad that someone would quite literally hate you for your success and be so bitter at you for doing the things in life you love. And that’s why this Wayne Dyer quote really hit a note with me. It’s like my wise-beyond-his-years husband says to me all the time: there is no cap on success. There is no set number of people who are “allowed” to be successful in any one field, doing the things they love the most. If you love baking cupcakes and this would make you the happiest – work towards it! So what if there are six other bakeries in your town that are already established. You will always bring something unique to whatever you do because there is only one you.

So, bottom line: believe in yourself, work towards your goals and keep on trying when everyone else around you has given up. If you have chosen to be brave and work towards what you want, you are already making progress. It might seem scary now, but it would be scarier to get to the end of your life and realize you never went after the things you wanted the most.