Are you successful or a failure?

The anonymous comment to the last post has made me think a bit more than usual. Nothing unusual there tho as I think to much anyway. But I wonder, do you think you are a success or do you think you are a failure?

I'm going to get a bit ahead of myself here as far as chronology goes but not to bad. If you've read any of this you know I started with nothing. Not even wanted by my mother so actually less than nothing.

I've been hungry, didn't eat for a week and others times for several days at a time. I've been completely homeless with no place to live and several times all I've had were the clothes on my back.

Did I consider myself a failure even then? Not a chance in hell. I may have been at the bottom but I knew I wouldn't be on the bottom forever. There is one thing I have faith in and that's myself.

While I wasn't homeless and hungry by choice, things that weren't in my control happened. However in another way it was by choice because there were people who would have taken me in, fed me and given me a place to live if I had asked.

Letting them do that for me would have made me feel like a failure. I have always been to damn stubborn and independent to ask others for help. I've taken care of myself since before I can remember. I rely totally on myself as I'm the only person I trust 100%. Perhaps this is one of the reasons I can't or won't deal with people who are unreliable.

Lol, so that statement is going to lead me to relationships eventually. Before that tho I want you to know that I have had 4 successful businesses. Success being I made money at all of them.

The best part of it is I was successful in 4 different areas. I owned a construction business, new homes and remodeling. I owned a restaurant and I'll never own another one. That was as close to failure as I've come in any business. I owned a highly successful manufacturing company that I started after I'd gotten laid of from a job I'd had for 12 years or so. Then I owned a successful Internet business.

I'm in the process of starting a different Internet business because I got bored with the old one. Hired some people to run it and they pretty much made a mess of it. See, that's what happens when you rely on others. I needed a new challenge and this new biz is it.

I expect the one I'm starting now will be even more successful than the last one. Why? Because I've spent the last year reading, studying and learning. Same as I did before I started my previous net biz.

I didn't know how to write html, I barely knew any marketing, nothing about search engines or much of anything else I needed to be a success on the net. I taught myself everything I know with free tutorials I found on the net.

MOF I also worked a full time job while I was teaching myself. I hate working for other people and I have one hell of a fear of failure. Combine that with being intelligent, stubborn and independent and there is no way I can fail. Not one. No chance. It's not an option. Never has been and never will be.

Relationships are another story. I don't even begin to know how to define success in that area. What I do know about me is that after the newness wears off I haven't been truly happy in any of them. Hmmm, just a thought but perhaps I've set my standards for a woman so high so I won't find one and thus can't fail.

OTOH I don't know how to define happiness either. I'm not sure I even know what it is, let alone how to be it.

However I haven't failed at happiness or relationships yet. How can I say that? Because I haven't given up yet. I've learned from each relationship, I've learned from sadness and depression and I've read and studied both relationships and happiness.

Besides, you can't fail until you give up. I didn't make it this far to fail at two of the most important things in life. Now I admittedly started out at less than Zero in those two areas but I'm learning and I may have learned enough to be slightly above Zero now.

Like everything else I've done in my life I expect to be successful at those two also. Like with everything else I'm to damn stubborn to give up. You absolutely can not fail until you give up or quit.

Giving up and quitting on myself are two things I just don't do. They are both choices and those very same choices can be made by anyone.

From where I started to where I am now is one hell of a long way. If I could do it so can you. So what's your choice? Be successful or a failure.