Success (?)

Ok, so there I am on a Sunday: a World Economic Forum event. Attended a couple of things, got into an interesting conversation with the International Editor of a publication and ultimately felt good about myself and life in general.

Then I stopped... everyone kept going, but I stopped. "What the hell am I doing here? It's a Sunday. I must be the youngest guy here by five years, even ten. Is this it? Is this what success looks like?"

Just some context: I'm 29, but have worked since I was in college at 19 - full-time kind of work, not part-time. Some would say my career is meteoric, fast-track written everywhere. I somewhat don't feel reassured. On the one hand, I feel I lost part of my life... hell, I only got my weekends back at 23 ... 4 years... yes, 4 years of no real weekends. A couple of vacations, yes... but now real weekends while working. On the other hand, I go back to my initial question: "It this what success looks like? What is success?"

Well, at least my definition of success - from what I remember - included some professional success, not too much, not a lot of riches, not a lot of money, not too much glamour... just enough of everything. It did include some white picket fences, well at least a wife or a reasonably "sustainable" girlfriend, some kids maybe - I'm good with kids. Yet, nothing there... professionally meteoric? Not sure, but even if I was, none of the rest. None of the "real life" that I wanted for myself. No real safe harbour. No real home. Just very nice apartments in some exciting cities, nice hotel rooms which are more common than not. Just the life of a so-called successful professional.

So today, while everyone was going around and I had stopped, I thought about the future. What do I want to do next with my life? Professionally I'm ok for now, but my life ... the rest of it... the whole of it? What about that? Is there anything I can do, even if I wanted to?

Not sure. Really not sure. I have more questions than answers and all my pseudo-philosophy of life is really nothing more than a couple of dreams: some vivid, some not.

I feel I need to re-invent myself, do the ultimate transformation, become an agent of change for myself: people say I'm good professionally as an agent of change, for crying out loud I've been doing it for 7 years, so why not for myself?

Yet, I've been here before and the result wasn't too good. Probably the worst time of my life. "You think too much" - people used to tell me and so with time I stopped thinking. I became happier.

Well, therein lies the dilemma: to think or not to think; to change or not to change.

One day a good friend asked me as one normally does: "What do you give the man who has everything?". In a moment of true genius (or I might say so myself) I answered to my own shock: "You give him the ability to appreciate all that he already has". My friend was shocked as well.

That's it: I need to appreciate what I have and stop whining. Is that it? I sure hope it is.