“When you are satisfied, you are successful. For that’s all there is to success is satisfaction.”  July 29, 1928

Will Rogers

I recently visited a place I have been to on about five other visits. I can’t seem to get enough of the totally relaxing atmosphere of this place. It is called Pleasant Hill Shaker Village and it is near Lexington KY. One of the Shakers mottos of life is

Put Your Hands to Work; and Your Hearts to God

When I recently came across the above quote by Will this phrase came to mind.  The Quakers were a somewhat simple people who took pride in their daily work. To them being a success was making that broom, or piece of furniture, or packet of garden seeds as perfectly as possible.  We can all learn a lesson from them as well as from Will in that regard. Do everything you do so that you are satisfied and you will be a success.

There are those, especially some around Wall Street or in corporate board rooms that think that being successful is earning more and more money. More money than anyone else. To most of us that is the definition of greed but to them it means they are successful. But, of course, they can never really be successful in their own minds as there is alway more money to be made. It usually ends up that they have much less happiness then all the rest of us. It that regard I pity them.

Being satisfied is also a prerequisite of being happy or maybe this is a chicken/egg sort of thing. Don’t define your happiness in terms of financial gains. If you do you are heading towards a very unfulfilled and for the most part meaningless life.

But what do I know….