Daily Inspiration: “When the measure by which you judge your success has changed, find yourself a different ruler!”

“When the measure by which you judge your success has changed, find yourself a different ruler!” – Futurist Jim Carroll

When you walk off stage in Las Vegas after having spoken in front of 5,000 people – with the echo of the clapping ringing in your head – you’ll know you’ve been successful. If your world had you in front of a lineup of people asking you to sign their copy of your book, you know it’s been a success. When you go on TV for an interview and get a whole bunch of laudatory email messages after, you know it’s been a good day.

All of these things have happened to me in my 25-year career – it’s been a rocket ride! I’ve had a lot of ‘pinch-me’ moments!

And yet yesterday, I walked ‘off-stage’ from my virtual studio in the back room – and went straight into the front room where the home gym is located and started a workout. This happened but moments after my virtual keynote for a few hundred agricultural executives.

From stage to gym in less than a minute – we certainly live in a new world!

And yet I knew it was a success – the studio was flawless, the tech was fantastic, and yet more important – my content was bang on! That became evident to me not only by the participation in the text message polls that I ran through the session but also by the number of questions coming in through the Q&A panel.

Not only that – my content was solid. I’ve now discovered a formula for these keynotes, that really consists of several segments: revisiting the “era of acceleration;” the future we talked about pre-Covid; how the world has changed with Covid; and specifically, how our industry has changed as a result. From that – what do we do now?

To me, the level of interaction indicates that people are aware, engaged, involved, motivated, and spurred on to think about their action plans for a new and different future.

Bottom line? My measure of success has shifted – and I’m loving my new capabilities and opportunities, despite the fact that there are still desperately few of these opportunities.

But one thing i know – I’m a success in this new and complex world! Because I’ve got a different measure by which to judge it!