J. Douglas Holladay | Stop Following Your Passion & 4 Essential Steps to Success

In today’s episode, we rethink the definition of success with J Douglas Holladay. Doug is the founder and CEO of Path North, a Georgetown University professor, former White House advisor, and the author of Rethinking Success: Eight Essential Practices for Finding Meaning in Work and Life.

In an age when more and more people are finding themselves trapped by the idea of a nonstop pursuit of material wealth, it’s time to take a moment and redefine what success should mean before we run ourselves into the ground, so what should success look like and what can we do to find long-lasting success that genuinely makes us better people?

What to Listen For

• What’s wrong with the current definition of success and why do we need to rethink it before we run ourselves into the ground?
• What is the difference between happiness and meaning, and how do you differentiate between the two so you are not chasing fleeting moments and rewards?
• Why is it more important to be comfortable sharing your weaknesses and failures instead of your strengths and successes?
• What role does forgiveness play in our ability to build and maintain relationships, and why can a lack of forgiveness be our downfall?
• How do we escape the trap of becoming our parents so we can take their best traits and ditch the worst traits?
• What can you do to find your own narrative while pushing back on everyone around you with their own narrative for who you are and who they expect you to be?
• What questions can you ask yourself to make sure you are living your story instead of the story everyone else wants you to live?
• What exercise can you do to integrate what you need to do and what you love to do?

Many of us define success through a lens we develop over years of experience and exposure to the world around us. Unfortunately for many, this has turned into an endless pursuit of more stuff to fill the void inside us created by the same society dangling the trappings of wealth in front of us no matter where we go in the modern world.

It’s time to redefine what success means so we can get out from under the obscene expectations set by society and start living a fulfilled life resulting from living a life inline with our values and not things.

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Resources from this Episode

J Douglas Holladay’s website

Rethinking Success by J Douglas Holladay

Dr. Michael Rich | Center on Media and Child Health

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