Thrive

To live a life of real fulfillment, think beyond the usual metrics of money and power.

We all want good, happy lives for ourselves and our loved ones. But what does happiness actually look like? And what does it have to do with success?

Traditionally, success is defined in terms of money and power, but for most of us, being rich and powerful isn’t enough to make us happy. So to live a life of real fulfillment, we need to redefine success.

The author learned this lesson soon after she co-founded The Huffington Post in 2005. At first, she viewed success solely through the prisms of money and power. Consequently, she put everything she had into her new company and worked like a maniac — often 18 hours per day.

She was exhausted, but she persisted. But then one day in 2007, the author fainted in her office and shattered her cheekbone. After meeting with several doctors and undergoing a battery of tests, the results were conclusive: Huffington’s unforgiving work schedule had driven her body to a breaking point, leading to her collapse.

The incident was a wakeup call. Huffington realized that focusing solely on money and power had prompted self-destructive behavior. By thinking of success only in terms of those two metrics, she had sacrificed her personal health and happiness.

To outsiders, it looked as though Huffington had achieved success because she had money and power in spades. But to her, it was clear that she wasn’t thriving. So she had to rethink her life and create her own definition of success.

To that end, she realized that thriving, living a life of real fulfillment, was the third crucial metric for achieving real success.

Thriving means creating space in your life to take care of your own well-being, tap into life’s wisdom, feel wonder and engage in giving.

So as you can see, money and power alone don’t lead to real fulfillment. But what are we actually missing when we see life only in those terms? Keep reading to find out!