Ever wondered how to measure success beyond the numbers that society often prioritizes? Join me, Todd Bertsch, on this eye-opening episode of The BOLT Podcast as we challenge the conventional success metrics. Inspired by a poignant story involving my son’s high school assignment, we highlight the importance of aligning success with personal values and intrinsic goals. Drawing wisdom from Bruce Lee, we explore practical steps like self-reflection, setting meaningful objectives, and finding a balance between traditional metrics and genuine fulfillment. Tune in for heartfelt insights and actionable tips to help you redefine what success means to you.
In this episode, we journey into living a life free of regrets by staying true to our authentic selves. Drawing from Marshall Goldsmith’s powerful book “The Earned Life,” we emphasize the priceless value of time and the necessity of focusing on what genuinely matters. Through a thought-provoking exercise where we imagine our own eulogies, we gain perspective on our life’s true desires. Regular self-check-ins and reassessments are encouraged to keep us on a path to lasting happiness and fulfillment. This episode is a must-listen for anyone, especially the younger generation, aiming to cultivate an enriched, joyful life without looking back with regret.
Chapters
- 0:15 Redefining success beyond numbers
- 3:00 Todd shares his personal story about his son
- 4:29 Success is often defined by what other people think
- 6:09 Practical tips for redefining your own success
- 9:14 Tracking goals
- 13:07 Embracing success without regrets
- 14:34 Marshall Goldsmith’s book titled The Earned Life
- 16:14 What will people say at your eulogy?
Links & Resources
- The Earned Life by Marshall Goldsmith
- Comparisonitis: How to Stop Comparing Yourself To Others and Be Genuinely Happy by Melissa Ambrosini
Related Episodes
Contact Us
Have a topic idea for an episode? Have some feedback about this episode or THE BOLT show? We’d love to hear from you.
Email us at: thebolt@toddbertsch.com
Todd Bertsch: 0:15
Welcome back to The BOLT Podcast. I’m Todd B, your guide on this exciting journey of personal growth and leadership, where my guests and I will share personal stories from our transformational journeys of how small changes can lead to massive results. You’ll discover tips on overcoming obstacles, setting and achieving goals, building lasting habits, developing confidence, living a happy, healthy and positive life, and so much more. If you’re ready to cultivate a growth mindset and become the best version of yourself, then let’s ignite your growth today. In today’s episode, we’re going to explore new perspectives on measuring success. We’ll dive into the topic of redefining success beyond the numbers and avoiding regrets as we navigate through our careers and our personal lives. It’s easy to get caught up in chasing the numbers, albeit salary numbers, promotions, social media followers, how many awards we’ve won.
Look, I get it. I’ve been there. And it’s tough, depending on the season. You’re in right, when you’re first starting out, you’re young, starting a family, buying your first home, you want to be a great provider, and that season of life might look different in the way that you measure success than it does when you get older and into your career. But what if these metrics aren’t truly reflective of success? What if they lead us to regret rather than fulfillment?
Todd Bertsch: 1:54
Today, we’ll explore how to redefine success in a way that prioritizes meaningful achievements and lasting happiness. So why do you think so many people equate success with numbers? I blame it mainly on society and the media. Our society often equates success with measurable outcomes because they are easy to quantify and compare. Numbers provide a concrete way to gauge progress and status, and I get that. For example, I’ll be successful when I achieve salary of X, when I buy a half a million dollar home or when I gain two million social media followers. These are tangible markers that people can easily recognize and understand. However, these metrics can overshadow more intrinsic and meaningful aspects of success, such as personal growth, happiness and life satisfaction, which can also be tracked and measured.
Todd Bertsch: 3:01
So I have to share a quick personal story with you here my son, who is now 26,. When he was a senior in high school, he had a class assignment where he had to interview someone he looked up to. I was grateful that I was a person that he chose. He wrote a great paper, but there was one quote I wanted to pull out and share with you because it goes perfectly with this episode. So here’s a direct writing from his paper.
Todd Bertsch: 3:29
After I finished the interview, we continued speaking, but the conversation shifted to my future plans. Because Todd is my father, he felt compelled, after sharing intimate details of his life, to offer me this explanation Success isn’t about the money. It’s about having a job you love and loving your family, and my success now lives in you. They were simple and powerful words, words that I will keep close to my heart for the rest of my life. Wow, yeah, that gets me choked up every time that I read that. I was going through some papers and I just happened to find this. It was from I don’t know like eight years ago, but you can see how relatable it is to today’s episode, and it really is all about defining success in a way that is meaningful to you, defining it your way and not somebody else’s way.
Todd Bertsch: 4:28
Success is often defined by what other people think. You know the old saying keeping up with the Joneses. It can be easy to set yourself up for failure if you look to external factors and influences for success. While they may seem happy and successful in the media, are they truly happy? And who cares anyway? Right, they are not you. You create your own plan. You define your own success. There’s a great quote I found by Bruce Lee that I wanted to share with you. He says always be yourself, express yourself, have faith in yourself. Do not go out and look for a successful personality and duplicate it. I think Bruce was spot on there, right.
Todd Bertsch: 5:16
So how do we begin to redefine success beyond the traditional metrics? Well, redefining success requires a shift in our mindset. We need to start by identifying what truly matters to us on a deep personal level. This means setting goals that align with our values and our passions, rather than societal expectations. For instance, someone might find fulfillment in creative expression like crafting, painting, photography, helping others, volunteering at a local nonprofit or maintaining a good work-life balance. By focusing on these intrinsic motivators, we can create a definition of success that is more personal and more fulfilling, a definition of success that is more personal and more fulfilling.
Todd Bertsch: 6:10
It takes time. It takes effort. You’ve got to discover what truly matters to you and then chart a course to achieve it. If you’re lucky, you’ll land a career or a job that vibes perfectly with your goals and your values. But even if you don’t, there’s still time right. Don’t sweat it. It’s never too early to start chasing your goals and making progress anyway.
Todd Bertsch: 6:37
So here are some practical tips that you can take to redefine your own success. The first one is self-reflection. So take the time to reflect on what truly matters, what makes you happy and fulfilled. Consider moments in your life when you felt the most content or the most successful. What were you doing? Who were you with? In journaling, this is a great tool to use for this. Start to make a list and start filling it out.
Todd Bertsch: 7:05
The second one is set meaningful goals. Once you understand what matters to you, set goals that align with your values. Instead of aiming for a promotion solely for the pay raise, think about how the role could contribute to your growth and your satisfaction. Number three is balance metrics with meaning. So, while it’s okay to have numerical goals, balance them with qualitative ones also. For instance, aim to spend a certain amount of time with your family or pursuing hobbies that bring you joy, and I’ll share some examples of this in a minute.
Todd Bertsch: 7:45
And number four embrace the journey. This is my baby. This is one of my favorites. You’ll hear this in just about every episode. Focus on the process rather than just the outcome. Celebrate small victories and progress, and recognize that setbacks are a part of the journey. Look, life is an infinite game. We are continually evolving and tweaking as we go. Number five everyone’s path to success is different. Avoid comparisons, as Bruce Lee said. Avoid comparing your achievements to others and instead measure success by your own standards. There’s a great book I read a couple years ago called Comparisonitis. It’s a great book. It’s fun, it’s an easy read. She goes really deep into her personal life. She was a dancer for a lot of years and expresses and shares how difficult that was right Comparing herself to others all the time. So I highly recommend you check out that book. I’ll have a link to it in the show notes.
Todd Bertsch: 8:51
And then last is tracking those new goals. Once you’ve defined your new goals for success, I highly recommend that you track these in some way. This will ensure that you stay aligned. It’s very easy to get off track as life gets busy and starts to fly by. So here are a few things that I do that might spark some ideas for you.
Todd Bertsch: 9:14
So, as I mentioned in several of my episodes, I’m a bit crazy when it comes to tracking goals in general. So I’ve created this customized habit life tracker for several reasons, one of which is to keep me aligned to my success goals and to live with no regrets. So I start with a life audit every January, scoring all the things that are important to me in my life. Then I create my revised goals for the year. Then I track these goals daily, weekly, monthly. This allows me to identify gaps or patterns so I can adjust. Here’s some examples of what I track and what success means to me. So don’t judge me. I’m just sharing so I can maybe spark some ideas, but this does work.
Todd Bertsch: 10:03
So one of my goals that I track is five days a week. I want to have quality time with my wife. I know what you’re thinking. No, this isn’t that. This is time talking, walking, really enjoying each other’s company. So I have a tracker and I track this. Now another goal I have four days a week. I want to have quality time with my daughter. I have a preteen and time with her is tough. Look, hanging with her dad at this age just isn’t cool. But hey, I don’t stop trying. I’ll take whatever she gives me and I’ll drop everything, but I want to track that. I want to make sure that I’m getting that time with her.
Todd Bertsch: 10:43
The third one is I want to spend more time with my parents. So at least one day a week I want to touch, base, call text or hopefully get together with them. Look, my parents are getting older. I don’t want to look back in regret and say I wish I would have done this or done that. At least I want to stay in touch and I’m blessed that we’re local. We’re like 15 minutes away, so there’s no excuse.
Todd Bertsch: 11:08
Another goal is spending time in nature. Look, this makes me happy. This recharges my mind, my body, my soul. I get reconnected, so I want to track that. I also track how many minutes a week I read. I want to have this continued growth and learning. And then, lastly, I track one day a week I want to do something related to my mission giving back to the community. So this is just a sample set of things that I track and goals that I have, but these are the things that define success to me, so I want to make sure that I stay on par with these.
Todd Bertsch: 11:47
I may also go as far as to put time blocks on my calendar. My wife used to make fun of me for this, but she realized it actually works. The key for me is that I have one calendar for both business and personal. This keeps everything in one place, it makes it visible at all times and it’s on my PC and my phone Same calendar so really there’s no excuses, but it makes me really stay attuned to what’s important to me, right? Make sure that I’m aligned so that I can track these things and worked two jobs for most of his life. I never asked him what his goals were or how he defined success, but looking back, he somehow managed to never miss a single sporting event for me or my sister, and look, we played everything all year round. So he was a busy guy, but he always put his kids first. Maybe too much to some degree, but I think this was how he defined success quality time and supporting his kids. So you can see, success comes in all shapes and sizes, right, and it really depends on what season you are in life.
Todd Bertsch: 13:07
But let’s talk a little bit about avoiding regrets. You know how can we redefine success to live a life free of regrets, cause they’re tied to the hip here. So living a life free of regret often comes down to making choices that align with our true selves, just like we’ve been talking about. When we pursue our goals that reflect our values and our passions, we’re less likely to look back with any regret. Regret typically stems from realizing that we have spent our time and energy on things that truly didn’t matter to us, and by that time it’s too late, right, unfortunately. By redefining success and focusing on what is really important, we can ensure that our efforts lead to lasting fulfillment. And, additionally, it’s important to stay flexible and open to change. As you enter into different seasons of life and life’s milestones like marriage, kids, job first house your commitments will change, your availability changes, and that’s okay, that’s life. So your definition of success may evolve over time. Being adaptable allows us to adjust our goals as we grow and change, reducing the likelihood of regret.
Todd Bertsch: 14:34
There’s a great book by Marshall Goldsmith titled the Earned Life, and Marshall has coached thousands of these top-level professionals in the world, and when he surveyed several of his clients who were heading into retirement and, by all accounts, to many of us, have lived a very successful life come to find out many of them have regrets about how they define success in their lives that all the money in the world and all the accomplishments will not buy you back time, time lost with family and loved ones, time lost doing the things that brought you the most joy. You can’t get this back, so you can see how important it is to define success right, because time flies so fast. Next thing you know you’re in your 30s, then your 40s and your 50s, like me, and you’re looking back saying, oh man, success for me was starting or owning a business or getting to this C-level spot, but by doing that I had to make some big sacrifices and I missed out on all this time with my family and my kids and my friends, or all these hobbies that really were these passion plays for me. You don’t want to do that right? So think about it early and often and make sure that you’re staying aligned to what is important to you. Do me a favor right now and let’s play a game called the end of life game.
Todd Bertsch: 16:14
How do you want to be remembered? What will people say at your eulogy? Do you want to be revered as a person who was a devoted family member that never missed your kids, sporting events or dance competitions? Do you want to be remembered as a person who was happy, fulfilled and brought joy and excitement into every room and conversation? Do you want to be remembered as someone who had a positive impact on society and left a legacy and paved the way for others.
Todd Bertsch: 16:48
Looking back now, do you have any regrets? I wish I would have X spent more time with somebody. I wish I would have traveled here. I wish I would have started a business or a nonprofit. I wish I would have volunteered more. I wish I would have went skydiving. While this may seem morbid to think about, it does help put things into perspective, right? The one thing everyone wants that money can’t buy is time, and, as you know, time flies by folks. Whether you’re having fun or not, it just does. And once you get married, start a family and have a thriving career, the next thing you know decades have gone by. I would love nothing more than to get this message across to the younger generation so they can focus early and live fuller lives, enriched by experiences, memories and joy, with no regret.
Todd Bertsch: 17:49
You know it’s never too late to change your course and define your own success model. So, in summary, success is a personal and evolving concept. It’s important to do regular check-ins with yourself and reassess what success means to you. Don’t be afraid to make changes if you find that your current path isn’t fulfilling. Look, life is too short to live by someone else’s definition of success. Create your own path, one that you’ll be proud of and satisfied with when you look back. Remember, success is what you make of it. Until next time, stay true to yourself and redefine your own path to success and live with no regrets. Thank you so much for listening to this episode. You are on your way to growth, transformation and joy. If you find this episode helpful, please like and share with your friends and, by all means, please leave a review. You can also view the show notes and The BOLT newsletter at toddbertsch. com. Remember, real change takes time. Start small and watch the growth take shape.

EPISODE SUMMARY
Success is a personal and evolving concept. It’s important to regular check ins with yourself and reassess what success means to you. Don’t be afraid to make changes if you find that your current path isn’t fulfilling. Life is too short to live by someone else’s definition of success. Create your own path, one that you’ll be proud of and satisfied with when you look back. Remember, success is what you make of it.
Until next time, stay true to yourself and redefine your own path to success and live with NO regrets.