Why Success Has No Deadline

So many of people think that life is over if they don’t achieve their goals by a certain point in time. Usually, the date that is set is arbitrary and comes much too soon. People think that if they haven’t realized their dreams by 25 that they never will but that is a foolish and destructive way to think.

Most people are barely even aware of who they are at 25, much less what they want, and many people will enter into their 30’s still with only a vague notion as they try to figure it out. One should not let the narratives they see and hear on social media trick them into believing that this is not the case. In fact, some of the greatest achievements of mankind have been accomplished by late bloomers. People who were well past the point in life when they were supposed to be successful according to society’s standards.

Popular examples are people like Ford and Edison, both of whom did not achieve success until after 40 and represent the quintessential rags to riches story. 

Some of my favorites in this category are people like Toni Morrison, Sharon Jones, Charles Bradley, and Charles Bukowski. Lesser-known figures to be sure, but all of them possessed the same strength of will that told them to keep going, defy the odds, and define success on their own terms. 

No one has it all figured out, and they don’t have to succumb to the notion that they are supposed to. They’re not. No one arrives at a point where everything is forever perfectly aligned. Maybe a person experiences it from time to time, but only for a moment, and one soon finds out that life is mostly about just having the courage to try, regardless of whether one succeeds or not, and more than that, they soon find out that the greatest achievement is in having the willingness to, if necessary, start all over again.