By Bill Quain
There are thousands of books written about success. Go to any bookstore or type in “success” on Amazon, and you’ll get enough suggestions to last you a lifetime. By the time you get finished reading the first ten success books, there will doubtless be another dozen added to the list!
Authors write about it, motivational speakers talk about it, and educators spend many hours in the classroom trying to define it. You can achieve success by adjusting your “7 Habits” according to Stephen Covey or dropping to a 4-hour work week according to the guy who wrote about the 4-hour work week, Timothy Ferriss. You can ask almost any successful person, and they will give you their recipe. However, I believe it can all be boiled down to just three words: money, sunny and honey.
To become successful, you need money.
Money is the easiest success ingredient to define, but for some reason, money is controversial. At Stockton University, I teach a class called “Make Money And Pay It Forward.” You’d think that would be a fairly noncontroversial course to offer at a university because each and every student is paying me (and all the other professors) to teach them how to get a decent return on their investment of time and money that the students pay out each semester. Well… it turns out that the subject of money is pretty controversial on a college campus. Nonetheless, in my opinion (and I’m the one who writes this column each week, so that makes my opinion the only one you are going to get here), money is the most important ingredient in success.
Look, you need money – unless you plan to live on a commune, where no one has money. By the way, when I first graduated from college, I did spend a short time in a commune. I’m not kidding! I’m glad I did because it took me a very short time to realize that not having my own money was a bad thing!
While most people understand they do need money, many people have no idea of how to get it or even who has it now. I’ll write more about getting money in next week’s column.
To become successful, you need sunny.
Okay, your first question is going to be “Bill, what the heck is sunny?” Sunny is your health: mental, physical and emotional. I call it “sunny,” because I think healthy people reflect a sunny attitude – optimistic, stress-free, strong, etc. Now, we can’t all be classically beautiful, statuesque, and glowing. However, we can all maximize whatever we do have.
Just like money, you wouldn’t think sunny would be controversial, but it can be. I do get feedback from people who say, “Well, there are times when life just gets you down.” That’s true, and I will address that in my upcoming “sunny” column. But for now, think about having that “sunny” attitude.
To become successful, you need honey.
The third component for success is honey. What is honey? It is your relationships. Think “Honey, I’m home.” Successful people have successful relationships.
Of course, even honey is controversial, because someone will always shout out, “Well, you can’t control relationships, especially if the other person is acting stupid, or jealous, or whatever.” Yes, there is always someone shouting out something about every one of the money, sunny and honey standards, but let’s look at the big picture here.
It is always possible that even the most successful people are going to run across someone who is just impossible to be with. However, it is also true that successful people have lots of caring and satisfying relationships in their lives. The relationships may be with friends, significant others, colleagues, customers, and acquaintances. They may be with other people who cross into their lives, such as their gardener, doctor, grocery store clerk, etc. Successful people – really successful people – get along with others, and successful people build those relationships.
Just like my promise with money and sunny, I’ll be doing a full column on honey. Stay tuned for that!
Didn’t you get the order wrong?
I can hear it now. Many of you are shouting, “Bill, you got the order of money, sunny and honey completely wrong! It should definitely be honey, first, then followed by sunny. Money is the least important part of success.”
To that claim, I have two answers:
- Think about this sentence: “If you don’t have money, it isn’t going to be very sunny, honey!” Folks, I don’t know much, but I do know that the thing that breaks up most relationships in the U.S. is money. And they aren’t arguing because there is too much money!
- If you think one of the other items is more important, change your list. However, without all three of them, you aren’t a truly successful person.
Money, sunny, honey: three upcoming columns
Okay, stay tuned to Shore Local Magazine. We’ll take an in-depth look at the three success standards, starting with money. Who knows? We might need more than one column for each of these three standards.
It’s a long winter here in South Jersey, so tuck in and enjoy. Maybe we’ll interrupt this series for Christmas and New Year’s, but let’s face it. If you are a snowbird, you’ve probably already left for Florida. Remember, you can always read Shore Local Magazine online!
So, stay in touch. Drop me an email at bill@quain.com. As I say each week, “I’ll see ‘ya in the papers.”
Bill is a Professor in Stockton University’s Hospitality Management Program. He is the author of 27 books, and a highly-respected speaker. Even though he is almost totally blind, Bill is a long-distance runner and runs the Ocean City Half Marathon each year. He lives in Ocean City with his wife Jeanne, and his Guide Dog Trudy. Visit www.billquain.com or email him at bill@quain.com.
