The feeling of success is like a drug. You achieve something(s) and are immediately elated, invincible, confident. Even better, there’s no comedown. You’re not going to fall asleep, stay awake all night, feel hungry or incredibly nauseous. You feel inspired to seek out what’s next. What else can you succeed at? You need to find it and accomplish it immediately to keep the feeling going.

A few weeks ago I wrote an article on running and mentioned that I’d be doing a race this June. Well, the Waterfront 10k was this past weekend, and I didn’t limp across the finish line – I sprinted. And while it wasn’t the most difficult of distances, knowing that all of the hard work during the months leading up to it garnered positive results was incredibly satisfying. I’m already sifting through upcoming races to see what I can do next.

We talk about the importance of failure in teaching us lessons, but what can success teach us? I realize that sounds ridiculous; success teaches us that we’re amazing, capable and bad as hell, duh Sarah. But if this is the case, why don’t we set goals more frequently for ourselves? Why don’t we believe in the possibility of our success more often? And no, I’m not telling you to go cross-stitch “She believed she could, so she did” on a pillow for self-motivation, I’m just saying, trust you can do something cool and new for you, and then go do it. The feeling is irreplaceable.

The beautiful thing about this is it doesn’t have to be a daunting thing every time. Yes, this race took a lot of work and preparation for me (being incredibly out of shape will do that), but I could have set a smaller, more achievable goal. Think about the things you really want, narrow in on a few and create a plan. Then start to think about the barriers to your potential success so you can work around them.

For example, if your goal is to learn an instrument but the instrument itself and lessons are pretty pricey—find an alternative. Do you know someone who can lend you that mandolin? Is there a YouTube mandolin instructional series out there? (Hint: the answer is yes.) Once you get there, don’t make your first marker of success to be the best mandolin player Canada has ever seen—start by learning a basic chord, or mastering a mandolin rendition of Drake & Rihanna’s “Too Good.”

A lot of the time we have aspirations and dreams, but beginning to achieve them seems daunting. We quit before we’ve even started by convincing ourselves the steps we have to take to begin are out of our reach.

If the thing you really want to achieve feels monumental, set achievable “mini successes” that act as steps to your ultimate goal. I could have never accomplished my goals if I set out and tried to run 10k on my first ever run. Break up your large achievement into smaller wins and enjoy the ride.

Here’s the thing I will caveat all of this with: no matter how much preparation and planning you put in place, failure is a very real thing. You may not succeed. You might pick up that mandolin and realize your hands just aren’t suited for the instrument. But to me, that’s a hell of a lot better than forever wondering if you can do it in the first place. Whatever success looks like for you, go out and get yourself addicted.

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