We pay a price for everything we get or take in this world; and although ambitions are well worth having, they are not to be cheaply won, but exact their dues of work and self-denial, anxiety and discouragement.
-- Lucy Maud Montgomery

From Anne of Green Gables, of all places. Though I don't remember the book too clearly (I was a kid), I do remember loving the miniseries when I was a teenager. And one classic line from Anne, "It's not what the world holds for you, it's what you bring to it." I always did love that sentiment. :)

In other news, day 1 back at work & I already have the old, familiar headache right between the eyes...

A man without ambition is dead. A man with ambition but no love is dead. A man with ambition and love for his blessings here on earth is ever so alive.
--Pearl Bailey, via Quoteworld

A few weeks back I received an email from Quoteworld, featuring an apology for not emailing its daily quote for the month of December. I hadn't received my daily quote for the month of December -- or, indeed, for the eleven months before that.

But I am pleasantly surprised to see it returned.

Quoteworld. Daily quotes. Occasionally.

Yesterday's post, which questioned success, inspired some thoughtful responses -- and also the offer of groupies (thanks, gigica!). Never wasted on me, I assure you.

There are certainly dozens of measures of success, & I suppose what I'm looking for is not so much to work out whether *this* or *this* is success, but what I myself would consider necessary and -- importantly -- sufficient to call myself a successful writer. When will I not cringe with embarrassment whenever somebody mentions me and writing in the same sentence? When (if ever) will I walk into a party & start to introduce myself to strangers as 'A Writer'?

Or, no, let's take a step back. When, in my own mind, will I be comfortable with the label 'writer' as part of my identity?

There's every chance I never will be, of course, and some time ago I did slam the confusion some people develop over 'being' versus 'doing'. So maybe what I'm really wondering, rather than 'when will I be a successful writer' is 'when will I know I'm doing good'?

Reassuringly, several people identified with my list for success, and that missing thing I touched on in point #5 received a few suggestions. Peace, satisfaction, liking the thing you've created. I agreed with all those comments. But what's interesting is that I assumed they would be a *result* of success, not a measure of success. Not part of success, in other words. I am trying to settle the bees in my stomach by looking for some kind of elixir to soothe them. But maybe that's not how they work. Maybe they're more closely tied with success than I realised.

Maybe they even *are* success.


"Don't get too depressed about not being where you want to be. This nagging feeling of anxiety is actually called ambition. Ambition is your friend."
-- Atom Egoyan