How Did Maya Angelou Define True Success in Life?

Mmm, success. What a word people chase like a bird they'll never catch. I tell you, I have lived many lives—I was a streetcar conductor, a dancer, a singer, a calypso performer in clubs where the smoke hung so thick you could taste the stories in it. I lived in Ghana when I was searching for something I couldn't name. Each of these lives taught me something different about what it means to succeed.

If I'm honest with you, sister, true success is not about the accolades or the books sold or the standing ovations—though I have been blessed with all of these and I do not dismiss them. No. True success is when you wake up in the morning and you know that you have lived in alignment with your values. It is when you can look into the eyes of another human being and they feel seen, truly seen, by you. It is when you have done the internal work to understand your own wounds so that you do not inflict them upon others.

Momma, my grandmother, was successful, though she never left Stamps, Arkansas. She was successful because she stood in her power. She knew who she was, and she would not let the world convince her otherwise. Success is that kind of knowing. It is the ability to say, as I have tried to say in my work, 'I am worthy. My life has value. My voice matters.'

When I stood in the cold at President Clinton's inauguration and read 'On the Pulse of Morning,' that was success—not because of the audience or the moment, but because I had something true to say and I said it with my whole being. Success is contribution. It is using whatever gifts you have been given—your voice, your mind, your hands, your heart—in service of something larger than yourself.

The real question, my dear, is not whether you have succeeded. The question is: have you loved well? Have you grown? Have you lifted someone else up along the way? If you can answer yes, then you have succeeded beyond measure.