How do you measure success?

Can success be measured? What is the general criteria?

I drew up the following list -

• Being consistently creative
• Doing the work you like
• Being able to work where you want and when you want
• Being able to work across diverse fields
• Learning new skills in the course of the work
• Getting satisfaction in work well done
• Getting paid well for work done
• Helping people find the right solutions for their problems
• Getting respect and acknowledgment from peers
• Being healthy on the way to wealthy
• Having enough savings for the rainy, snowy, sunny, earth-quaky, volcano-bursting days
• Being well-liked generally, without anyone tripping up to capture your private moments for the public media

For the record, I never thought it was all about keeping up with the Joneses.

But it's nice to remind yourself from time to time about wh0 you are and what you are all about.

Especially when the Joneses look down their noses and make pointed remarks about lilies of the field that neither toil nor spin.

And what do you do in that situation?

A. Do you throw a fine fit and a thundering tantrum about being a grossly misunderstood creative person?

B. Do you calmly and patiently explain in detail the time, effort, thought, research and learning that goes into crafting an article, designing a web site, producing a graphic, creating an illustration or painting a picture?

C. Do you hike up your nose in your turn and offer them that lovely tale about pearls before swine?

D. Do you hone your acting skills by pretending you are too thick-skinned and superior to be felled by such minor barbs?

Well, it really depends on when they drop the clangers and what sort of mood I am in - saintly, educative, bloody-minded or beastly.