Make No Assumptions About Success

July 23rd, 2007 by Shaun Boyd

It was surprising to see how radically my site’s visitor statistics changed overnight. One day, LifeReboot receives 9,000 hits from 850 unique visitors. The next day, LifeReboot receives over 700,000 hits from 36,000 unique visitors. That’s just amazing. That’s incredible progress. That’s the power of the Internet.

The traffic spike occurred thanks to the social bookmarking site Digg, where people can see what’s new and popular on the Internet. It featured two of my articles on its front page, leading thousands of Digg users to my site.

July 2007 Bandwidth Consequently, LifeReboot experienced a day where it received 42 times as many visitors as what I’ve come to consider “normal,” the number of LifeReboot subscribers tripled, and the earnings from advertisements jumped from five to fifty dollars. It’s quite exciting.

I’m trying to be careful though, because it is tempting to label LifeReboot a success.

It’s easy to jump to conclusions about the future of LifeReboot, and imagine that with the site earning $50 per day, it will yield $1500 per month.

It won’t — or if it will, it won’t yet. This traffic spike is an isolated event. An anomaly. One exception to the norm that shouldn’t be mistaken as a representation of every day henceforth. Success doesn’t work that way.

Success won’t arrive on your doorstep overnight.

To truly attain success, you must strive towards it gradually. I didn’t write two articles and suddenly appear in the Digg spotlight. I wrote fifty articles over the course of four months, and two of them drew in an audience.

The majority of the things I’ve published on LifeReboot barely made a splash. Regardless of this, I kept writing every day, hoping the articles I published would eventually get noticed. As a result, I’ve learned the secret to success:

You either strive towards success every day, or you don’t.

For example: I want to be a writer, so I write every day.

There are some days when I write things that aren’t good enough to publish. There are some days when I can’t get all of my thoughts out in one sitting. There are some days when I come back to something I started writing before and then decide I’d rather write something completely different.

Regardless of these bumps in the road, I’m always pressing forward. Whenever I’m tempted to say that I’m successful, I try and imagine the effort I put forth to get to where I am. Then I remind myself: You need to maintain the same level of effort to maintain the same level of success.

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11 Responses to “Make No Assumptions About Success”

#1 Anders on 23, Jul, 2007 at 4:54 pm

I came in on that Digg-wave … I was captured by your “10 Articles that changed my life”. Reading some of your other articles, made me subscribe to your RSS feed.

I think allot of what you are writing is dead on to my own situation and I hope that I will do something more with my life. Stop my laziness and follow my dreams. 🙂

#2 Neo on 23, Jul, 2007 at 7:22 pm

I came in on the digg wave too. But after reading through, I thought this was a great website and most of your articles are excellent. So I’ve also subscribed to your RSS feed and hope to see you write more great stuff!

Keep at it!

#3 Gavin on 23, Jul, 2007 at 7:24 pm

Hi, I also came in on the Digg-Wave and I plan to stick around! I really like your writing Shaun, thanks for putting the site up and writing what you do! I agree with Anders that a lot of your articles are interesting and useful. I want to compose music full time and It’s a frightening leap to make, Thanks for the advise and encouragement!

#4 Jenny on 23, Jul, 2007 at 10:11 pm

I really like what you have to say, I also read about you on Digg and have subscribed to your RSS feed. I look forward to reading what you write, your words have been an inspiration to me. I’m going through a change in my life, trying to decide which direction and where I want to go, thank you for what you are doing, you have helped me.

#5 Sunny on 23, Jul, 2007 at 11:03 pm

Hi, I actually find your article â€œ10 Articles that changed my lifeâ€? on delicious.com, reading your article actually make me thinking about how do I want to make a change in my life. You are right about success does not come overnight. I hope you will earn more success in the future. Keep up good work!

#6 Mary on 23, Jul, 2007 at 11:06 pm

I came here because my daughter sent me the link and said I needed to check it out. She was right. I think I will stay around too. Thanks. I am sure I will find some things I need to consider as I peruse.

#7 Matt on 24, Jul, 2007 at 5:02 am

Aww, unlike the other comment-ers, I didn’t come in on the social bookmarking wave. 🙁

However, I do like your blog and continue to check up on it daily – your writing style is incredibly unique, and your advice for life is solid and useful. Keep it up – I’m curious to see where this blog will go in the future!

#8 Kate on 24, Jul, 2007 at 10:18 pm

hey! I came in with the digg people. Love the site and its message. Will be checking back.

#9 Dan on 24, Jul, 2007 at 11:27 pm

I also came in with the digg crowd but have probably read 50% of your articles and will be reading the rest. This site is great. Well done. Also on your RSS feed 🙂

#10 Danielle on 25, Jul, 2007 at 1:37 am

Thanks to you Shaun my blog got crazy hits too! I wish I’d been updating it more often now and including links to my website. Actually, it’s made me get back to work on my website so that I actually can start publicizing it so that potential clients can find me!

Thanks for the link love Shaun. You’re doing a great job with Life Reboot!

#11 Robert plumer on 03, Aug, 2007 at 11:58 am