Planning and Pondering - What is Success?

As many of us (homeschoolers or not) get ready to plunge into a new school year, it's a great time to make the effort to ponder that Big Picture. What do we really consider success to look like? What are we really, ultimately, trying to do in raising our children to be (hopefully)successful adults?

Here are a couple of quotes I've run across that help me think about my real goals. I now have them posted front and center on my kitchen whiteboard (using black construction paper decorated with glittery gel pens). They are helping keep me on track in this season of planning our curricula, projects, and activities:

"All success consists of this: You are doing something for somebody - benefiting humanity - and the feeling of success comes from the consciousness of this." - Elbert Hubbard, 1923

"Try not to become a man of success but rather try to become a man of value." - Albert Einstein (1955)

Those are great thoughts to ponder. To me, the trick, (and the fun!), is figuring out what to do with them.

I find that our path twists and loops - a sort of 3-D cursive that looks different every day. Once our feet hit the ground each morning, we are off on another adventure. The way our madcap wanderings unfold makes planning a challenge, at best! Even with all the bumps and ruts, challenges, and choices, though, it is still enchanting to anticipate what could lie around the next bend. . .