Welcome to The Adventure of Success!

This is the first blog post on The Adventure of Success. On this website, I encourage people to self-improve by taking responsibility for their own lives, pursuing their dreams, and overcoming self-limiting thoughts and destructive habits.

Of course, the first individual that I have in mind while writing these lines is myself. I expect that writing on The Adventure of Success will boost my motivation to excel in the most important areas of my life. At the same time, I expect that the readers of this website will benefit from my experiences, recommendations, and research.

The Adventure of Success focuses on the following areas for self-improvement:

• Optimal health
• Time and attention well spent
• Finances and career development
• Social relationships (including romantic and sexual relationships)
• Psychology and mindset
• Learning

Why this website’s name is The Adventure of Success

Success is the accomplishment of goals planned by yourself. Consequently, success does not necessarily mean being wealthy and/or famous. If being wealthy and/or famous is your defined goal and you accomplish it through your own effort, then you are successful. If your defined goal is to live an austere life and you achieve that, for example, by living in the countryside and producing your own food, then you are successful too. Following this definition, inherited wealth (or inheriting a life of modest means!) is not a success because inherited wealth (or austerity) lacks the two key components of success:

1. the setting of a goal for yourself, and
2. the attainment of that goal through your own action.

Because the path to success is uncertain, I consider the process by which an individual seeks to accomplish their goals to be an adventure. That is, the endpoint of the journey is relatively clear, but the pathway to get there is not. This journey entails some risks and the route is likely to be modified along the way. Importantly, the effort carried out during this journey is an enormous source of satisfaction. Not only do you gain psychological strength and do you further develop your knowledge and skills, but you are also psychologically rewarded with a feeling of achievement and enjoyment.

For me, this adventure of becoming what you want to be is far more important than being what you want. Because of this, I decided to call this website The Adventure of Success. The symbol of a hiker climbing towards the top of a hill is a clear metaphor for this adventure. It also connects well with one of my favourite hobbies at the moment: hiking!

Logo of The Adventure of Success

About me

My name is Ángel V. Jiménez.

I am an enthusiast of self-improvement. In the last four of years, I have extensively been reading, writing, and thinking about self-improvement. I have also tested different strategies to self-improve in the areas mentioned above. Now, I would like to share my knowledge with the world through The Adventure of Success.

Professionally, I currently work as freelance data analyst. I have previously conducted research in psychology and cultural evolution seeking to understand:

• what makes particular ideas widely spread through society while others are scarcely transmitted (cultural transmission).
• how people select their sources of information to acquire valuable knowledge/skills (social learning)

These areas of research have undoubtedly practical value to people interested in self-improvement. However, their practical applications have been largely neglected. An exception is a book, Made to Stick, by Chip and Dan Heath, where they teach how to make ideas catchier. Another exception is some of the blog posts by Scott H Young. For example, this one.

Because of my research expertise in these topics, I would like to write some articles/guides about how to transmit better your ideas and how to select your sources of information on The Adventure of Success. Stay tuned!

Me on a hike around Mylor (Cornwall, UK)

Get in touch

I hope the articles on The Adventure of Success are useful for my readers. Consequently, I am very interested in receiving feedback from my readers on what I’m doing well and what I could do better on this website.

If you would like to provide such feedback, please feel free to drop me an email: contact@adventureofsuccess.com

Similarly, if you would like to ask any questions, don’t hesitate to contact me.

Ángel V. Jiménez