It took me failure to learn what success is.

I closed that deal.

I made that move.

I built an A team.

I …

As a serial entrepreneur, I get super-excited about creating something from nothing. It starts with a shard of an idea. Then a vision I can share with others. Then it becomes a movement whereby others believe in the vision enough to join me in turning it into reality. Then, blood, sweat, and tears. This entrepreneurial journey is not for everyone. The pressure of potentially not making payroll, the feeling that you might’ve just disappointed a bunch of people who invested millions in you, the out-of-left-field betrayals, twists, and turns, and best of all, knowing all my insecurities are in some way on display, fully embedded in the culture of the company. Whew! Fun times!

The most recent entrepreneurial season I travelled has been the toughest of my career. Combined with other stresses, the depth of these pits were deeper than any I had ever experienced. The death triangle of not sleeping well, being stressed about really bad scenarios, and being anxious about the uncertainty hit my body and my spirit hard (I wrote a separate post on how I dealt with the worst anxiety of my life). It’s no fun being on the cusp of going out of business, getting sued, and possibly having the media blast our failure publicly. And it’s right here that I need to be. There are things we can only learn in the darkest part of the valley. One such things is my relationship with success.

See, I’ve worked hard for most of my life. I’ve started 7 companies and have had multiple failures and multiple exits. Through the trials of the last season, I’ve come to realize everything I knew about success is all wrong. God shifted my entire mindset and motivation-and this shift took place in 5 steps.

Step 1: I work hard. I busted my butt. I came up with the idea. I innovated. I took the risk! Any success I experience, I achieved it. I deserve it. I earned it. I’m a humble genius, haha! I deserve my success.

But upon further reflection…

Step 2: I made some good decisions and some bad decisions, but my good decisions outweighed my bad decisions, and over time, those good decisions compounded to achieve the success that I attained. I made some strategic decisions that made me successful.

But upon further reflection…

Step 3: Hmmm, if I’m honest, I’m realizing that many of the wins in the business were things that happened to me, not because of me. I “happened” to be in the right place at the right time. A perfectly timed meeting with someone who unlocked a key to winning the market. To this day, I still don’t know why we started getting a deluge of incoming cold calls from Fortune 100 companies demanding our software. I just know it happened right after my wife and I answered the call to move to Africa to serve others (I was the trailing spouse!).

While I was the one who showed up, made the pitch, built the relationship, etc, so much was circumstance totally out of my hands. And actually, in some ways, the business succeeded in spite of my missteps- I had my head in the sand on multiple tough decisions that had to be made and I made some investments that failed miserably. Was this success more related to the goodness of God than I realized? Maybe my success was a result of what happened to me (and in spite of me!) instead of because of me.

But upon further reflection…

Step 4: Even if I did make wise decisions and some savvy moves, how can I take any credit if every aspect of my very being are all God’s? Every good and perfect gift comes from God. The breath in my lungs, the heartbeat in my chest, the eyes I have to see, the legs I have to walk, the brain I have to think, and every moment I have alive on this earth-all of this is pure and utter mercy. Undeserved. It’s all a gift. It is my path to walk, but the path points to God’s goodness not my goodness. “My” success really isn’t mine at all.

But upon further reflection…

Step 5: Business and financial success, what is it, really? Whether we fail or succeed, the real purpose in life has very little to do with net profit, product-market fit, and venture funding. Of course our businesses, run redemptively, can advance the Kingdom of God. But what if God putting us in business is much more to do with becoming more like Christ, growing to be the human God wants me to be, and loving others well? What if “our” businesses — in success and in failure — are primarily props that God uses to grow us up and to give us an opportunity to serve others? We learn to lean on Him more than our experience. We learn He is in control (and we’re not). We learn We to be faithful, one day at a time. We learn to trust in the Source, not the resource. Success in business isn’t even the point!

This is a fundamental rewiring of not just what success is, but what life is all about. We’ve been taught our whole lives that if I do A, I will get B. Work harder! Work smarter! Get to know the right people! Influence the influencers!

I control the outcome.

I influence the outcome.

I can’t control the outcome.

I’ll admit, I’m not fully at step 5 all the time as a lifetime of wiring is hard to unlearn. But more and more, I’m seeing in this way:

The ultimate exit strategy is not selling your business, but surrendering it.

The secret to success is less about leadership tactics, and more about prayer and fasting.

Because, in the end, we aren’t measured by our productivity, but by our faithfulness.