By Freelance Writer and Books Author Denise Turney

It’s easy to fall into success illusion. Desire to succeed, all by itself, could fuel the error. A history of getting what you want without having to work for it or knowing how the goal was met could also attract you to an illusion.

Success Illusion Signs

The unfortunate thing is that a success illusion feels good, but it’s not real. Signs that you’re in this type of illusion include:

• You’re proud of how much work you do, how busy you are, without knowing if your efforts are paying off.
• Fantasy is a mind trick you invest a lot in, spending hours each day dreaming about living at certain success levels without doing any work to really get there.
• Defining achievements as “luck” – experiences that only happen to “special” people has become common for you.

Rewards of being trapped in success illusion are linked to emotions. If you’ve ever fantasized that you were in a relationship, working a career, fulfilling community or social goals, the types of actions that improve your and other people’s lives, you know how good it feels to imagine you’ve already accomplished a long-term goal.

Stop the Fantasy Rewards

You might even start rewarding yourself based on how strong the fantasy (and emotions linked to the fantasy) is. Let this happen and you could slip into a cycle of fantasy-reward, the very cycle that could keep you from actually taking smart actions to produce real success.

An example of this is of a gambler believing that, this time, she’s going to hit big. Should she have won $1,000 or more just once, she might convince herself that she’ll win big again, maybe even scoring a six-figure win. That belief could create “good feeling emotions”, propelling her further into debt.

Family and friends telling her that she’s trapped in an illusion might not work. At some point, all these loved ones might be able to do is to watch while she sinks deeper into debt feeding the illusion.

If you’ve talked with someone who has seemingly hit bottom and listened to them tell you about their past victories, even as they struggle to get through the day, you know what the end result of being trapped in a success illusion can look like. Once you believe that you’ve already done your best or that you’re winning when you aren’t, it can be challenging to pull out of the fantasy.

Free Yourself from Success Illusion

Add in the belief that it’s up to something else, a force, to map out your life and make what you want come true and you could end up sitting on the sidelines, watching you life (and opportunities to really succeed) pass you by. This might be a reason why scams work.

Fortunately, even if you find yourself trapped in a success illusion, you can get out. You can go free of the fantasy. There’s no way to con yourself about this. Honesty and truth have to be at work to free yourself. To begin:

• Write down where you are and where you want to be. For example, if you’re $20,000 in debt, write that down. Then, write down how much you want to have in your savings, checking and retirement accounts. Later, you’ll identify smart actions you’ll take to get from where you are to where you want to be. For now, get clear about recognizing and accepting where you are now and where you want to end up.
• List actions you took to get to where you are. The more clearly you see your role in where you are, the more empowered you might feel to create the good change in your life you want to experience.
• In bulleted form, write actions you can take to change your course. Do this free of judging whether you think you’ll succeed at these actions. Simply brainstorm and bring steps you could take to achieve your goal to the front of your mind.
• Identify resources and tools you can use to achieve your goal.
• Get clear about why you want to achieve the goal. Sounds simple, but the why can keep you going, serving as powerful motivation.

Digging Deeper

Next, dig deeper into the process, mapping out detailed actions you’ll take. Commit to taking these actions. If you don’t, you could slip back into fantasy. To commit, you’re agreeing to be resilient and persistent.

Quitting can’t be on your list of things to do, not if you really want to succeed. Stay on track by creating a spreadsheet that list where you want to be, the actions you’re going to take and the actions you are taking.

But don’t just list actions you’re taking, list the results of your efforts. You need to see which actions are working and which actions you might need to change or stop.

In fact, if you’re serious about success, review results daily, weekly and monthly. Because this an ever changing world, you’re going to have to make adjustments as you continue on your path. Tracking the actions you take and the results of those efforts can make it easy to spot just where you need to make an adjustment.

What If Success Isn’t Sexy?

Another thing that your tracker might show are approaching trends. That’s another reason why reviewing the tracker daily, weekly and monthly is smart.

You might have figured out that achieving success is generally so un-sexy. But if the why of your goal is strong enough, each step you take can yield tremendous reward. In other words, you might feel on top of the world because you can clearly see that you are making progress.

A growing confidence and faith that you can gain success in other areas is a by-product of sticking to your goal and making continual progress. Keep in mind that, depending on your goal, you might have to continue advancing for the remainder of your physical experience.

Careers in the arts, scientific explorations and commitment to a community or your family are types of success goals that may not have an end date. So, keep going, stay focused, review your tracker and celebrate your milestone successes.

Doing so might not feel as cozy-good as a fantasy or an illusion. All things considered, it’s much better because it’s real.