What Happens When Success Stops Including You?
- thespiralcoaching
- 3 days ago
- 3 min read
Updated: 1 day ago
Over the past few weeks, I've been asking women one simple question.
If success was designed around the woman you are today, what would change?
I expected a few thoughtful replies.
I didn't expect the conversations that followed.
Busy, successful, high-achieving women shared things they may not have said out loud for a very long time.
Here are just a few of the themes that came back...
✔ Spending more time with family without feeling guilty.
✔ Measuring success less by titles and more by alignment.
✔ Realising they'd quietly believed that if something came easily, it somehow didn't count as success.
✔ No longer wanting to spend life chasing the next milestone.
✔ Wanting to feel genuinely valued instead of simply being expected to carry more.
✔ Feeling they always had to be "the strong one", even when they were exhausted.
What struck me wasn't the variety of their answers.
It was what was missing.
Not one woman mentioned earning more money.
Not one talked about a bigger title.
Almost every answer pointed towards the same thing.
They weren't describing bigger success.
They were describing a different relationship with success.
One where ambition and wellbeing could exist together.
One where achievement no longer came at the expense of themselves.
This is why identity matters so much.
Because the woman who built your success isn't necessarily the woman living it today.
You grow.
Your priorities change.
What once felt important may no longer fit.
Yet it's surprisingly easy to keep living by a definition of success you created years ago, simply because you've never stopped to question it.
The real question isn't whether your definition of success has changed.
It's how much longer you're prepared to keep living by one that no longer fits.
Because every year you continue chasing a version of success that no longer reflects who you are is another year spent feeling disconnected from the life you've worked so hard to build.
That's exactly where my work begins.
Together, we uncover the identity patterns quietly shaping the way you think, work, perform, give and make decisions.
From there, we build greater clarity, stronger self-trust and create a version of success that no longer asks you to sacrifice yourself in order to sustain it.
Imagine...
• Making decisions without constantly second-guessing yourself.
• Feeling successful without constantly needing to prove yourself.
• Being ambitious without feeling guilty.
• Creating success that feels just as good on the inside as it looks on the outside.
If this has stirred something in you, don't ignore it.
Once you see it, it's very difficult to unsee it.
Clients who complete my 12-week Success That Includes You programme often tell me they wish they'd started sooner because, for the first time in years, they stopped trying to fit themselves into their success... and started creating success that truly fit them.
So I'll leave you with the same question.
If success was designed around the woman you are today, what would change?
Ready to explore what's possible?
Book your complimentary Success That Includes You Session
A relaxed, no-obligation conversation to explore where you are, what feels out of alignment and what creating success that truly includes you could look like.
Here's to creating a version of success that includes you.
Senem 🌀
About The Spiral Coaching
The Spiral Coaching Ltd is led by Senem Palaz, an ICF-trained identity coach with over 20 years’ experience supporting more than 700 people through life transitions.
The work centres on helping women recognise patterns of self-abandonment, avoid burnout, and build a life that includes them.
All coaching is private, one-to-one, fully online, and confidential.
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