After you have survived dozens of these reflections, it becomes clear that change is inevitable, pain is necessary and Love is the stuff that makes the years worth living.
We may never know what is the thing that will make us happy. We could live our whole lives, never figuring it out. Or, we can work in a direction and be totally knocked out by life’s circumstance. We know what we want, and no matter how hard we work we cannot attain our dream. And yet, life can bring us great treasures from the most unexpected of places. We can find a deep satisfaction from watching something happen that we could never have guessed in our wildest of imaginings. We can be surprised by great love and happiness. Love and success can come to us surprisingly.
Given this random nature of life, how do we evaluate success? It is not to be, as soon as we claim it, as soon as we think we own success, it flees. The act of evaluation changes life into something it is not, a contest or a game, a race. Life is none of these things, but is instead the experience.
Plan, do, judge and even evaluate, but know this, it matters not. Life will give us all of everything, it is us that must turn it into an experience that is right for us. It is us that must turn it into success and love. 
But it doesn’t define you. A great psychologist once said that “if you don’t like your childhood, then re-invent it.” It is part of you and yet, the emphasis is up to you. You can give power to any part of your past that you want to. Do you want to remember the embarrassment of your mother’s harsh words or do you want to remember what your mother gave to you? Do you want to remember the teacher who treated you badly in grade school, or do you want to remember the pride you felt when you earned a B in Math? All are true, but which will characterize you?