What is the greatest threat to your legacy?
When you think about legacy—how you want to be remembered, the impact you want to make, the people and priorities that matter most—it’s natural to assume the greatest threat is failure. A moral failure. A business collapse. A broken relationship.
And it’s true—failures can certainly damage a legacy.
But here’s the thing about failure: failure shouts. Failure acts like a loud wake-up call. You hit a wall. You’re forced to stop. You’re forced to reflect. And often, those moments—while painful—become turning points that change the entire direction of someone’s life.
There’s another threat to your legacy that’s far more subtle… and far more dangerous.
Success.
Failure shouts. Success whispers.
Failure jolts us awake. Success lulls us asleep.
Failure feels like crashing into a wall. Success feels like drifting one degree off course until you no longer know where you are.
Failure feels like a crisis. Success feels like comfort.
And the truth is: comfort can be far more dangerous than crisis.
That’s why Jesus asked, “What does it profit a man to gain the whole world, yet lose his soul?” (Mark 8:36). In other words, what good is success if it costs you what matters most?
You can accomplish everything the world values—and still wake up one day wondering, There has to be more than this.
Here’s the reality every leader eventually has to face:
Success is the greatest threat to significance.
Leaders climb the ladder of success only to realize they placed the ladder on the wrong wall. They worked hard. They sacrificed. They achieved. And then they reached the top, looked around, and felt an unsettling truth:
I’m successful… but I’m not significant.
The danger of success isn’t that it destroys your life overnight. The danger is that it slowly reshapes your priorities. It narrows your vision. It crowds out reflection. And over time, it pulls you off course from the life God is actually calling you to live.
Success doesn’t usually feel like rebellion.
It feels like responsibility.
It feels like momentum.
It feels like “this is just the season I’m in.”
But seasons turn into years. And years turn into regret.
At some point, every leader has to decide:
Will I keep climbing the ladder I’m already on—or will I move my ladder to the wall God is calling me to build against?
Because significance doesn’t come from doing more.
It comes from aligning your success with God’s purpose.
In the next post, I want to get very practical. I’ll walk through five silent traps of success—five ways leaders can be winning professionally while slowly losing what matters most.
Your Next Step Toward Significance
If this post stirred something in you, it’s likely because you’re sensing that success alone isn’t enough.
Download the FREE Significant Leader Guide to help you identify where you are today and where God may be inviting you to realign your work with deeper purpose. With this resource, you’ll also receive a video training where we go deeper into the Significant Leader Framework and how to apply it to your work.
Or, if you’re ready for a personalized conversation, schedule a Vision Call and we can explore together how you can become a Significant Leader.
