Five years ago, Julie Duffy came up with a business idea that she thought would be a slam-dunk success. "Dinner by Design" would be a place time-starved working mothers could gather to assemble well-balanced meals for their families or pick up pre-made entrees. "I saw it as the answer to every woman's dilemma at the end of the day--'What are we going to have for dinner tonight and how am I going to get it on the table?'" says Duffy, a former vice president of sales for Discover Financial Services.

But Duffy, now 39, faced some huge hurdles. She didn't have experience in commercial food service, she'd never worked in retail, and she received blank stares from friends when she described Dinner by Design. "The concept of a meal-assembly company was so new, it was challenging for people to understand," she recalls.

So Duffy consulted experts in food service and retail, wrote a business plan, and self-financed the opening of Dinner by Design in her hometown of Grayslake, Illinois. Within months, she was deluged with requests from customers who wanted to become her business partners. That's how a franchise company was born. Today, Dinner by Design has 60 locations in 11 states, with annual sales of more than $8 million system-wide.

Power of perseverance
Successful people like Duffy know the power of stick-to-itiveness--whether it's used to launch a business or lose weight. In addition to not giving up easily, they also learn from their mistakes by embracing a temporary setback as a chance to reassess their game plan.

Psychologist Angela Lee Duckworth, a researcher at the University of Pennsylvania, calls it "grit"--a quality that she defines as "tenaciously pursuing something over the long term." She believes it's more important than I.Q., grades, leadership skills, and talent when it comes to succeeding in work, school, and other areas of life. In her study of high achievers, Duckworth found that grit was one of best predictors of achievement for Penn undergraduates, West Point plebes, and national spelling bee contestants, among other survey participants.

What, exactly, does it mean to be successful? "The most successful people understand that success by their own definition is truly the best success," says Shelley Weiss Cohen, a life coach in Northfield, Illinois. "The yardstick they use to measure their success is often more subjective than those who set a standard based on somebody else's achievements."

They also know that one's definition of success is likely to shift over time. "At 42, we're not motivated by the same things as we were at 22, when opportunities seemed endless," says Karissa Thacker, a management psychologist in New York City who helps executives become more successful. "Pay attention to the internal shifts you'll experience as part of the natural aging process--and make sure your goals are consistent with who you are at different points in your life."

Beyond grit
It takes more than a megadose of grit to go from setting a goal to reaching it, since success is as much a state of mind as it is the result of executing the right plan. Here are six unexpected success strategies:

• Set the stakes high. "Successful people take the risk of jumping out on the tight rope, which creates a level of emotional intensity," Thacker says. "The higher you aim, the bigger the payoff." That said, be sure your goal is attainable. "There should always be an element of uncertainty to get you going, but it should be balanced with the possibility that the goal can be met," explains Marcia Reynolds, a certified executive coach in Phoenix and author of Outsmart Your Brain! How to Make Success Feel Easy.
  
  
• Be emotionally invested but personally detached. Passion for a goal is the emotional commitment that drives successful people forward, but avoid letting the outcome of each step affect your self-esteem. "There will be setbacks along the way," Reynolds says. "Make sure that little voice inside your head says, 'That didn't work ' not 'I didn't work.'"
  
  
• Keep a clear vision, but stay flexible. While it's important to stay focused on your goal, it's also crucial to remain open to more than one way of achieving it. The path from where you are now to where you want to be might involve a detour--a lesson that Lee Lessack, a 44-year-old vocalist in Los Angeles, learned when he launched his career in 1996. "I wanted to work in the music industry, but only a handful of singers earn huge dollars exclusively from concert tours," says Lessack, who performs in theaters and clubs nationwide. "Though I earn a good living from my concerts, it's not enough to maintain my lifestyle." The solution? To supplement his income, Lessack created LML Music, an independent record label, which produces and distributes CDs for over 75 recording artists. He also has recently launched Spot-On Entertainment, a concert production company that handles mostly Broadway artists. "Eleven years ago, if anyone had told me that my career would have three pieces to it, I wouldn't have believed it," Lessack says. "I'm successful today because I stayed true to my vision, but I didn't get stuck with how I'd get there."
  
  
• Reach out for help. While writing her first novel, Ellis Avery was reluctant to show the manuscript to friends who offered to give feedback. "I felt like I should have been able to do it all on my own," says Avery, 34, author of The Teahouse Fire, a critically acclaimed work of historical fiction set in 19th century Japan. But she is glad she changed her mind. Avery's partner noticed a section that moved slowly, so when her agent made the same observation, she promptly cut 100 pages. And when two friends pointed out that all one character had going for him was his looks, Avery beefed up his back story. As Cohen explains, "Sometimes people aren't successful because they have the 'Lone Ranger' mentality--they don't get that success is almost always a team effort requiring some degree of cooperation, collaboration, and the support of others, even if they're flying solo."
  
  
• Live in the here and now. Don't dwell on past successes and failures or fixate on the future. "Break the big goal into interim goals and then celebrate both your effort and achievement along the way," Reynolds advises.
  
  
• Seek emotional support. Thirteen years ago, when Jack Drucker decided to take up the accordion at the age of 46, he wanted to become proficient enough to play in public. Realizing that he needed encouragement to stick to his weekly lessons and 90 minutes of daily practice, he chose his cheerleaders wisely. "When I told people I played the accordion, many weren't impressed or interested," says Drucker, chief of staff at the Minneapolis VA Medical Center in Minneapolis. "But people who play an instrument or enjoy music encouraged me to persist and asked me about my progress. There's no doubt that their support has helped me reach my goal."

Cynthia Hanson knows that these strategies work, as she has used all of them during her 15 years as a successful freelance writer for national publications.