Achievement

a·chieve·ment

 /əˈtʃivmənt/ Show Spelled[uh-cheev-muhnt] Show IPA

–noun

1.

something accomplished, esp. by superior ability, special effort, great courage, etc.; a great or heroic deed: his remarkable achievements in art.

2.

act of achieving; attainment or accomplishment: the achievement of one's object.

While that is the dictionary.com definition, I have never thought of achievement as implying great things.  I've always viewed it much more as the secondary definition of attaining one's object.  If you've ever seen the movie "What about Bob?" with Bill Murray, I like "baby steps".  This leads into my three "favorite" characteristics of achievements.  

First, achievement is personal.  It is not an achievement if the person doing it doesn't view it as such.  For me, getting my homework done in time for class is not an achievement.  Remembering everyone's name in class is much more so because for me, it was a challenge.  Not to say that the homework is not a challenge but, for me, because it is a requirement of the course it is not personal.

Second, achievement does not come easily.  Again, I am poor at names, so remembering everyone's name is an achievement for me.  It is also personal.  The difficulty is personal to me but that challenge may not be recognized by someone else.

Finally, achievement is about bettering yourself.  To keep with the remembering of names, I recognize that I need to get better at learning people's names.  I need to practice doing so.  Next time, learning 32 names won't really be much of an achievement for me.  Working to remember more and more peoples names will be.  I think you have to raise the bar on your own achievements.