eng10-V5· Vocabulary· ~13 min

Success & Stages of Life

Words for success, ambition, careers and life stages.

This lesson covers words about success, ambition, careers, and the different stages of life. You will learn to express your goals and talk about your future plans. These words are useful for describing personal achievements and professional development. The exercises will help you remember and use them correctly.

Key terms

success — The achieving of something you have been trying to do.
ambition — A strong wish to achieve something, especially success or power.
career — A job or series of jobs you do during your working life.
determination — The ability to continue trying to do something even when it is difficult.
milestone — An important event in your life, such as graduating or getting married.
achievement — Something that you have done successfully, especially through hard work.
Word Groups by Theme
CategoryWords
Success & Ambitionsuccess, achieve, ambition, goal, determination, achievement, succeed, fail
Career & Workcareer, profession, employer, promotion, retire
Life Stageschildhood, adolescence, adulthood, graduate, milestone, generation

The 19 target words organised into three thematic groups.

✎How to Choose the Right Word in a Gap-Fill
  1. 1Read the full sentence: Example: 'After years of hard work, she finally got a ___ at the company.'
  2. 2Identify the context clues: The words 'company' and 'years of hard work' suggest a workplace situation.
  3. 3Check each choice: 'Promotion' fits perfectly — it means moving to a higher position at work. The other options (generation, childhood, milestone) do not fit a workplace context.
🚫Common mistake

Don't confuse 'succeed' (verb) with 'success' (noun). You succeed at something; you have success in something.

💡Note

Many of these words can form both nouns and verbs: achieve → achievement, succeed → success, promote → promotion.

⚠️Caution

The word 'graduate' can be both a verb (to complete your studies) and a noun (a person who has finished university). Pay attention to how it is used in the sentence.

Rules

  1. 1Success-related words form a family: succeed (verb), success (noun), successful (adjective).
  2. 2Life stage words describe the different periods of human development from birth to old age.
  3. 3Career words are about jobs, work, and professional growth.
  4. 4Many abstract nouns in this set end in -ment (achievement) or -tion (determination, ambition, promotion).
  5. 5The word 'generation' refers to a group of people born around the same time, not to creating something.
  6. 6'Milestone' originally meant a stone marker on a road showing distance — now it means any important life event.

Practice

10 easy · 10 medium · 10 hard

10 random questions per test

EasyMediumHardMixed