The only gauge for life success
All that matters is these three things, the first of which is the most crucial
These are the only three criteria with which you should judge success, because this definition of success is the only one that will save you:
Is your outlook positive?
Are you improving?
Are you taken care of?
For a long time, I strove for success.
I heard the platitudes about how important it was to value the process, be grateful for what we have, act humbly, etc. and I would have agreed with them all.
There is knowing, and then there is the emotional shift that takes place at the core of your being which causes you to truly accept the meaning behind the platitude.
If you asked me whether I considered myself successful, I would have told you ‘yes’ even though I didn’t truly believe it.
We are beset on all sides by cravings, we see and desire so much of what we don’t have. The very word, “want” was originally an adjective for “wanting.”
Contemporary society conceives of success as having what others want. In other words, success only comes with having what others lack.
I lived by this, I wanted, craved, and pushed myself to have the toys, status, and adulation that defines success. Perhaps it is a failing, or perhaps it is to my credit that I never quite did enough to get it. Maybe something wasn’t so broken in me that I would make all the necessary sacrifices to get it.
But I kept striving.
And then life officially entered its autumn phase.
A friend of mine who I never got to know all that well (I was too busy, too intimidated, too self-absorbed), died recently. He was basically my age.
The man definitely didn’t deserve it.
He dismantled IEDs in Iraq. Was the sole breadwinner of his family. Had a child younger than mine. Was an all-around positive force and gentle soul.
Life takes the best of us for inexplicable reasons long before we’re ready.
It’s all over too soon.
Oftentimes, it leaves those who are the least able to fulfill these three criteria on their own.
While it would be nice for those of us who can claim to have these three treasures to give a little to those who don’t, I’m not even going to ask you to do that.
Instead, what’s needed is a mental filter that we can apply over certain words and images within society.
Success is the best one to start with.
Today, “Success” is literally a magazine. The prerequisite for getting on the cover seems to be wealth and fame. I remember seeing this one in a grocery store and being a little shocked that an internet celebrity had made it into the mainstream.
What I didn’t realize then was that the word is being used to sell something else. That Tim Ferriss was on there because he had a book to sell, people to pay, an empire to run.
That just three years before, he was on the verge of a mental breakdown trying to finish his last “4-Hour” book. In fact, what drives so many conventionally successful people to achieve so much is the feeling that it’s never enough.
All you see accumulated has yet to fill the hole inside.
The reason you haven’t striven so maniacally as they lies in the blessing that your hole is much smaller, that you were fortunate enough to have people who helped you fill it.
They say success begets success, but if you use the conventional definition, success also begets failure. It’s the kind of success that entraps. I believe this is why so many “successful” people are miserable, they build machines around themselves to attain the two prerequisites to get on the magazine, and then they’re forced to keep the machine running forever.
They might be improving and they might be taken care of, but its impossible to maintain a positive outlook if you’re acting against your will.
That’s why, if you ever see this magazine or the word pop up on a billboard or movie title, you should decouple the concept from the face in front of it. So often, the people who receive the title could not be farther from attaining it.
The nice thing about my new definition for success is that it’s simply manageable.
It doesn’t even require that you take care of yourself, because winter follows autumn and many of us simply won’t be able to. Instead, we will need to rely on loved ones and the goodwill we’ve stored in previous seasons. We will need to be taken care of.
But at that time, you will get to enjoy the fruits of old age, too. Because there are a lot of them, provided you took care of yourself and improved your abilities and properly enjoyed the moments that came before.
A simple example: When you are strong, you get to help out the weak. And when you become weak, you get to have those who you helped pay you back. This is karma. This is beautiful.
And even if you don’t make it, or you never get all the things you want, maintaining these three criteria will ensure you still get to enjoy what you have.
This is all it takes to be successful.
A success you don’t have to buy or sell anything to get.
Nicely written and kinda something I've been dealing with myself
no.3 in particular kinda expands on the perspective that success... that it isn't just about what you've made for yourself. it's what you've done for others too!