Dr. Umar Khan
Dr. Khan belongs to a Lahore based Think Tank.
18-5-25
What constitutes Success in life?
“Success is not the key
to happiness. Happiness is the key to success” Albert Schweitzer
The first serious lesson the society, including parents,
hammers on a newly arrived baby is that he/she must succeed. Life is short and
competitive, and he/she must struggle hard to succeed, unfortunately not much
is taught about what constitutes success. This lesson well learnt makes many
competitive but also ruthless and unscrupulous. After nearly half a century’s
efforts a very few come out apparently happy while the vast majority remains
unsatisfied, guilty and remorseful for not performing and achieving enough
scared of being labeled a failure. This vicious circle is going on from times
immemorial while increasing in intensity.
The most common sought after symbols of success are the
following.
- Money. It makes life easy
and comfortable while making influencing other’s and their attitudes
possible. Control over earth’s resources through money has always been the
most popular symbol of success.
- Fame. Its desirability has
increased manifold with the development of modern means of human
interaction. Fame now plays a significant role in achieving monetary
targets too.
- Power. Assuming control
over others through power has always been sought and fought after throughout
history. What the proponents get by this is still unexplained. No person
with a healthy psychological makeup is known to have special affinity for
controlling others.
- Achieving acknowledgment
of excellence/zenith in their fields. This appears most popular among professional
middle classes ready to go to any extent to achieve. This excellence and
its acknowledgement also help achieve wealth and fame.
For the sake of limited time and
space we will focus on these four only.
After making a person comfortable by providing the basic
necessities there isn’t much money can do apart from resting in the bank. Fame
and power have even more limited scope like achieving acknowledgment of professional
excellence. Looking a bit deeper in these popular success symbols one point
stands out, its approval of others and the validation through their opinion
that is being pursued. Basically it boils down to impressing others, mostly
unknown strangers, bizarre, isn’t it?
No matter how much money you accumulate, fame you get, power
that you exercise or professional excellence you achieve everything in this
world is temporary. The good lord appears deeply socialist ultimately ensuring
equality at the end where everyone experiences the same, wise and unwise, rich
and poor, powerful and the weak. Ultimately it’s the small time span in the mid
that is the play time for the life on this small piece of a huge universe that
is hardly noticeable, significant, meaningful or consequential,
No wonder an old sage commented, “Problem with people is
that they take life too seriously.”
If these sought after aims are so temporary and meaningless
then why these have been sought after and fought for needs exploration.
Ever wondered why the derby winning horse runs so fast and
exerts so much that many times collapses during the race? One thing is for sure
he isn’t aware or concerned with the trophy that his owner covets. According to
experts the winning horse runs only to avoid the physical pain his rider might
inflict by lashing him while a minor concern might be expectation of food. No wonder
most of the hard working worldly achievers never get enough time to think and
reflect about what they really want in life. Most of us just start running in
the race of life that the society imparts on our innocent minds when we are
young, a bit like the race dogs trying to bite a mechanical rabbit. It’s only
after successfully chasing and achieving that futility of the objective is
exposed resulting in depression and sorrow.
Mark
Twain explained it beautifully, “To succeed in life, you need two things:
ignorance and confidence."
Ultimately success is self-defined. What matters most is
whether a person feels his life is meaningful and fulfilling on his own terms.
I also ran and ran in the race of life until I had some time
to think and reflect coming to definite conclusions about what constitutes success
in life.
My take
Since times immemorial people have been trying to answer
this question without any trace of consensus. It appears foolish to even try, hence
we proceed.
With the help of successive approximations and elimination
have come to the conclusion that the closest to the definition of success that
we can achieve is the answer to a simple question,
“Is the world a better place to live for others with or
without you?”
Looking through this lens we see many apparently big
achievers turn into failures and vice versa. Unfortunately our history books
have glamorized and defined success totally differently.
How can we call the murderers like Alexander, Genghis Khan
or more recently Harry Truman or Stalin successful achievers when they caused
so much pain and sufferings? Neither can we call the unscrupulous business
tycoons successful like Rhodes or Rockefeller. Third world is full of crooked
extra rich influence peddling politicians that fulfill all the prevalent
criteria of success but would be doing a favor to this world by leaving it.
We still don’t know who invented the printing press that revolutionized
the world. Selfless geniuses like Tesla, Jonas Salk, Tim Berners-Lee and many
others refused to patent their achievements dying in utter penury. Mother
Theresa and many others like her died penniless after leading a hard life. Many
might call them foolish failures but according to my criteria they were the
most successful although recognition or ignorance by an ordinary person like me
would have hardly mattered to them.
Ultimately you are the best judge of your success in this
world and not the many you work so hard to impress.
It is interesting to note how using this criterion of
success can change our perception of the people we considered successful and
heroic.
Life’s fulfillment emerges from individual participation
in the service of humane ideals. Working to benefit society maximizes
individual happiness. (The Humanist Manifesto)
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