There is No Success Without Hardship--Sophocles
So, I'm at BAM this weekend, and as usual, I become spellbound by all of the collective knowledge that is, literally, at my fingertips as I walk up and down the aisles.
I find it absolutely mind-boggling that you can be in a single edifice, and hold the keys to the entire known universe- ( I was, coincidentally, in the space-exploration aisle). I suppose the same could be said if you are standing in a library, but there is something about those clear plastic wrappings they put on library books that makes what is contained within seem less accessible. But, as usual, I digress.
So, there I am, walking among the aisles of knowledge and I find myself in the self-help section looking at all the titles: The Success Book, How to Succeed in Business, Politics and Love (seems a bit broad to me), 7 Secrets of Successful Teens (almost picked that one up for our 204 library but I figure--one day one of you will write a way better one. PS--my money's on Vivek) etc.
All of these books, all dedicated to the notion of success.
And I started thinking about how many of them there were.
And the next thought was--how do these books ever sell? Aren't all individual ideas of what success is dramatically different?
And now, here we are.
So, tell me--what is YOUR definition of success?
What are the hallmarks, again, to YOU, of a successful person?
How do you judge whether or not you are successful?
Are there different levels, different measures of importance tied to levels?
What do you need to have, to own, to acquire in order to feel successful?
What types of things need to happen in order for you to see yourself as a success?
I find it absolutely mind-boggling that you can be in a single edifice, and hold the keys to the entire known universe- ( I was, coincidentally, in the space-exploration aisle). I suppose the same could be said if you are standing in a library, but there is something about those clear plastic wrappings they put on library books that makes what is contained within seem less accessible. But, as usual, I digress.
So, there I am, walking among the aisles of knowledge and I find myself in the self-help section looking at all the titles: The Success Book, How to Succeed in Business, Politics and Love (seems a bit broad to me), 7 Secrets of Successful Teens (almost picked that one up for our 204 library but I figure--one day one of you will write a way better one. PS--my money's on Vivek) etc.
All of these books, all dedicated to the notion of success.
And I started thinking about how many of them there were.
And the next thought was--how do these books ever sell? Aren't all individual ideas of what success is dramatically different?
And now, here we are.
So, tell me--what is YOUR definition of success?
What are the hallmarks, again, to YOU, of a successful person?
How do you judge whether or not you are successful?
Are there different levels, different measures of importance tied to levels?
What do you need to have, to own, to acquire in order to feel successful?
What types of things need to happen in order for you to see yourself as a success?
My definition of success is someone that works hard and strives for what they believe in. To be successful, you need to be motivated and want what you’re striving for. Success is whatever makes you happy and achieving your goals. The hallmarks of a successful person, to me, is just them doing whatever they love and making sure they stay motivated. You judge whether or not you are successful by setting goals for yourself and striving to complete and meet these goals. You know you’re successful when you are able to say you accomplished something. There are different levels of success and obviously some goals can be bigger and harder to achieve than others. Different levels are just school work success, work success, and life success. To feel successful, I need to have goals for myself and people around me that will motivate and support me. I don't feel like I need to own anything to be successful, because success is not all in money or actual tangible things. In order to see myself as a success, I feel that I need to, one, meet my goals, and, two, be recognized. I need to know and believe in myself that I can and will be successful.
ReplyDeleteMy definition of success is someone who strives to achieve a goal of theirs. Somebody who accomplishes a goal. To be successful is to achieve something that you want to achieve. Everyone wants to be successful. I believe that everyone in some way is successful. Even just having a career is successful. I judge myself being successful by goal setting and slowly achieving them. I know I am successful when I am happy about what I do. Not everyone is successful in the same ways, there are different degrees of success. For an example, someone who always works hard to get money or fame may think of success different than someone who is born into it. That means that to the individual, success has to do with hard work. To the rich person they may not think of themselves as successful because they haven't seen the before and after. Progress is success. In order to be successful all you need is determination. You need determination and courage, if you have these you can achieve your goals meaning you will then be successful. In order for me to be successful in the community I would want to make money and have a family. These are basic things but if I have a career that I love and a family that I love I would be successful. But you cannot just judge success off of a career and a family. Success comes from where you started from and where you have been. Picture it as a pyramid and everyone starts at different levels, some people may start at the bottom and others may start in the middle. As long as you are climbing up the pyramid and getting higher up, you are successful. No matter where you end up at the top, as long as you get higher you have been successful.
ReplyDeleteLet's be real if someone wants something, they will do everything in their power to get/accomplish what they want. When you want something you don’t complain, you can’t be a pussy about it. Life’s hard get used to it. You don’t need fancy cars or a mansion to be successful. To me someone who is successful is someone who gives their 110% in their field.For example, I make small goals for the day, and out of all those goals I pick 3 that HAVE to get done, no buts about it. I find that as success because I accomplish my goals, even if its something as small as drinking a protein shake. The only thing you have to own to be successful is discipline. Discipline is key to all success, someone who is disciplined is successful and in the long run they will get what they want because it's about getting stuff done whether you feel like it or you don’t. Another example; all throughout freshman year I got up at 4:30 am everyday. By the time you were waking up, I already worked out twice and took a shower. I don’t think there are levels, because some people get out of bed and that's a goal you know. I think it’s all about morals and character. Like I’ve always had a hard mentality, I don’t want you to pat my back and speak to me like a baby, yell at me. When I don’t finish something, I put myself on punishment. And you can tell when I fall of, even the way I look is different.
ReplyDeleteYou asked for three things in order to see yourself as a success.
Honesty, you have to be honest with yourself. I find that I lie to myself sometimes and you just have to stop making excuses. Get it done.
A Vision. A goal is a goal until you write it down, then it becomes a vision. When you have a vision you have a clear path of where you’re going. And when you have a clear path you know what you have to do to get it done.
Drive. Motivation is temporary, you have to be hungry. Everyday wake up and ask yourself “What am I going to do today to be better? What do I want to get accomplished today? How bad do I want it?”
My definition of success is achieving something that you personally want to see yourself overcome, without losing motivation. Working hard and striving for what you want. Everyone is successful in their own ways and everyone succeeds in different things. We all have set goals that we want to see ourselves reach. Goals should be set based on what you want to push yourself for, what you want to feel, and most importantly, what makes you feel happy and excited to conquer. To me, the hallmarks of a successful person is to set goals that you know you won’t lose motivation for or have thoughts of quitting. Another hallmark of a successful person is to set the goal that would make you feel an abundance amount of happiness, and would make you feel a way that you love feeling once it’s achieved. Setting the goal is the first step of me judging whether or not I am successful. I know I’m successful when I have no doubt that I will achieve the goal, when I am able to say I accomplished something. There are different levels of successful. Ones that are bigger and also harder to accomplish. Life in general is the biggest success, then work success is tough, then your average elementary-high school grades success. Depending on your age, we all set different goals we want to see ourselves achieve. There are also long term and short term goals in your life that you can set for yourself. I don’t really need anything specifically in order to feel successful. All I need is motivation from myself, while having the right mindset to push through anything. I also need the people around me; my family and friends, to be there with me by my side and to know they are always there for me no matter what. Myself and those around me are what I push myself for. I need to feel like I’m making progress and getting higher than what I was in order to see myself succeed. I just need to keep my head high and never lose hope. As long as I believe I can do something, there’s nothing that should get in my way.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteUnlike the generic response I don’t believe in academics being a noose around success. Let me rephrase, the weight that students and parents put on school is all in hopes for success. I do not believe that you must stress this in the way that most kids and adults tend to do. At some point in my life-two years ago even, I may have disagreed. But, the point is like most things in life, it’s not all it’s hyped up to be. I believed success to be what you make it to be. While 5’s on AP Exams are fantastic, it’s not going to get me to success. I may be wrong in saying so, but I don’t believe it is going to create success for anyone else either. All of the "success" is what’s up to you. You choose what college to go to, how to proceed it, what comes after that even. That 5 is simply a stepping stone of many into the path of success. The characteristics of a successful person are guaranteed these three things, 1. Drive, 2. Initiative, 3. Action taker. You must first have the motivation to seek out a task, it is easy for anyone to say that they would “like to do something”. Therefore the second step is directing the inspiration and imagination. Lastly, to complete the actions set out is what allows for success. All simple, yet essential steps. These steps can be applied to any aspect of life, social, academic, or personal. This mental staircase is what gets you past one step, and onto another. Someone who is experienced in doing this has a better chance of fulfilling the goals they set in front of them, no matter what that may be. In these same steps I think to myself I would really like to this or that. But, if I do not execute that then I do not deem myself on the road to success. It’s all mental. Success is a mentality. Certainly, there are different levels of success. The further in life you get, comes more experience, and along with experience comes opportunities. Success is years in the making and ones success may not be another's. One who did not have a job and now works finds that a personal success. Someone who has worked a low paying job seeks to reach higher levels, and is no longer satisfied with the starting job. The sooner you plan, the further you can go really. There are no limitations to success. Those who find they need the verification of others to know they are successful have gained nothing at all. That’s why it is important to reflect upon your personal goals and not satisfy the wants and needs of others. At the end of the day you are stuck with you. What does all of the work you put into mean if you cannot appreciate them? The only way you can see yourself as a success is if you believe it, no person can confirm that for you.
ReplyDeleteMy definition of success is somebody that is willing to accomplish their goals and fight through all the hardships that got them to this goal. Whatever that goal maybe, small or big, I think that those that are willing to fight against the world for this goal and accomplish this task, they are successful to me. I think the biggest hallmarks to be being successful would be just me enjoying life and being happy at the same time. Coincidentally, those two things don’t go together because either my life is ass and I’m happy or my life’s going great but my mental state is not going to brightly. How to judge whether you’re successful or not really depends on you and how you consider to be success. To me, I think that if you’re motivated all the time and willing to strive for the best you can possibly be really shows me whether I am successful or not. In order for me to say I’m successful is when I think that my life is all settled down, and I can go home and make my parents proud. There definitely is different levels of importance because say something like school. To my parents, school and education should be one of my biggest priorities and to me, I just don’t think the same way, rather I think that being happy and having a decent life, is one of my biggest priorities. For me to feel successful, I think that I will need challenges and goals set out for myself for me so when I’m done, I can feel like I really matter in the world. Types of things that I need for myself to be seen as successful, would be recognition and the sense of feeling complete. I would do anything to be recognized and one word from somebody whom I admire really would allow me to feel as if I accomplished my goal.
ReplyDeleteSuccess is accomplishing everything you set out to do. In order to feel success one must be comfortable in their life while positively affecting others around them. One must know that what they're doing is helping others and yourself lead a better, healthier, happier life. There are many different levels of success due to the fact that everyone reaches their success at different times in their life. Everyone is different. The levels do not rank by importance. Everyone's accomplishments, no matter how small, mean something to them, therefore they're all important. One who is successful is happy, brave, shows integrity, and us willing to share their success with the people around them.
ReplyDeleteI think success is when you are content with where you are in life. A person is successful when they look at themselves and are happy with who they are and what they are doing in life. Yes there are different levels of success, just like there are levels of how content you are with something. You can be successful in something as little as a sports game, a test, or something big like a career or relationship. Any step you take that you believe is the right choice that benefits you is being successful. While sometimes it may be easy to tell if you are succeeding it also may not be. You might be able to feel unsuccessful immediately or it may take years to figure out you have been doing things all wrong. One this is for sure though, you are the one in control of your success, your calling the shots. You decide if your going to get up and work hard or do nothing and deal with whats coming. The requirements for success always vary from person to person. Someones idea of success might be waking up on time while others way of succeeding may be getting rich.
ReplyDeletePersonally, success is not just making a lot of money. I believe success is rooted in self-fulfillment and societal progression. To truly be successful in something, it has to be something I enjoy doing. Even if I was the best or richest at one particular thing, I would still not consider myself "successful" unless I am ultimately happy. Hallmarks of success for me would be measured by 3 key things. Firstly, my impact on society. Being influential in society is more valuable than anything. Having a true impact is really what would be most important to me. Secondly, happiness. Obviously this is something that I cherish greatly. If I'm not happy doing it, then why bother. And finally, financial excess. Although this might seem hypocritical, I do believe that money plays an important part in overall success. You very rarely (if ever) see a poor successful person. Success and wealth are almost synonymous in most peoples mind. This is because we are typically taught that a wealthy person is a successful person, even when that's not always the case. My overall success is only to be determined by my own self-fulfillment. Period. To see myself as successful I am most likely going need to own a large business. I have already drawn up at least 5 business plans, each corresponding to a different industry I might pursue. That is my overall goal in life. Being a big, influential, successful, business man. Congrats capitalism, you have me in your grasp.
ReplyDeleteMy success is when my personal self-reflection is satisfying and content. When I don’t wish for more and I don’t settle for less. To me, a successful person is someone who strives for more thou they already have it all, or have already reached their goal desired. It’s someone who has endless hopes for themself and somehow always achieves their goals, never gives up. They find happiness where it’s usually not and sadness only when others are struggling to achieve their goals. You can’t say someone is successful, I feel it’s very personal, only ‘you’ would know if you are; what meets to your own standards. Success is levelless, there’s no amount to success that’s too much or too little, for me I never want to settle for less. To see myself at success I need to be happy and content with not only myself but my life, my living situation, and my relationships with everyone around me.
ReplyDeleteSuccess to me is reaching your ultimate goals and exceeding them. Everyone has an overall goal in life. Whether that’s to be rich or famous or anything they want. A successful person has to be hardworking and motivated to reach their goal. You can’t move a big rock up a hill without picking it up or finding a way to move it from point A to point B. There is some work involved in between.
ReplyDeleteTo judge whether you’re successful or not you have to ask yourself if you are progressing toward your goal and if you’re making the correct decisions to help you reach your goal. I believe there are levels to success. I’ve always been told that success is like a ladder and you have to climb, little by little, to reach your goal. So I do believe there are different levels of success and it’s measured not only by looking how far you’ve come but by looking how much you still have to go.
I believe you need to have the right mindset in order to be successful. By this, I mean you have to really want to be successful and to not give up. There also needs to be confidence in your mindset. You can’t let yourself down because that then leads you to pursue more negative actions than positive. In other words, you’ll be taking steps back rather than forwards on the ladder of success.
What I need to happen in order to see myself as a success is to just believe in myself. If I believe that I will be successful one day then my mind will be set on reaching that ultimate goal and succeeding it. That’s about it. I know I’m going to be great one day.
To me, success is more on the inside than the outside. Yes, success can mean good grades, playing varsity, making lots of money, etc., but success also comes from deep within. Success comes from the determination to be great at something, to work hard to reach your goals. I don't think you can judge whether or not a person is successful. Different people celebrate different successes. Someone might view success as making millions of dollars, while someone else might view success as just having the ability of getting out of bed in the morning. In order to feel successful, I need to accomplish my goals. Whether it is achieving high honor roll, hitting a homerun, or simply having a good day mentally, I feel like I have succeeded and that just creates more determination to be better.
ReplyDeleteTo have a successful life I would want to have to have a family and be able to live a comfortable life and not have to worry about money. If I could accomplish this than to me I would have lived a successful life. A successful person is a person who lived their life and accomplished most of their goals. To me you don't have to be a millionaire to be a successful person you just have to fulfill your own dreams. I will find out if I have been successful person by the time I’m 40. By than if I don't have a family of my own and I’m not making bank than I haven't fulfilled my goals which means I’m not truly successful. I would definitely say there are levels to success for example if I end up making a whole lot of bread but I don't have a family than I would say I am partially successful. In order to be successful you need to know what you want in life and have some type of plan of accomplishing those goals. The first step I’m taking to a successful life is going to college and getting a degree. This will hopefully lead to me making a lot of money, and I have already found the perfect girl that I want to start my family with so I am on the right track to a successful life.
ReplyDeleteMy definition of success is when you feel happy with yourself and you have no worries in your life. A hallmark would be when you have a home and you have a mate who is with you and would never leave your side and a job to support your living. I know when i am not successful when i am not proud of myself when i know i can do some much better and vice versa. There are many levels of success like for me i would be like okay i'm successful what now? What can i do to better myself, what can i do that will help me in the future to make me even more successful. Also i can be successful but i might not be proud of myself like the things you are doing. Like what if you're making a lot of money but the way you're doing it is harmful or illegal? To be successful you need to have a base, you need to know what you're doing and what your goal is. You need to have that drive in you, the drive that will give 100% on everything you do and you just won't stop. You need to know why you are doing this and do you actually like doing what you're about to do. I say this because some people aren't happy with what their doing right now like the career and just regret what they decided to do. Everyone says that you need luck to be successful and that is definitely not what you need. Yea, some people did get lucky for example the people who post videos saying “ I dropped out of high school but i make a million dollars a month” or something. That for me is just it happened for you for a reason, that opportunity came to you because someone or something knew it was right for you and now one else could do it better than you. That’s what I think things happen for a reason.
ReplyDeleteMy definition of success is being able to reach any goal you set yourself to. Success should make you feel like you did something right. It should give you the best feeling in the world like you can keep doing bigger and better things. You don’t have to show that you have been successful, it can just be for you to know. In order to be successful in my opinion, you need to be confident, determined, and be as optimistic as possible. There shouldn’t be a moment in which you stop believing in yourself, and you don’t want to keep going. You need to avoid any thoughts like that. Usually people see success as having lots of money and having a big home and a nice car, but that is only success for some people. Being successful means you worked hard enough to accomplish your goal and make yourself the happiest you can be, no matter what it is. Everyone wants to be successful in their own ways and that is perfectly fine. I think it is easier to be successful when you have other people supporting you in some way, although you can be successful by yourself too. Success is key.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteSuccess comes with feeling satisfied, accomplished. I judge whether or not I’m successful on how I feel in the moment. If I did something, big or small, and I feel at peace with myself and satisfied, content, happy, I know I was successful in doing whatever I did. I believe there are different levels of success, like big and small matters. Something as small as, beating my best time on a run, or as big as getting into my dream school. In order for me to be successful, I just need to feel like I accomplished something, anything. Getting an A on a test, scoring a goal in a game, cleaning my room and it actually staying like that for a week, exercising and eating healthy, helping someone with anything, finishing a book, finishing a craft, you get the point. I feel success from any small thing I accomplish. But in order for me to truly feel successful in the future, I would love to accomplish each and every one of my goals, but as long as I accomplish the main ones I’ll be fine. Right now my biggest obstacle is getting into Boston University and getting my Masters in athletic training, then working for a professional football or soccer team. Once (and hopefully) I accomplish this task, I will truly feel successful in life. I’ll have my dream job, working my with professional soccer player of a husband and traveling, starting a family, just living my best life. To me that’s the most successful thing and I would see myself as successful. I won’t feel unsuccessful if I don’t accomplish those things either though. Will I be disappointed? Possibly, but that won’t stop me from making the best of it and still succeeding.
ReplyDeleteSuccess has always been the word that's wandered through my word bank without a definition. I don't think in long term goals, I focus on small goals and go step by step. The meaning of success has changed for me as I have grown, and it's because of my "one step at a time" mindset. As I've progressed through school, I've set yearly goals for myself, sometimes subconsciously. With these goals also comes the pressure of reaching them. I believe success is not reaching these goals, but dealing with the pressure that comes with it. People are phenomenal and it's amazing to see what we can accomplish when we put our mind to something. Devoting 100% to anything leads to success, which means having a hard work ethic, being persistent, and having an engine that never quits. I have never heard of a person that has worked their hardest at a goal and failed.
ReplyDeleteI don't know if this is true, but I believe people set goals for themselves that they actually believe they can accomplish. Humans hate failure, so they set achievable goals for themselves to subconsciously to avoid defeat. I judge my levels of success on the progress I make towards my goal and how long it takes me. I have a weird cynical view on goals in that I'm neither happy nor sad if I reach my expectations. I set a goal. I reached it. Nothing more. Nothing less. Albeit, it may be an insanely hard goal but it goes back to my belief that people don't set goals they don't believe they can accomplish.
The optimistic side of me wants to believe there are different levels of success, in that people can still succeed without reaching the goal they set out for. However, the cynical side of me believes that there is only success or failure. If you don't reach your goal, then you've failed. Even if that failure is some type of success, it was not the success you sought out for in the first place. Personally, I can only see myself as a success if I reach the goals I set for myself, and that's how I believe everyone becomes successful—from within.
Success, in general, is completing your mission or goals. I ,respectfully, disagree that everyone's definition of success is different. Everybody is GOALS are different because everyone worships and values different things, money, food, religion time. However, in completing them, brings joy to everyone. SO i believe the definition of success is being happy. If someone is miserable, how are they successful? To be successful, you need to have perserverence and work ethic and depending on your goals, a certain level of wisdom and knowledge.
ReplyDeleteMy definition of success is accomplishing what you wanted to accomplish. The hallmarks of a successful person is someone who is happy with what the accomplished and that it was one of their goals. I know I’m successful when I’m happy at what I completed, usually it’s just goals I set for myself or overall me saying “I’m going to do well on this test” and then doing well on it. That’s successful for me because I wanted to get a good grade and I did,it wasn’t any specific grade but it was simply just making sure I did well on it. There are different levels like HUGE success or small success, huge is like getting into your dream school while something small would be like waking up on time for school. To feel successful you would need to work hard, work hard at everything you do. Don’t go easy, don’t let anything come easy to you work so hard that you’ll never have to ask “How did I get a good grade on this?” or “How did I get into this school?” Nothing will beat hard work, continue working hard and one day you’ll get where you want to be, your goals might change but work hard to achieve those. In order for me to feel success I would have to accomplish some minor or huge goals of mine like getting into a good college, getting good grades on my tests, improving in lacrosse even more, being happy and satisfied with my life when I’m older, and so much more.
ReplyDelete