What is Success?

In various dictionaries success is defined as the favorable or prosperous termination of attempts or endeavors. Additionally in current environment success is also directly associated with the attainment of wealth, position, honors, or the like. But beside what the dictionary says, what is success for you, me and billions of other people who are living on the 3^rd planet from the sun – Earth.

Couple of days back for no reason I decided to sit at roadside tea stall. While chatting with one of the rickshaws puller, I asked him the question about what is success for him? He answered that he doesn’t know what success is. But after thinking for a moment he answered back that he wants to send his mother and father on Hajj. He further gave it a thought, had a sip of tea and said that he will consider himself successful once he can earn the money to send his parents to Hajj and then finally when will be able to send them. It was a cold evening and he barely had adequate cloths to cover his body from the chilly air. While we (rickshaw puller & me) were talking at the tea stall, the owners of the stall jumped in between and said “that he (rickshaw puller) even skips his meal to save money for the Hajj trip for this parent.” I got so much touched, and hence made an attempt to offer a help for the trip. But once he noticed it in my talk, he immediately responded “Sahib (sir) it will be my money and ‘I’ will send them”. I felt so strong about that moment and left the place. I kept on wondering that the entire notion of success for him revolves around the trip to Hajj by his parents.

I am in the middle of reading Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers, and the same book explains (from my viewpoint) the formula of success or achievement in the following manner:

Hard Work + Luck = Success.

Of course the most of the successful subject taken into the research for the book are highly successful people in their own rights. The book digs deep into some luck or rather wonderfully defined/explained “opportunity(s)” that made people like Bill Gates, people like Bill Joy, people like Steve Job and so on what they are. Outliers begins with a provocative look at why certain five-year-old boys enjoy an advantage in ice hockey, and how these advantages accumulate over time. The book also explains what Bill Gates, the Beatles and Mozart had in common: along with talent and ambition, each enjoyed an unusual opportunity to intensively cultivate a skill that allowed them to rise above their peers. Bottom Line, the book is a highly recommended piece of work. It throws up some wonderful “scientific” attributes of success.

At 60, Professor Ray Umashankar, who has an artificial hip, climbed the 19,340-foot Mount Kilimanjaro, the highest peak in Africa, to honor his son Naren, who killed himself following a bout of depression. He defined success not being the skill but passion to do a thing. So climbing a 19000 plus mountain even with an artificial hip, just to honor his son was a success.

While I was articulating the above para I noticed that how easily I used the word “just”, without giving a thought that how important it could have been for Prof. Ray to climb the mountain that he forced himself even with the artificial hip. This truly indicates that definition of success in different people’s worldview is different.

Continuing with the attributes of success, I believe and as indicated by Prof Ray that “passion” plays an important role in an individual or collective success. Yes most of us try to do hard work and if luck favor at the appropriate time we taste success. But being passionate in what you believe or what you want to achieve not only plays a critical role but (for me) is the tipping point towards your so called or so believed anticipated success.

Hence with this hypothesis I believe people like Bill Gates, Bill Joy, and other successful figures were passionate about what they were doing, even before they realized what they want to achieve. In the above story of the Rickshaw Puller, the person was so passionate about sending his parents to the Hajj that I was even able to notice a dazzle in his eye when he was talking about it.

The rickshaw puller among others big names have, and are surely putting a lot of hard work but I still truly believe that they are bounded by the spell of passion that has ignited the notion of hard work. Similarly if you see the case of the father - Prof Roy, he was so much passionate to honor his son that beside his physical constraints he was all willing to do the hard work, and I would assume that while he was climbing he must have had the factor of luck favoring him with the right conditions for the climb.

I do not consider myself any scholar in any field, nor do I have any intentions to be one. But I believe that we all have to be passionate in what we believe, what we think, what we do or what we want to achieve. So the formula of success for me is:

Passion + Hard work + Luck = Success.

Similarly I am passionate for someone whom I love & care; working hard towards it, and I know once luck strike, I will taste success. I know that even she knows that…………………………………….

Have A Happy & Passionate Sunday!