Psychology of Success...

Dr. Prabodh

It is generally believed that Success is getting what you want. If you get what you want, you are successful. Success is usually gauged in terms of money, recognition, career, relationship, status, awards, etc.

Success for most means what others see you as... what others think about you! We think we are successful when people think we are successful. When people don't think we are successful, we too deny ourselves to be successful. There is an irresistible urge to prove our worth to the world. The urge to perform, to achieve is all about letting the world acknowledge it. All of us want to be successful... right from our childhood. The race of success begins with scoring good marks in school followed by pursuing and completing a professional course and then getting a well paid job... an endless list! Success is like hankering after ceaselessly.

You cannot be successful forever. That 'they happily lived forever' is an illusion. Everytime one succeeds, there is another milestone to be achieved for further success. Success is ephemeral. It is objective. It is a material entity which is quantifiable, which is numerically stated, which is objectively evaluated. Once a goal is achieved, it becomes the stepping stone to another goal. Success is like running behind the ever receding horizon. It would be interesting to ask questions to the one whom you consider to be successful. The person, at the pinnacle of success, might say that 'the best is yet to come'.

Life is a celebration and we need reasons to celebrate life. Unfortunately, we do not celebrate without reason. We need not celebrate only monumental success... We can celebrate day-to-day's trivial moments of trivial success. We should celebrate success everyday. We should find some reason to celebrate everyday. When we wake up in the morning and do not set some milestone, some goal or some target for the day, we may end up wasting our time. Success has measurability... something which can be measured. This measurability makes one feel that one is successful.

Success is an accomplishment of what one wants or expects. Targets should be realistic and not driven by one's ambition. One can achieve success by setting parameters even on one's death-bed. All that one needs is an attitude to succeed. Success involves seeking validation (of one's performance) and appreciation of others. Appreciation does not ensue without any reason. Performance is an expression of one's potential or the manifestation of one's personality. When such performance is appreciated , it becomes success. There is nothing wrong in seeking such validation as man is a social animal. We should endeavour to enjoy our success seeking validation and creating our self-image. However, when we start creating our self-image solely on the appreciation of others, we place our remote in other's hands who can manipulate and manuvere us. Eventually, we might lose our autonomy.

When we help others to be successful, we are paving the path of our own success. Both the King and the King-Maker are successful. However, the King is always at a risk of losing his kingdom. A King-Maker does not have anything to lose. A King-Maker is beyond success and failure.

Children can be inspired and motivated to create their milestones of success. We can inspire them only if we ourselves have trodden the path we want them to tread. However, children can be motivated by way of rewards and punishments. Success and Happiness are two separate entities which govern our existence. Not every success makes us happy...Not every happiness gives us success. At times, one wins while losing and loses while winning . When one succeeds, there is a compensating loss at some place which makes one say 'Am successful but am not happy'. Success is material; Success can be quantified. Happiness is spiritual; it can never be quantified. We need to be successful because we have to have aspirations ; we have to have motivation to manifest our potential. But we also need to be happy because that is the transformation we take ourselves to from the material world to the world beyond.

Success involves competition. One is successful when the competitors are left behind... while the ones left behind are failures. Sooner or later, one stops finding competitors outside and starts finding competitor inside. On this path of competing with oneself, one arrives at a destination where one does not want to compete with oneself anymore. This is contentment. One does not feel the urge to fight with oneself, to improve upon oneself. One thinks one has reached the level where now one can watch than act/do/perform/achieve/rise high. Sucess now becomes an irrelevant redundant parameter. Success /No Success ceases to exist. The urge to succeed is over. Such a contended person refuses to engage in the material world. He believes in being happy in the present moment.

Contentment is a continuous happiness. There is no uniform, universal definition of success. Success is delivering an expected performance. This expectation is based upon the assessment of one's potential. Potential exhibiting into performance which equals an anticipated performance is Success. We should not measure our success in terms of the failures of other. We should win not because the other has failed. We should win because we deserve to. Never get influenced by the definitions and the goalposts of others to feel successful.

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