success!

Disclaimer: I am listening to some Britney Spears Femme Fatale album so I am sorry if some of my sentences do not make sense or are grammatically incorrect. The influence of social media these days...

Let's talk about motivation and perseverance and desire in no particular order since they all work together to achieve success. Everyone goes through each process differently but ultimately, these are three keys to success. For example, if you want to be "good" at piano, you need the desire to play it, the motivation to learn forevermore, and the perseverance to continue to play it after you peak (or even if you don't?). Same goes for playing a sport, starting a family, getting through school etc.. If you are missing one key ingredient, your chances for success are not possible, given that success to you means "the favorable outcome of something attempted." But to me, that also means happiness, you gotta be happy in your strive to success. If you are not happy, why pursue? I do not consider someone who makes a trillion dollars a day, but hates hates hates their job because they don't have time to do anything else, successful. Sure you are successful at making money (which doesn't matter THAT much in my opinion) but you fail at being happy, which is pretty damn important. What fun is a sad puppy?

Motivation can stem from a variety of things. What motivates you? Well for me, family motivates me greatly, and my desire to explore my interests. Competition is great motivation, but too bad I am generally not a competitive person. I'm pretty humble about some things and only if I know I can't win something do I try to compete. That is like Tour de France leader, Thomas Voekler, claiming that he has 0% chance to win the tour, but he has been in the lead for about 9 days now.. but that's a different story (it's psychological, he wants to give himself a mental buffer so that the real contenders will brush him off, thinking they will catch up easily later). I guess I am kind of like a Thomas Voekler, the best of the best motivate me as I test out their abilities. Granted I don't compete much at all, even amongst my friends for fun. I guess my friends aren't competitive in the physical sense, but when it comes to class ranks and orchestra, they are unyielding. I guess I am just different. If I know I am more capable of doing something, I don't just go all out... like when I go bike riding with pals, I don't treat it like a time trial, I stay with them and chat! It is so much more fun that way. Bad mouthing is also good motivation. Another tour example, a top sprinter from Great Britain named Mark Cavendish is getting heated media on him. The top American sprinter, Tyler Farrah, accuses him of cheating or riding dirty and whatnot, which motivates Mark to destroy the competition. He has won, I believe, 4 or 5 stages of the tour, which is mad impressive. Anger is his motivation which he creates, which is enemies cause.

Desire. You have to love what you're doing. Do you think Mark Cavendish would still be racing on bikes if he did not enjoy it? Obviously not. Thankfully he is, so his talent isn't going to waste. It's all in the eye of the beholder though. My good friend Steve was the best violin player around (I am sure this is true, he is also humble), but he no longer had the desire to play. So he made the right decision and stopped playing. What good would it do if he didn't even please himself while playing? Certainly it must be different when your heart is not in it. Let's say Steve continued to play violin, in hopes to stay the best, but he has no desire to. He will obviously not be successful because if he has no desire to, he would practice less and make some careless mistakes, and someone else who has a stronger desire to be the best would be the best. All we can say that my pal Steve was a successful violin player, and still is, given that his definition of being successful at playing violin constitutes woo-ing girls and non competitive play. I kid, but I know he is happy with what talent he possess. So did his talent go to "waste"? Not at all. Maybe his goal in life is to become a business owner, or a lawyer, or a doctor, and not a violin player. If his goal was to be a top violin player, we all know he would become one easily. He thinks he can do something better with his life, that he can contribute more than just to arouse ears (which he still can, no doubt, just not the peak he used to be at). Let's all turn heads to my good friend Jenny. She has a strong desire to become a doctor for her own reasons, that also motivate her. It doesn't end there. She desires many many things, perhaps to many to list, and it will certainly take more than five minutes to do so (inside joke detected). But knowing her personality and willingness to succeed at almost any cost, I am certain she is geared toward a successful life. Her desire, motivation, and perseverance are blatantly obvious.

You gotta persevere. If you find out, once you are a doctor, that you don't wanna be a doctor anymore, you will probably become a comedian. That's funny isn't it? All of us have persevered in one way or another. I know for a fact that almost all of my friends are pursuing higher education. Why? Because they want to be successful  which they will attain only after they are happy with their life. What if you are never happy with your life? Then you are miserable. Just kidding, that just means you are ambitious and always want to try new things. You can be happy and still pursue new things though; That means you are successful but still want to gain more success. If you want something pretty badly, you will give it your all to keep at it. Mark Cavendish is not going to stop winning until he is retired, and his goal is to win every sprint finish that the tour has to offer. If he thinks "I will just win a few, and see how the rest go," that mean's he doesn't have the desire to win, in which he will not be able to enjoy bike racing as much, and might even retire because he stops winning. That is a pretty extreme example that is not probable in the real world, but if he is that kind of person (I am sure he is not) then it could happen hypothetically. The concept of perseverance is most likely linked with the enjoyment of doing something.

Anywho, success is very very broad and perhaps not easy to pin point. If Voekler does not win the tour, then was his ride successful? Yes and maybe no. (First of all, it means a LOT to wear the yellow jersey, aka be the race leader. You get a lot of benefits, such as revenue and media attention). He has been in yellow for 9 days (and he is French too, so he is so prideful when he rides in it) and counting, which is an extremely successful feat, and he is tremendously happy right now. He stated that he had 0% chance of winning, which translates to "I won't win" which can translate into "I am fine without winning in the end." So if this is the case, he would still be successful if he lost because all he wanted was to please the French crowd and ride in yellow for the longest time possible. But if he really had winning intentions, then his overall ride was a failure; he did not win and is not happy, but his ride would be a success in its own right that he held yellow for so long. So its a term that is easily thrown around but maybe hard to follow, and his highly subjective to the beholder. In the general perspective though, only the final step is of any importance. For example, is Bill Gates successful? He didn't finish college. Same goes for Michael Dell and other of those billionaires. Was he or was he not successful in college? Maybe all they needed were a few classes to learn how to do what they do today to gain their glory, and simply stopped attending to do their own thing. I am sure they are happy now and they are successful at what they do. Generally, people tag the term failure if someone does not finish college, but Bill Gates and the others prove so otherwise.

Well next time you ask your self, am I successful? See if you are where you are at, and if that is where you wanna be at, and if you are happy with that. If not, do something about it! We all wanna be successful in life, whether it be learning how to swim, being a doctor, being a bum (that's not that easy for some), and only through motivation, perseverance, and desire, can we be.


-KT