Success

Discussion in 'Human Science' started by Jan Ardena, Oct 28, 2010.

  1. Jan Ardena OM!!! Valued Senior Member

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    When a person is said to have had a successful life,
    what is meant by it?

    What would make your life a success, and why would you think it so?

    jan.
     
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  3. John99 Banned Banned

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    The second part is just too vague to answer because it would be tailored to the individual so what makes me feel successful may make some feel otherwise.

    The first part: I guess it is really just if your happy.

    Edit: actually content would be the state of mind, of course, happy all the time is not realistic.
     
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  5. cosmictraveler Be kind to yourself always. Valued Senior Member

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    Success is measured in many ways. I feel that just by living as long as I have and not dying young I've already been successful with my life. There are others however that want money, prestige, property, notoriety and many other things that make their lives successful to them. It is up to each of us to determine what we each view as success in life and attain that goal if we can.

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  7. Bebelina kospla.com Valued Senior Member

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    Big house, plenty of cash, a pool, big screen tv. Pool is perhaps unecessary, but a home-spa? Bubblepool! Big areas of land. Power over people.

    But if we're talking about after you have died, what you value then as successful with the life recently lived, then I suppose it can vary greatly, depending on what you aimed for with this life to begin with. Having had a positive influence on others usually brings some kind of satisfaction in the life hereafter. To some it's simply having survived against all odds.
     
    Last edited: Oct 28, 2010
  8. Skeptical Registered Senior Member

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    I agree with CT.

    It has been said of success and achievement that achievement is getting what you want, and success is wanting what you get.

    On that basis, even poor, uneducated people can be successful. I knew a guy some years ago who thought being successful was having lots of kids. He was a thicko of the worst kind, and was married to his third wife (poor woman). He had about 12 kids. A very successful man.
     
  9. keith1 Guest

    To enter an existence and to leave it, knowing you have done little to destabilize it's sustainability.

    Having entered an existence, and finding others have already preceded you in destabilizing the sustainability of that existence, to thwart them by undermining their efforts. Even to the lengths of collapsing the paradigm as a whole, in order that sustainability must be reestablished, even without your continued presence.

    This is the measure of true success.
     
  10. wynn ˙ Valued Senior Member

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    15,058
    To know what the right state of mind is, and to have that right state of mind, at least at the end of each day, but especially at the time of death.

    Why I think so? I seem to have practically come to fnd the value of having a calm and properly concentrated mind.

    For example, during a procedure at the dentist, I cannot just "close my eyes and think of Christmas". It's just not enough. Although I have the ability to zone out at will, the consequences of doing this have scared me to the point of refraining from using this strategy.

    Given how living beings usually fare in this world - they get sick with all kinds of illnesses, get caught in burning buildings, get assaulted, lose their jobs, their lovers leave them, and then, to top it all off, comes death in its numerous painful and humiliating ways - these things are something to prepare for. Because if one doesn't do something to prepare, one will just suffer more.
     
  11. Bebelina kospla.com Valued Senior Member

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    Even with massive preparation for all those common occurances, one would still suffer, so true success in that respect would be to avoid all that. To live a life as meaningless as possible, or short enough for those things to never happen, like being a featus that never gets born.
     
  12. Jan Ardena OM!!! Valued Senior Member

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    John99,



    The whole thread is tailored to the individual.




    You mean there are other parts?




    We do try live our lives in such a way as to be happy all
    the time, at least from some point in the future. Don't we?

    What stops us from being happy all the time?

    jan.
     
  13. Jan Ardena OM!!! Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,968
    Bebelina,



    Is the success in having these things, or having the time to enjoy
    them?



    I would be inclined to rate the latter as a successful life, as one
    may have learned valuable lessons along the way.

    jan.
     
  14. Jan Ardena OM!!! Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
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    cosmictraveler,



    What if you have a long-life of mis-fortune, would you still
    consider long life successful?



    I agree, but what is it we are all striving for. What makes life a success.
    Personally I agree with john99, that happiness is the key.
    And I suspect that is the theme of your answer. So what is happiness?

    jan.
     
  15. Jan Ardena OM!!! Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,968
    Skeptical,


    True.
    So what is success?


    I wonder if he felt he had made a success of his life.


    jan.
     
  16. Jan Ardena OM!!! Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,968

    So success is, changing the world to something you approve of?
    Where exactly is the satisfaction?

    jan.
     
  17. Jan Ardena OM!!! Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    13,968

    So a successful life would be one where one prepares onself for anything.
    A sort of life of equiliberum.

    jan.
     
  18. Bebelina kospla.com Valued Senior Member

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    I think both, owning things brings satisfaction and a feeling of success, having the time to enjoy whatever is extra successful. Not having time to enjoy acquired expensive luxury items one would think should cause a feeling of failure, but that is still to be found out.

    To enjoy life without learning any lessons could also be measured as successful. Because you already know it all.
     
  19. cosmictraveler Be kind to yourself always. Valued Senior Member

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    33,264
    What if you have a long-life of mis-fortune, would you still
    consider long life successful?


    By living however long is a very succesful life to me. I really do not need things and stuff to make life sucessful as to me life itself makes it so.




    I agree, but what is it we are all striving for.

    That is up to you to determine what "floats your boat" as they say.



    What makes life a success.

    Again that's a personal thing not up to others to say what makes you feel that you are sucessful.




    Personally I agree with john99, that happiness is the key.

    That's his opinion as many others will have other views about what their thinking is about sucess.




    And I suspect that is the theme of your answer.


    No it was not, living and being alive is what I view as sucess.




    So what is happiness?

    That again is up to each person to answer.
     
  20. keith1 Guest

    Having the widest global consensus of unintimidated individual, agreed-upon approval.
    Where isn't the satisfaction in that?
     
  21. Skeptical Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    1,449
    Let me repeat my definitions.

    Achievement is getting what you want.

    Success is wanting what you get.

    The successful life is the one in which a person lives the life they want to live. The proverbial hillbilly, sitting on the stoop with a jug of moonshine in his hand, and a fatuous smile on his face, may be judged to be very successful.

    The self made billionnaire may be very unsuccessful if the life he is leading is still not the life he wants.

    Happiness as such may be a part of success, if that is what the person wants. However, happiness is usually transitory, and can lead to nastiness. For example : taking heroine makes you very happy, but is not a sign of success. Perhaps dying of heroine overdose, in a state of maximum happiness is successful, but I doubt it!

    The best most of us can hope for is a state of modest contentment. It is kind of interesting, that for most of us, research shows that such a state is not attained until getting rather older.
     
  22. Fraggle Rocker Staff Member

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    24,690
    After you're gone, your success will be measured by those you left behind. From that perspective a successful person is one who left the world at least a slightly better place than he found it; one who gave back to civilization at least a little bit more than he took from it.

    If doing this also makes you happy, so much the better.

    Arch-criminals, despots, etc., manage to accumulate a lot of wealth and power, but they do it by taking more than they give. They're like communists: their contribution to the world, especially to its economy, is negative. No one considers them successful, except in the narrow sociological context of a "successful criminal who managed to stay out of prison."
     
  23. keith1 Guest

    Pavlov's dog hears his master's voice and gets excited about a conditioned response. His master's voice means nothing but a pending meal.

    A chicken plays the piano because of the seeds spread upon the keys. The odds are astronomical that the music doesn't suck.
     

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