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What really is success?


Success means different things to different people. But most people, (and even the dictionary), define success as winning - being rich, being famous, and being powerful. So success is all about a heady cocktail of money, power, and influence. Many people are inspired by wealth and extreme individualism, like that which was proclaimed by Ayn Rand in her novels, demonstrating that "selfishness is a virtue"; Gordon Gekko, Michael Douglas' character in the film 'Wall Street' famously said "Greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right. Greed works." The economic collapse of 2008 can be ascribed to greed. The rampant corruption in India is also because of unlimited greed. As Milton Friedman said, "The business of business is business".

Mine is an alternative view of what success is. Wanting to be number one in whatever we do, winning the race should never be the sole objective. Life cannot be reduced to a rat race, because even the winner still remains a rat! Coming first, is a byproduct. What matters is the effort that one puts in. We should not be losing the race for want of effort.

It does not matter whether we win or lose. What matters is how hard we fought for what we believed in. When we talk of goal-setting, the issue is not whether we achieved our goal or not. It is how hard we tried. What is more important is what you become in the process of achieving your goal. Success is becoming what you are capable of becoming.

Success also means making other people successful and happy. In Zulu/Xhosa culture from Africa, there is a phrase, Ubuntu. When translated it means, "I am what I am because of who we all are." In other words, the very essence of being a human being is to be interconnected to other human beings. The Zulus say, "A person is a person through other persons."

Therefore, to be successful in life, you need the close and intimate support of other people, the team. We win nothing on our own, unless we give support or take it. After all, we live in an inter-connected world.

(This message for June, 2014 is excerpted from the CEO's message at the Graduation Day ceremony for the Class of 2014-IB)

(This is the essence of the message brought to newly elected Leaders of The Indus Student Council at Bangalore, by Lt. Gen. Arjun Ray (Retd.), CEO of the Indus Trust on the occasion of The Ceremony of Investiture on January 26th, 2012)

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Date: 03/29/2024

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