Our culture tends to define success in terms of the acquisition of status and wealth; but might there be other more soulful ways of understanding success?

Confusion about what Makes for a Successful Life

Author and spiritual Director, Anthony DeMello, called our culture’s recipe for success into question with the following story:

A small-time businessman, 55 years old, is sipping beer at a bar… and he’s saying,‘Well, look at my classmates, they’ve really made it.’ [But] what does he mean,‘They made it?’ They’ve got their names in the newspaper? Do you call that making it? Who determines what it means to be a success? Being the president of a corporation has nothing to do with being a success in life...[nor does] having a lot of money...People who made it! Made what? Made asses of themselves because they drained all their energy chasing after something that was worthless. They’re frightened and confused… They are controlled and manipulated… Do you call that human? And do you know why that happens? Only one reason: They identified with some label. The identified their “I” with their money or their job or their profession… If I change my profession tomorrow, it’s just like changing my clothes. I am untouched. Are you your clothes? Are you your name? Are you your profession? Stop identifying with them. They come and go…

DeMello might be judged as ranting here, but there is a measure of Truthspeaking in his words. Certainly, in the status quo view, the path to success is to climb the proverbial ladder, striving, over a lifetime, to achieve security and recognition. But has it ever occurred to you that spending your life energy to make a name for yourself could actually interfere with genuine success? First, because, in so doing, you will be ignoring your own inner compass by conforming to society’s recipe for success; and, second, because you will make the mistake of seeing success as a future goal—something that you expend your life energy reaching for—instead of understanding success as a life-long practice of being fully alive and fully present to yourself and to the world, moment-by-moment. This is a crucial distinction because, in the hot pursuit of success, it is easy to forget an essential truth—namely, that our ends and our means are inextricably bound together. This means that if we fail to create good will, health and happiness in the pursuit of success, then the end (the outcome) will be devoid of these essential qualities.

It was, perhaps, with this wisdom in mind that Thomas Merton, who lived his life, one day at a time, as a monk in a monastery in Kentucky, offered this advice to young people: “Be anything you like, be madmen, drunks, and bastards of every shape and form, but at all cost avoid one thing: success.” I confess that I was confused when I first read Merton’s words because he seemed to be saying that there is no such thing as “success”. My confusion lifted when author and environmentalist, David Orr, put Merton’s admonition in perspective with these words: “The plain fact is that the planet does not need more successful people, but it does desperately need more peacemakers, healers, restorers, storytellers, and lovers of every kind. It needs people who live well in their places. It needs people of moral courage willing to join the fight to make the world habitable and humane. And these qualities have little to do with success as our culture has defined it.”      

Success Exploration 2: A Failure Resume

Most of us have been taught to avoid failure, at all cost, by playing it safe and coloring within the lines. But what if we were to embrace failure!? You can experience what this might be like by preparing a Failure Resume. That’s right: A Failure Resume! This is different from the standard resume where we attempt to summarize the story of our lives in glowing terms, adorned with achievements and accolades. Rather than an honest appraisal of who we are; the standard resume is often a gussied-up story where we attempt to sell ourselves as successful, in accord with our society’s metrics for success.

But a Failure Resume—now, that’s different because it offers a fuller story of who you are. Show this to a potential employer and s/he will have a true window into your character, into your courage and readiness to step into the unknown, into your willingness to learn from failure, into your capacity for humility and vulnerability, into your tenacity and resilience—all hard won through your personal trials and tribulations.

So, for the purpose of self-discovery and awakening, consider setting aside some journaling time now to create a Failure Resume. And, then, who knows, some day, in the service of aliveness and authenticity, you just might muster the boldness to share both your Success and Failure resumes with a perspective employer and that employer just might welcome you with open arms.

"Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive."
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- Howard Thurman