At its core, success boils down to the combination of three essential ingredients: talent, commitment, and opportunity. Talent is innate; it cannot be taught or attained through experience yet it is the base of the pyramid we call success. Commitment, on the other hand, is acquired through foresight and aspiration. At the top of the pyramid lies opportunity; it is the quality that distinguishes the outstanding from the average. Those outstanding people are forever indebted to both the seeming negligible, and the obviously beneficial opportunities they were presented with.
Talent is the foundation of a success, without it commitment and opportunity have nothing to build on, even so, talent alone is not success. Take Christopher Langan for example, the media has dubbed him “the smartest man in America.” In fact he may even be the smartest person in the world. Einstein is the embodiment of intellectual success; his IQ is document to be 160. In 1999, the TV show 20/20 aired and interview with neuropsychologist Robert Novelly, in which he confirmed that Christopher Langan’s IQ was 210. Dr. Novelly also described Langan’s IQ as “the highest individual that I have ever measured in 25 years." In high school he earned a perfect score on the SAT even though he fell asleep during the test. Langan attended Montana State University, but his financial problems, and his belief that he could teach his professors more than they could teach him led him to drop out Langan is known mostly for his part in developing the "theory of the relationship between mind and reality." Beyond that his name rarely surfaces while defining success. Even though he possessed such amazing talent Langan did not become a billionaire entrepreneur, instead he took a strin...
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...ly was well off; they could afford to send him to Lakeside one of the few schools with access to a time share terminal in 1968. He also happened to live a walking distance from University of Washington. Together these pivotal opportunities can be credited with rising Bill Gates to the status he is at now.
Success is often thought to be the product of creativity, leadership and attitude. While many successful people possess these qualities they are not the building blocks of success. To become outstanding in a crowd of average people a person must be talent and willing to work hard in his field of choice, most importantly though, he or she must be lucky. Every successful person from the dawn of humanity until this very moment is the product of favorable odds.
Works Cited
Gladwell, Malcolm. Outliers: The Story of Success. New York: Little, Brown and, 2008. Print.
I agree with Gladwell that hard work can lead to success. Too often we think success happens because someone has money or gets lucky. This is wrong. Success takes hard work, imagination, and motivation. “Success is not a random act. It arises out of a predictable and powerful set of circumstances and opportunities.” (Gladwell 52) If you assert yourself and use your mind and imagination, you can create those
Natural talent doesn’t lead the person to success, but it’s the combination of nurturing and favorable events that will make the him/her “successful”.
Success can be a very hard word to define, simply because where you come from
My definition of success is not based on being a wealthy person on the contrary, it is based on ones' positive attitudes, actions, trustworthiness and strong character demonstrated while dealing with the many challenges of life. For me, being able to focus as well as maneuver through adversities and succeed are key components of being a successful person. The late George W. Jenkins and Brandi Callum are prime examples, and they have different success stories.
Nearly everyone has the desire to be successful in their lives, whether it be measured in the amount of wealth a man owns or the accomplishments he has made in his life. Therein lies the most common, the success in a man's profession. There are multiple approaches to this connotation of success where a wide range of techniques can be applied. One might think that the only way to reach a particular level of success is to take on a competitive nature and achieve that coveted position of number 1. However, being competitive does not necessarily insure that a person is ‘successful.’ They must be competent in their field to reach the top spot. An example of these two sides can be found within Arthur Miller’s Death of A Salesman using the characters Willy and Bernard.
´´ If one advances confident in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life he imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours. ’’ These words were spoken by Henry David Thoreau.Success is within the mind of the individual. A large portion of one´s life is spent working to become successful. People are told throughout childhood to work hard so they can grow up and achieve all of their dreams. But success takes many different forms. Different people have different interpretations of what success means to them. It does not matter how related they are to each other in certain áreas they always have a different point of view of what success really is. For some success is measured by social status and wealth
Hard work and dedication can lead you to success anytime. As my dad was young he would be working on the farm in India and his older cousin would tease him when planes flew by. My dad had a goal that he wanted to lift the poverty in his family, which he managed to do. Now whenever we go back to my uncles my dad teases him about the planes. He was dedicated and persistent, he knew his goal and went to achieve it. He has now lifted the poverty and the whole family is now fairly wealthy. Successful people are rarely just lucky; they put effort into their work. Many people say being persistent is key to success. Persistence is something that helps you hold onto those dreams. You refuse to get discourages even when you see other people not being able to succeed at their goals. Knowing that you can achieve your goals and trying for those goals is key. Also, having somewhat realistic goals is important as well. Most of our goals are judged by society; most of the time we seek their approval before doing
The results of hard work are astronomical. Despite popular belief, efforts to succeed do not go unnoticed, such as the practice that goes into mastering a hobby, skill, or talent. All throughout one’s life, people are told to work hard and to try their best at everything they accomplish. This has an effect on what is widely considered to be success and how to achieve it. Although many credit others’ victories to innate talent, the true key to success does not lie in talent, but in hard work.
One thing that everyone wants is success. Success is something anyone can achieve, if they put their best effort into it. Success is one of the most critical elements to so many events throughout someone’s lifetime. Although it may sound so simple to obtain, it can actually be difficult. The reason that it could be hard, is the fact that there are so many components to find success.
Talent is overrated, no one who is successful did it overnight, that is fact, however, the discrepancies begin on the why. Many claims were made and thoroughly supported by Malcolm Gladwell in “Outliers: The Story Of Success” and “The Struggle to Be First: First-Gen Students May Be Torn Between College and Home” by Alina Tugend. The factors that are believed to be attribute to success are social class standards, the educational level of a family, and practical intelligence.
Some people take advantage of two, or maybe three of those opportunities. Not taking advantage of opportunities doesn't necessarily mean that it is impossible for one to succeed, but the more opportunities someone takes advantage of the less time it will take for them to reach their goals. Opportunities come and go, but the next step is looking for and creating new opportunities for yourself. Many successful people have also said this such as Orison Swett Marden: “Don't wait for extraordinary opportunities. Seize common occasions and make them great. Weak men wait for opportunities; strong men make them.” This quote directly supports the second “secret to success”. It tells us that although you can wait for opportunities to come, you need to make opportunities for yourself to be truly successful. For example, the I joined my school’s play even though I didn’t really want to at first. When I told the teacher that I wanted to join, it was already past the application deadline, but I showed him some of my skills and he eventually let me
Having admirable character, making conscientious decisions, and possessing positive determination are key ingredients for remarkable success.
When someone is skillful, it means someone has the ability to do something well through knowledge and performance (Merriam-Webster.com). When one is determined to do something, they have reached a decision (Merriam-Webster.com). The critically acclaimed film, The Blind Side, is the story of a homeless teenager, Michael Oher, who gets adopted by the Tuohys, plays high school football, and becomes a professional football player. The Blind Side shows in order to “make it,” one must obtain skill and demonstrate determination regardless of obstacles. For Oher to achieve his American Dream, he had to overcome: low grades, social and economic stature, racial prejudices, and the odds of making it to the National football League (NFL).
Success is within the mind of the individual. A large portion of ones life is spent working to become successful. People are told throughout childhood to work hard so they can grow up and make lots of money. But success takes many different forms. Different people have different interpretations of what success means to them. For some, success is measured by social status and wealth; for others success is determined only by the amount of happiness one feels.
The price of success is hard work, dedication to the job at hand, and the determination that whether we win or lose, we have applied the best of ourselves to the task at hand.” As you watch mainstream media you notice that the rich and successful are always joyful and confident. This eludes you from the hard work it takes for someone to become successful. Main stream media has falsely popularized the true definition of being successful. Many people start to believe that you’re only successful if you own an enormous house with multiple rooms that you can sleep in a new room each night, or having luxurious cars, owning expensive items, traveling anywhere you want at any given time, but in fact the true meaning of success is far from that. In