Prosperity And Success (soul, America, quote, Christianity)

[noland123]

Do prosperity and success come from who you know or the seeds you sow?

[bulmabriefs144]

First off, prosperity and success are not signs of God's favor. Christianity basically sees the worth of a person as intrinsic, not based on worldly goods. Eastern Religion puts it even more bluntly, that you govern your own reality, and given that, if success is the outflow of you life, this makes yours a shallow reality.

Not that failure is a sign of God's favor either. Truth is, success has nothing to do with religion. Success is completely unrelated, good or bad. It's basically a measure of yourself, using other people's terms. Which is stupid, only you are worthy to you. Love is a better measure of worth, as only people who love themselves can be loved.

For answers of the following, try the business section. I dunno, I've not been employed much. I've managed to be easily hired from having the desire to get the job, no excuses. But since the last two businesses I was in were completely crappy, and I realized I wanted something else, I've had a half-hearted approach to job hunting after that.

[ashleynj]

What do you mean by prosperity and success. Success might have different meanings to different people.


Paulo Coelho — What is success? It is being able to go to bed each night with your soul at peace.

[Woodrow LI]

Originally Posted by ashleynj

What do you mean by prosperity and success. Success might have different meanings to different people.


Paulo Coelho — What is success? It is being able to go to bed each night with your soul at peace.

Quite true.

Success is very individualistic. We have no visible means of determining who is a success. Success in simple terms means have acheived our goals. For some those goals might be very shallow and for others very complex.

But the ultimate success seems to be achieving 'Peace of Mind"

[mordant]

Originally Posted by noland123

Do prosperity and success come from who you know or the seeds you sow?

Both, and neither.

It's more dumb luck than most people want to acknowledge, because people like to congratulate and flatter themselves with their brilliance when things go well. And it's not like there aren't accomplishments they can and should point to and be proud of, but the reality is that the connection between intentions and outcomes is flaky at best, and the Horatio Alger narrative that anyone can be rich or at least president if they want to badly enough and try hard enough just doesn't hold true for all comers.

Prosperity and success are a combination of talent, persistence, social acumen, interest and decent luck -- not least, living in a stable, civil society that provides us with opportunity and is supportive of individual liberty.

Recognizing this allows us to be humble about our accomplishments and compassionate about failures -- ours, and other's.

[mordant]

Originally Posted by ashleynj

What do you mean by prosperity and success. Success might have different meanings to different people.


Paulo Coelho — What is success? It is being able to go to bed each night with your soul at peace.

Yes we have to ask what success looks like.

But I think questions like the OP tend to be asked in the context of "my personal goals have been achieved" without regard to the realistic nature of those goals or how it effects others or how sustainable it is or even whether it feeds the soul or not.

[old_cold]

To paraphrase a saying........
With desire and enough effort, everyone can rise to their own level of incompetence.

[Shirina]

Originally Posted by mordant

Both, and neither.

It's more dumb luck than most people want to acknowledge, because people like to congratulate and flatter themselves with their brilliance when things go well. And it's not like there aren't accomplishments they can and should point to and be proud of, but the reality is that the connection between intentions and outcomes is flaky at best, and the Horatio Alger narrative that anyone can be rich or at least president if they want to badly enough and try hard enough just doesn't hold true for all comers.

Prosperity and success are a combination of talent, persistence, social acumen, interest and decent luck -- not least, living in a stable, civil society that provides us with opportunity and is supportive of individual liberty.

Recognizing this allows us to be humble about our accomplishments and compassionate about failures -- ours, and other's.

As someone who has a passion for history, I've read a lot of biographies and autobiographies. Some are famous folk, some not so famous. I even read the biography of the guy who designed and invented the SAT tests. Not the most lively life to read about to be certain but it certainly gave me an insight to the flagrant elitism that still permeates our society.

At any rate, what I've noticed time and time and time again is that, in all of these successful and accomplished lives, there was always a crossroads where dumb luck and ONLY dumb luck launched their careers. If not for that lucky day, it is unlikely they would have ever achieved their goals.

In the instance of the SAT man (whose name annoyingly escapes me now), he happened to be eating lunch with a friend while on a weekend visit to New York City. Into the cafe walks one of the mighty Rockefellers - and it just happened to be the ONLY Rockefeller that SAT man's friend actually knew. So ... the friend manages to introduce SAT man to Mr. Rockefeller, and through that meeting and a stammering, blundering sales pitch, SAT man convinced Mr. Rockefeller to invest in creating and marketing the test.

SAT man became a multi-millionaire many times over thanks to the exorbitant fees (another "weeding out" process) ... but, most likely, none of us would have ever taken an SAT test if not for the dumb luck of SAT man: being in the right city, in the right cafe, with the right person, at just the right time.

There's a lot of smart people out there carrying around some awesome, inventive ideas - but all the hard work, persistence, intelligence, and diligence won't mean squat if you don't have the dumb luck to go with it.

Without it? Someone else with the same awesome, inventive idea you had but WITH dumb luck will get their product to market before you do, and you'll find yourself locked out of your own creativity thanks to the other guy's patent.

Unfortunately, America's Puritan version of Christianity doesn't abide failures very well. All it takes is one screw up to have your life permanently downgraded - especially now thanks to computer files that keep track of every fart, sneeze, and case of the runs you'll ever have in life.

They say failure is the best teacher - which is why we have so many dumbasses running the show these days.

Darth Vader: "What is it, General?"

General Veers: "M'lord, the fleet has moved out of light speed. Com-scan has detected an energy field protecting an area of the sixth planet of the Hoth System. The field is strong enough to deflect any bombardment."

Darth Vader: "The rebels are alerted to our presence. Admiral Ozzel came out of light speed too close to the system."

General Veers: "He ... he felt surprise was wiser --"

Darth Vader: "He's as clumsy as he is stupid. General, prepare your troops for a surface attack."

General Veers: "Yes, m'lord."

(Calling Admiral Ozzel on ship-to-ship communications)

Admiral Ozzel: "Lord Vader. The fleet has moved out of light speed and we're preparing to ... Ach! Ugh! Blyarghh!"

Darth Vader: "You have failed me for the last time, Admiral. Captain Piett."

Captain Piett: "Yes, M'lord."

Admiral Ozzel: "Ulgp! Argh! Gulp! Echhhh! Achhh!"

Darth Vader: "Make ready to land our troops beyond their energy field and deploy the fleet so that nothing gets off the system. You are in command now, Admiral Piett."

Admiral Ozzel: "Arrrrrrrrrrrrrgh!" (*thud*)

Captain Piett: "Thank you, Lord Vader."

[ashleynj]

Originally Posted by Woodrow LI

Quite true.

Success is very individualistic. We have no visible means of determining who is a success. Success in simple terms means have acheived our goals. For some those goals might be very shallow and for others very complex.

But the ultimate success seems to be achieving 'Peace of Mind"

Yes, and achieving peace of mind can sometimes be more difficult than anything.

Bob Marley on being rich: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGKLkaRs1NE