Has this ever happened to you? You read something or hear something a thousand times and don't give it much thought, but then one fine day when the stars are all aligned you hear it again and you suddenly 'get it'.
This weekend during a drive across Colorado to play a game of Cricket, I tuned in to NPR. The renowned blues guitarist, B.B. King had recently broken ground on a project to build a museum dedicated to him in Indianola,Mississippi and NPR was running a feature on him. Apparently during the 40s and 50s, the Mississippi delta area was teeming with hordes of extremely talented Blues musicians. I might be wrong about the dates but hey it was 6:30 in the morning - it's a miracle that I was even able to drive !! Anyway, the interviewer asked King how was it that among the many talented guitarists who were around at that time only he could make it to the top. After giving some usual celebrity bs about managers/friends/family he said - because I wanted it more.
Isn't that what success in any field really boils down to? Once you have the minimum requirements to succeed in a field (a height > 7ft for basketball, decent analytical skills for academic research) all that really matters is how badly you want to succeed. On the face of it that might seem to be a good thing. After all we cannot acquire talent but we can always make ourselves want something really bad. Then how come it is so hard to have that drive? I am pretty sure most people do not set out to be average. But that's how most people end up as (by the definition of average). Maybe it's because attaining real success in most fields is a marathon, not a sprint. During the course of this long race on many occasions one has the option to drop out of the hard, risky, unpredictable path and head down the safe, comfortable, average road. Most people succumb to this temptation. A select few press on and are successful.
There I said it - my unified theory of success in professional life :) Maybe I should go for more early morning drives from now on.
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2 comments:
Doesn't this theory partially answer your questions in the first post: "Is this kind of long term focus really possible? Do people really know when they graduate what exactly they want to do with their lives? Is that kind of focus even desirable?"
Looking forward to reading more posts and good luck with your MBA.
Resident-of-Pitt
Yeah it does, though that was not my intention :)
In the 'focus' post I had in mind people who when they have a goal do take risks and work hard. Its just that their goal keeps changing. In this post I had in mind people who have opted out of the rat race so to speak and who have chosen the comfort and security of 'averageness'.
But you are right in that a person who wants something bad enough will obviously be focussed on it over a long period of time.
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