What It Really Takes to be a Success

Contrary to what many believe, talent, drive, vision, or skill don’t add up to success. We live in a world full of talented and gifted people, yet success evades many of them. Why? How many times have we all seen a person with less talent or drive than another succeed? I know I’ve seen it a number of times. This mystery perplexed me for years, until I really paid attention to the details.

Here’s what I discovered.

Many overly talented and gifted people are complacent, they know they’re good, people tell them all the time. This leads to the “Success will come to me” attitude. They become sidetracked by other areas of life, relationships, jobs, after all, they have time, success is on its way. It will come, it has to, they’re gifted, special, aren’t they? Hardly, they have one or maybe two major things in their favor, it’s not enough, but they believe it is. People tell them it is.

Take the high school football star I was best friends with, he’s a great example. A very popular fellow indeed, a very gifted athlete too. He went and played university football, the golden boy, “That kids going places” everyone said. He’s a mail man in his forties today, the golden years behind him. He’s one example of many. What happened?

It depends on whose version of the story you believe, his, or what really happened, by those who knew him. His version is that he was never recognized for the great talent he was, things were different at university, no one knew him, the coaches didn’t pay attention, scouts didn’t see him, he never got to play enough.

The truth?

In our small town he was a sports hero, he stood out, he was a big fish in a small pond. When he got to university he was still the same gifted athlete, but he was one among many, he was a small fish in an ocean of gifted athletes. He didn’t have the hunger needed to succeed; he was too complacent from too many compliments. The old saying go’s, “Once you start believing your own press, you’re done”. I’ve seen it happen time and again, it’s a common story, and you probably have some of your own examples.

The moral is this, life happens, time passes, it’s inevitable, stay hungry. If you’re at the bottom of the heap, good for you, you’ll get tough, you’ll be hungry, and you will probably work your way past more talented people. Don’t buy your own press, you can’t succeed on compliments and praise, life doesn’t work that way.