Success

I tried to define success, in the days that have ensued since my confidence that I would be able to procure a definition for the admiring public. However, in the days that have ensued, it has become entirely clear to me that it is impossible for anybody, let alone me, to define success. You see, success as it really should be is an entirely personal affair, corresponding only to an individual’s personal and professional needs; it is related in no pure form to culture beyond the fact that some individuals achieve it and that individuals make up a culture. In fact, I will, although in no way promoting the act of self-promotion, point out the use of the word “some” in the previous sentence: I could have said, reasonably, within the bounds of my conception, that every individual achieves success, because there is always someone striving towards that way of life; because there is no actual originality in life, it would be possible to say “every individual achieves success” without lying. However, it would not be true to my sense of the word to say that every individual achieves success, because success is the most personal thing in the world. Success holds within it the promise of the end result, the hope for the achieving, and all the failures and knowledge acquired in the time when the individual strived for success. I cannot define success; I cannot reasonably apply the rule of my own life onto the life of another. I can measure for myself what I think success is, but another person looking at my definition is likely to say, “Poppycock, I’ll settle for nothing less than the presidency.” Success is a term that must be defined in the moment of success, not in the dusty archives of a library dictionary: The book is shut, and success ends.