Only permanent success is allowed
Only permanent success is allowed
SOURCE - https://brightwanderer.tumblr.com/post/681806049845608448
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I think a lot about how we as a culture have turned “forever” into the only acceptable definition of success.
Like... if you open a coffee shop and run it for a while and it makes you happy but then stuff gets too expensive and stressful and you want to do something else so you close it, it’s a “failed” business. If you write a book or two, then decide that you don’t actually want to keep doing that, you're a “failed” writer. If you marry someone, and that marriage is good for a while, and then stops working and you get divorced, it’s a “failed” marriage.
The only acceptable “win condition” is “you keep doing that thing forever”. A friendship that lasts for a few years but then its time is done and you move on is considered less valuable or not a “real” friendship. A hobby that you do for a while and then are done with is a “phase” - or, alternatively, a “pity” that you don’t do that thing any more. A fandom is “dying” because people have had a lot of fun with it but are now moving on to other things.
| just think that something can be good, and also end, and that thing was still good. And it’s okay to be sad that it ended, too. But the idea that anything that ends is automatically less than this hypothetical eternal state of success... I don’t think that’s doing us any good at all.
This reminds me of a friend who opened a bakery. The business was successful, and the food was good, but she decided to give it up after a few years when she and her husband started a family.
I don’t consider that a “failure” by any definition. For her, it was a great experience that had run its course.
we as a culture have turned “forever” into the only acceptable definition of success.
I really don't agree with the premise, and would encourage others to reject that worldview if it starts creeping into how they think about things.
In the sports world, everything is always changing, and careers are very short. But what people do will be recorded forever, so those snapshots in time are part of one's legacy after they're done with their careers. We can look back fondly at certain athletes or coaches or specific games or plays, even if (or especially if) that was just a particular moment in time that the sport has since moved on from. Longevity is regarded as valuable, and maybe relevant to greatness in the sport, but it is by no means necessary or even expected. Michael Jordan isn't a failed basketball player just because he wasn't able to stay in the league, or even that his last few years in the league weren't as legendary as his prime years. Barry Sanders isn't a failed American football player just because he retired young, either.
Same with entertainment. Nobody really treats past stars as "failed" artists.
If you write a book or two, then decide that you don’t actually want to keep doing that, you're a “failed” writer.
That is a foreign concept to me, and I question the extent to which this happens. I don't know anyone who treats these authors (or actors or directors or musicians) as failures, just because they've moved onto something else. Take, for example, young actors who just don't continue in the career. Jack Gleeson, famous for playing Joffrey in the Game of Thrones series, is an actor who took a hiatus, might not come back to full time acting. And that's fine, and it doesn't take away from his amazing performance in that role.
The circumstances of how things end matter. Sometimes the ending actually does indicate failure. But ending, in itself, doesn't change the value of that thing's run when it was going on.
| just think that something can be good, and also end, and that thing was still good.
Exactly. I would think that most people agree, and question the extent to which people feel that the culture values permanence. If anything, I'd argue that modern culture values the opposite, that we tend to want new things always changing, with new fresh faces and trends taking over for the old guard.
Working in medicine, especially emergency medicine, I have to hold on to this kind of mindset very tightly. I see death frequently. I have had infants die in my care, and there is nothing I could have done to save them. I have had frail, miserable, elderly people in my care that have been kept alive through titanic and terrible measures, and their lives would have been so much better overall if they had been allowed to pass peacefully a few years earlier.
I saw another post yesterday about the old and infirm lying in nursing homes, staring at the ceiling, coding, then being dragged back to life by the heroic efforts of the staff and the ER....just to go back to staring at the ceiling for another year.
It seems counterintuitive as a physician (in training), particularly in emergency medicine where our whole job is to steal from the reaper, to advocate for sooner, more peaceful, more autonomous deaths. I have always been a proponent of physician-assisted suicide because I have seen too many people whose lives would have been better if they had been shorter.
The best definition of success I heard was from Earl Nightingale -
Success is the progressive realization of a worthwhile goal.
Doing something because you want to do it--and it betters yourself, your family, or your community--makes you successful.
This reminds me of Sand Mandala
Once complete, the sand mandala's ritualistic dismantling is accompanied by ceremonies and viewing to symbolize Buddhist doctrinal belief in the transitory nature of material life.
I think in some cases it's driven by capitalism. Your business didn't make you money forever? Failed. Your books stopped selling and you didn't make millions from what you published? Failed. Your show was good for a couple of seasons, but outlived it's hype? Failed
There are other scenarios line you mentioned, marriage or hobbies, that AREN'T about money. But the ones that involve profit follow that.
This translates to tv shows too to prove the point.
Tv shows that only have a few seasons that are high quality start to finish are so much better than tv shows that go on and on and on and on.
For example, the simpsons, whilst an excellent show, should have ended many seasons ago. It's 30 odd seasons in, and it's stale. It's a little funnier recently, but i dont think it will ever be as big as it was.
I would consider it a failed show now but a successful show back when it was popular.
So it's pretty much proof of the point that forever is not the definition of success.
I think you are looking into things in a non healthy way.
You are right that success and failure are not binary. Furthermore, every system, be it physical, living, or social, fails sooner or later.
That doesn't mean we shouldn't strive to not fail for as long as possible, for if something brings joy or safety it's continued success is important. It follows that if something that's important to someone fails it's healthy to morn it and to try to learn from it to not repeat the same failure.
Dan Savage (of the sex and relationship advice podcast "Savage Lovecast") says this frequently.
A short term relationship can also be successful. It doesn't have to end with one of the partners dying in order to be considered good and worthwhile.
At the hill's foot foot Frodo found Aragorn, standing still and silent as a tree; but in his hand was a small golden bloom of elanor, and a light was in his eyes. He was wrapped in some fair memory: and as Frodo looked at him he knew that he beheld things as they once had been in this same place. For the grim years were removed from the face of Aragorn, and he seemed clothed in white, a young lord tall and fair; and he spoke words in the Elvish tongue to one whom Frodo would not see. Arwen vanimelda, namarië! he said, and then he drew a breath, and returning out of his thought he looked at Frodo and smiled.
'Here is the heart of Elvendom on earth,' he said, 'and here my heart dwells ever, unless there be a light beyond the dark roads that we still must tread, you and I. Come with me!' And taking Frodo's hand in his, he left the hill of Cerin Amroth and came there never again as living man.
J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of The Rings, The Fellowship of the Ring, Book 2, last paragraph of Chapter VI: Lothlórien. I bolded the last 8 words.
Aragorn knows to let go, while deeply, profoundly, cherishing what was. Be like Aragorn.
Very good perspective and this is actually similar to some of the ideas of Buddhism. Everything in this life is temporary, enjoy it while it lasts.
I totally disagree with your characterization. I can come up with dozens of examples of how people don't think that the goal is "forever". That's not to say that you're lying, if you feel it then no doubt your feelings are genuine, but I don't think your feelings are a good reflection of contemporary society at large.
I do think it betrays society's lack of present-focused mindfulness. I've had a handful of friendships that I thought would go on to be quite strong and longlasting, but they fizzled out after a while. That's not to say they were bad or failed friendships. I'm grateful for the time I experienced with them.
"If you're not growing. You're dying "
Such a good way to put it. And I have focused on something similar for myself. Literally everything is temporary.
I tend to be a planner, a saver, the person who never uses consumable items in games, and the person who will avoid using an item they like so that it will last longer.
It’s helped me allow myself to enjoy today more, and spend more of my time doing things I want to be doing.
This is actually rather poignant.
By this standard, "successful" companies simply haven't failed yet.
It's standard that in human experience, we will fail at things. It happens, it happens often, and it will continue to happen. Failing at something is the first step. Without failure, how would we ever know how to "succeed"?
This doesn't, and shouldn't, imply that we are bad at a thing, or that we can't become good at it, or that we should give up and stop trying. It also doesn't and shouldn't imply that we should continue to try. "Failure" is just an outcome, whether that is good or bad is entirely up to the viewer to decide.
I would argue that failure is simply a mental/social concept. Things simply happen. "Success" or "failure" is entirely dependent on those who had some interest in what specifically happened. Even if you're trying to achieve a specific outcome, whether you do or not is entirely inconsequential. You tried to achieve an outcome by doing x, y, or z, and then a, b, and c occurred. Whether a, b, and c are the outcome that was desired or not is not a consequence that the universe cares about.
So much of this is simply social constructs.
"Something isn's beautiful because it lasts forever." - some robot
You can blame George Lucas and Star Wars for this.
Do or do not there is no try.
Yoda
This reminds me of The relationship Escalator
We also don't need to see failure as a wholly bad thing. If your hypothetical business closes down because you couldn't afford to keep it open, it DID fail, but if it ended up making your mental health better to not have all that stress, then it lead to a good thing.
Maybe I'm too realist and literal.
Misses the point of marriage, but other than that it's an awesome glimpse into a more sane future
Some things I think we want to aim at for our entire lives, and those things are good in and of themselves even if we don't achieve them.
I think getting good nutrition, staying in a healthy state/sustaining or increasing our health span so we aren't sick, exercising so we can still get out of bed every day, seeking novelty and variety in the things we do, exploring new places, learning about the world around us and ourselves, sharing all of these things meaningfully with others on a similar journey, and even defending things that mean a lot to us are some examples of this.
The idea that these experiences must last eternally was something Nietzsche talked about this in his works. He rejected Plato's notion of the Forms as well as many religions' concepts of a life after death - this "other world". To Nietzsche, the good life in this world is defined by how far life can stray from its best moments, and that working through hardships and recognizing that they aren't permanent gives us the power of freedom.
Good times must be accompanied by bad or even mediocre times. Good times lasting forever are no different than bad or mediocre times lasting forever. So yeah, writing that book or making that friendship/relationship can be a good thing. And if those things aren't perfect, we have more reason than enough to make them better. Whether that's work shopping the book until it gets better or starting over with fresh new ideas. Whether that's meeting new people and developing those friendships over time, or leaving them for new friendships when other people don't want to reciprocate. I like to think of so many people wishing for good times to last forever are lazy and just don't want to put in the effort to change, which in my view is the whole point.
Some things do celebrate the ephemeral, so perhaps there's a cultural need to wrangle these into joy. We beat illness, graduate from school, solve problems, and complete tasks. Adopting such language might help? They've finshed their dream of owning a bakery, lived their goal of being a writer, proudly escaped the clutches of their successful career etc..
Forever is a very long time
Seinfeld
Like Fat Mike, I too define success as “not working.”