The Secret To Success

Team+USA+Gym+%28Photo+taken+by+ESU+Woman+Wrestler+Mia+Macholuso%29

Team USA Gym (Photo taken by ESU Woman Wrestler Mia Macholuso)

Sydney Curry, Staff Writer

¨I don’t know what the secret to success is, but I do know what the secret to failure is, It’s trying to please everybody.¨ –Ben Lionel Scott

In a survey conducted by the Mountaineer, 85% of students say there is a link between success and happiness.

When asked what success means to 12th grader Jezebelle Gawin, she said, ¨Success to me means finding the job you are passionate about and love while making a living off that job. Success means reaching short-term goals and long-term goals.¨

According to Datacommons.org, Last recorded in 2021, there are 7.888 billion people in the world. That’s a lot of people all competing for a place in the world. Trying to make their mark, a long-lasting memory that stands the test of time. 

So why do we choose to spend a lifetime chasing Success? According to Success Magazine, “We all die. The goal isn’t to live forever, the goal is to create something that will,” said Chuck Palahniuk, author of the cult classic, Fight Club.

Over time, it has been proven that only certain people earn that place on the map. We may all want to be successful, but only a certain few earn it. Everyone wants to achieve greatness, whether it’s being rich, famous, or highly respected. 

¨I think it comes down to work ethic, working hard is so essential. You just have to push past your limits and constantly work at what you’re trying to accomplish. Have that goal in your head and keep motivating yourself to achieve your dreams,¨ said ESU woman wrestler, Mia Macholuso. 

According to Linked In, The biggest problem is the person. The same goal some people can achieve quickly, but some can’t achieve at all. Success is hard because some people are not willing or don’t have enough dedication or skills, and knowledge to achieve some goals.

So why is it that only so few succeed and achieve that aspiration? They become remembered; they become timeless. 

The biggest reason is that we spend so much time in our lives repressing how we feel, how we should act, and how we should talk. We hit the mute button so often, it becomes this habit constantly set on default. We make excuse after excuse of why we don’t deserve the thing that makes us happy. 

Society tells us to think realistically and follow a life plan of how we are supposed to act. We´re taught to be reserved instead of being spontaneous and chasing our dreams. But everyone who has succeeded has done so by coloring outside the lines.

¨If someone had asked me if I would end up where I am today, I would have laughed at them. Your life takes you places and you do your best to hold on and see where it takes you. You take your experiences and you learn from them. It’s all you can do,¨ said Jimmy’s Business Owner Chuck Curry.

A great example of this is the creators of Apple. Both Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak were college dropouts. They followed a different route than everyone else and it paid off. Apple today is a trillion-dollar corporation.  

A famous poet by the name of Robert Frost published a poem called The Road Not Taken published in 1916 reads: 

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

The path to success is not one that’s easy or common. The journey comes with falling on your face from time to time. The difference is whether you get back up or not.

¨I’ve failed multiple times in my life. I’ve lost matches and I’ve had disappointing moments in my career as a wrestler. It’s hard getting back up, but I believe in myself enough to keep trying to be the best I can,¨ said Macholuso.

The most difficult thing you need to succeed is to believe in yourself. It’s also the most important. That resilience, that kind of never giving up attitude stems from a totally all-encompassing belief in yourself. That’s the key to success.

Ross Perot, an American business magnate, billionaire, politician, and philanthropist says about success, ¨Most people give up just when they’re about to achieve success. They quit on the one-yard line. They give up at the last minute of the game one foot from a winning touchdown.¨

Success may be hard, but it’s not impossible. You have to ask yourself just how far, just how much pain and sacrifice are you willing to handle to go after what you want. Just how willing are you to chase your dream? You have to be honest about what you really want and understand what makes you tick. Success is not a pipedream, it can be a reality. It comes down to you and a little bit of luck, of course.

¨

“The fight is won or lost far away from the witnesses, behind the lines, in the gym, and out there on the road, long before I dance under those lights.”

— Muhammad Ali