Success begins in the mind
A model answer has been provided for students' reference.
It is strongly recommended that students prepare the answer on their own.
We all wish for success in life: success in academics, success in sports, success in career, success in relationship, financial success and so on. We all endeavour to attain success. From our birth till death it is the process of being successful that keeps us moving. We become happy when we attain success and unhappy when we fail. The concept of success is integral in our life. All our activities aim at success. What then is success? Can we attempt to define it? Success, in fact, is an attitude in our mind, that springs from deep inside our mind and manifests in our experiences. Success is an attitude, a perspective that is universal. A person may be an American or European or Asian or African but the attitude of success is the same in all. One may be a cricketer, a scientist, a technocrat, a manager or a musician-the attitude of success is the same. What then is success? Can we attempt to understand it precisely and comprehend how to attain success?
History is replete with examples to demonstrate success and failure. The conquest of the Everest, man's landing on the surface of the moon, the invention of information technology and so on and so forth, the list goes unending. When we switch on the radio or the television news we come across the news of so many success stories in diverse fields like sports, arts and entertainment, business, politics, science and technology. We watch or listen to the interviews of the achievers who have attained success. Success connotes attainment of a specific goal by a person or a group of person within a specific time frame.
After the conquest of the Everest, Tenzing Sherpa and Edmund Hillary were interviewed to reveal their feelings on conquering the Everest. Both of them categorically told that they had conquered their minds. In fact, Lord Buddha once told that we are the result of what we think. Our thought has a very important role in attaining success. In fact, success begins in the mind. The secret of success lies in proper thinking. As we know that success means attaining a specific goal within a specific time frame in a particular situation, so attaining success depends on understanding the situation and setting the right goal in the right situation. Having set the goal, success depends on chalking out the steps or strategy and tactics to attain the goal. It follows from this that attaining success is basically an exercise in the mind.
Many a time we come across people who could not attain success. If we try to understand their cases we will find that majority of them failed because their goal was unrealistic or unachievable. In other words, their thinking was unrealistic. To be successful in any domain one need to assess one's strengths and weaknesses. One has to apply strength,weakness, opportunity and threat analysis before venturing into any activity. It follows from this that success begins in the mind. This holds good for individuals as well as a team or an organisation. Sometimes, we meet people who fail inspite of proper planning and strategising. This is due to lack of implementation of the strategies. Poor implementation once again is due to a particular mental attitude. In other words our thinking and knowledge plays a key role in attaining success.
In case of team work also thinking of the team members matters a lot in attaining success. Think of a musical orchestra, a cricket team or a team of scientists and technocrats launching a satellite, without proper understanding and coordination among the team members, there cannot be any success. It follows from this that success begins in the mind because understanding and coordination is a mental exercise.
We have read many tales on success and failure like the hare and the tortoise story. The story gives us the message that slow and steady wins the race. This is clear from this that one of the conditions for success is steadiness which in turn is an attitude of the mind. The hare who was running very fast in the beginning of the race decided to rest for a while thinking that his rival the tortoise would be far behind him. This particular attitude of the hare and his decision ultimately led to his failure in the race.
Fatalists would opine that success or failure is predestined. That means it is independent of our efforts. But this is not the case. It is true that there are many situations in life where taking proper decision is very difficult. There are a lot of uncertainity involved. But even in these circumstances, by proper planning and managing the risks one can attain success. In other words, fatalism itself is an attitude of the mind, it is a belief in the mind influencing our actions. Moreover, success or failure is a perspective. It is how we interpret a situation. Napoleon, the great general once said that losing a battle is not losing the war. Failure in one situation may lead to success in the other. It all depends on the attitude. Failure prepares the way for success. Failure is the pillar of success. Such a state of mind brings success. It follows from this that success begins in the mind. In some unprecedented situation attaining success becomes very challenging, for example, medical scientists trying to find out a vaccine for AIDS or administrators dealing with an economic crisis like recession which are unprecedented. Dealing with such challenging situations need innovative thinking which again demonstrates that success begins in the mind.
To conclude, success which we all wish to attain comes as a result of proper thinking and attitude. It begins in the mind as an attitude and manifests as a real life experience. To attain success one has to apply thinking to the fullest and harbour positive attitude. T.S Eliot, the famous poet once said:
“Success is relative. It is what we make of the mess we have made of things.”
In other words, Success is relative to the person wishing for success. It begins in the mind as thought and comes to reality as experience.