loved the two videos. the business leaders are really impressive and speak with great clarity. but all "inspirational" stories have an undercurrent of the same thing that underlies self help books and cults. they have the effect of appearing to simplify complexity, and lift the psychlogical burden of ambiguity.
but the rules of success are more often than not defined in hindsight. would people who tread the same path as the 2 instances you cite reach the same point. unlikely. luck was always a tremendous factor.
another kind of life one can be inspired by is a life of imagination. their success is not about events or what they acheived in human affairs, but the groundbreaking thoughts they propounded. many scientists would fall in this category (einstein, heizenberg), philosophers (kant, sartre, russell), moral thinkers (jesus, buddha).
Hi Pankaj...reading the first para of your comment made me smile, as I realized that these videos do indeed fall in the same league as the self-help books etc...basically they all serve to reassert one's confidence...i guess the mind is always susceptible to a good, encouraging word, and so falls for such stuff, no matter what one's ideological stand on the question. :-)
But still, I am going to keep reading about the successful people, and will keep shunning the self-help books too...coz the latter are just not believable enough.
But you are right about what these people say being a product of hindsight, and an overly-simplified hindsight at that.
A friend of mine is preparing for IAS. She said that her coaching instructor told her to never go after the advice given on 'How To Prepare' by those who've already made it. Because, they'll make it look like extremely simple and easy. He advised them to ask instead those who tried for year after year after year, and could not make it.
3 comments:
loved the two videos. the business leaders are really impressive and speak with great clarity. but all "inspirational" stories have an undercurrent of the same thing that underlies self help books and cults. they have the effect of appearing to simplify complexity, and lift the psychlogical burden of ambiguity.
but the rules of success are more often than not defined in hindsight. would people who tread the same path as the 2 instances you cite reach the same point. unlikely. luck was always a tremendous factor.
another kind of life one can be inspired by is a life of imagination. their success is not about events or what they acheived in human affairs, but the groundbreaking thoughts they propounded. many scientists would fall in this category (einstein, heizenberg), philosophers (kant, sartre, russell), moral thinkers (jesus, buddha).
Hi Pankaj...reading the first para of your comment made me smile, as I realized that these videos do indeed fall in the same league as the self-help books etc...basically they all serve to reassert one's confidence...i guess the mind is always susceptible to a good, encouraging word, and so falls for such stuff, no matter what one's ideological stand on the question. :-)
But still, I am going to keep reading about the successful people, and will keep shunning the self-help books too...coz the latter are just not believable enough.
But you are right about what these people say being a product of hindsight, and an overly-simplified hindsight at that.
A friend of mine is preparing for IAS. She said that her coaching instructor told her to never go after the advice given on 'How To Prepare' by those who've already made it. Because, they'll make it look like extremely simple and easy. He advised them to ask instead those who tried for year after year after year, and could not make it.
true :)
"i guess the mind is always susceptible to a good, encouraging word" - well said
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