An end of the year reflection on success

As we end another year, some of us would be asking ourselves how successful we were in the year that is drawing to a close. 

Recently a former colleague I have not seen for nearly 20 years reconnected in a happy reunion, marvelling at where time went, and then lamented about how the fuel issue/economic crisis had impacted her. Her office had terminated the allocation of the private official vehicle and fuel allowance previously provided. She was forced to travel by bus. After so long in the profession, she resented that she was “back to where she started” “going by bus”.

This is her perspective and I tried to understand it, although I had a totally different attitude. I enjoy bus travel and am kept busy looking at different bus routes to travel on my journalistic and academic research work. When I told her this, she seemed aghast.

“Surely, you cannot enjoy hanging on for dear life on a bus railing in these sardine tin-like jam packed buses,” she asked.

Wondering how to explain a totally different worldview than was entrenched in her mind, I asked her whether it was not nicer to be with people, travelling together as it were in this life journey, (occasionally listening to loud bus music!) than being cocooned inside a metal prison which pollutes the earth, euphemistically called a car.

She stopped me mid narration saying “aney here, stop all that. I thought you had changed after all these years but you are the same mad fellow,” and with that admonishment started serving me the noon meal. 

I did not venture further, except to say that Sri Lanka should ideally be a country where politicians are made to go by bus. I was happy that she agreed!

But this conversation made me think through how the manner in which we look at something shapes the outcome; such as the phenomena called happiness or sorrow.

In all the times that Sri Lanka had the fuel crisis, this writer got into a pair of slippers and walked to get to all the official  meetings, sometimes doing as much as 15 kilometres a day, on those very reliable human wheels called legs! 

Amusingly, friends who had two or three cars parked at home were providing excuses for not getting to where I was! Asked how on earth I managed to get to the official meetings and how terrible it would have been. I tried to tone down my enthusiasm that it was actually very enjoyable to walk.

At least it is extremely educational for a Sri Lankan taxpayer that what we pay in tax is gone down the potholes that rig the roads every other step of the way!

But the idea here is that anything that we call suffering has to be painted in the canvas of the mind before it manifests as suffering.

For my former colleague, going by bus was seen as suffering as she saw it as a demotion of sorts, compared to what she enjoyed earlier from the company. She saw having to travel by bus after reaching a considerably senior position professionally as a terrible blow to her social prestige and came to the conclusion that this meant she was ‘unsuccessful’.

This is a common feeling many of us living through false social values get ourselves addicted to. 

What is ‘success’? How can it be defined? How can we measure it?

Once again, living in an increasingly materialistic world it is common for all of us to measure ‘success’ by the comforts of our brick house, the comforts of the latest car and so on.

Comfort is not a bad thing. Wanting it is not a sin. But the utmost comfort we can have is happiness, and happiness is not found in any of the above. Happiness is knowing that we are alive and that we can bring happiness to another person, every day, as much as we can through meaningful action, even if it is just a smile. Yet, we often seek happiness only routed through our individual wants. 

The moment we stop doing so, our depression, anxiety and worry will stop because we will shift our focus onto a wider spectrum beyond ourselves and we will link closer to humanity all around us. 

Hence ‘success’ that we have achieved in a year could be as to how many people we have helped, how many lives we have changed, in whatever minor way and how compassionate and forgiving we have been.

There are many books that show how such happiness is more long lasting and contributes positively to physical health, such as in the book ‘Spirituality demystified; understanding spirituality in rational terms’ by Rohana Ulluwishewa.

Such truths are for us to find out in practical terms.

This world is temporary and it is beautiful. Let us live in it and do so fully and authentically. Let us refuse to be caged by the norms of ‘success’ that confines us to material success. Let us look at measuring success as per how much positive change we can bring to others and our own holistic success in life will be ensured.

(SV)