Success Is A Lousy Teacher, It Seduces Smart People – Bill Gates

Success is a lousy teacher:

“Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can’t lose.”

– Bill Gates

And here I was thinking that failure is a lousy teacher cos it makes us feel low sometimes and makes us question our abilities. I have always hated that about failure and I am sure we all have. And it really sucks right? I mean it feels so horrible and we would be prepared to do something at least to get out of it as soon as possible. And rightly so, no one likes to be in a horrible feeling for a long time. That’s totally inhuman!

Success Is A lousy teacher but a Brilliant Thing

And success is a brilliant thing. It helps us build one success over the other. It builds confidence, makes us feel that we can achieve anything in this world and that certainly is an amazing thing. Who in their right senses would not want that? It is such a lovely life right – to be successful in everything we do and not to face the difficulties of failure at all?

Well, that might all be true, but there is something which success will not teach. It doesn’t teach us humility, it doesn’t teach us to appreciate the efforts and the process. Of course we will appreciate the final result cos we can feel it and the triumph exists. But we cannot appreciate the limitations. If we are successful in everything we do, we cannot possibly appreciate the difficulties and challenges of others quite simply because we have never experienced the same.

Success is a lousy teacher and there Is No 100% Success

That being said, we all know that there is no 100% successful fellow – or else life would suck comparing ourselves to them :P. And if there is a man who proclaims that he is successful in everything he has done, I would say that he is either lying or maybe he has not challenged himself enough.

There is something brilliant about failure as well. It helps us reassess our situation and provides a fresh look. It helps us look within and see if there is any scope for improvement. It helps us pass the buck from one person to another until we realize that there is not going to be any progress unless we take the blame on ourselves no matter who is at fault. Failure also teaches us that it is a common occurrence and we need to learn to look past that and be unperturbed by that. Failure also tells us that life is not just about a list of achievements to be ticked one after the other, but it is also about becoming who we truly are capable of.

Of course things are going to go astray, things are going to go off peak and push us to the lows. And it is going to make us question ourselves. But that is not the end of it, that is never the end of it. The end is something far more beautiful than the success and failures of life. It is in the becoming of who we truly are.

Someone rightly said –

Life is not about what you get in the end but who you become in the process and success without fulfilment can’t really go too far.

And that is our quote of the day, stay tuned in for more such inspirational quotes.

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