The myth of “King Midas” by Thomas Bulfinch and the “Fallacy of Success” by G.K. Chesterton investigates how success can be achieved, but leaves the reader questioning if it is as easy as it sounds. In Thomas Bulfinch's “Midas”, the author explains how there was a great King named Midas. He took care of his old schoolmaster for eleven days, then the god Bacchus gave him reward for his hospitality. Whereupon Midas wished that whatever he touched turned into gold, “He took a glass of wine, but it flowed down his throat, like melted gold… he hated the gift he had lately coveted.” In other words, when Midas wished for the power to turn everything into gold, he later regretted it, due to the fact he couldn’t eat anything. (Paragraph 2, Bullfinch) An overarching theme expressed in the quote is “success cannot be easily attained with a touch of a finger”. …show more content…
Midas almost died because of his crazy wish. Therefore, there will always be problems with shortcuts to success, so it has to be worked for. In addition, working for success relates back to modern day, because it is not as easy to achieve success as we think. G.K. Chesterton the author of the “Fallacy of Success” explains how “Books of Success” are full of lies that do not teach you how to be successful but instead teach you how to be snobbish. Furthermore, Chesterton goes on describe “In our society, temperance will not help a poor man to enrich himself, but it may help him to respect himself. Good work will not make him a rich man, but good work may make him a good workman.” To sum it up, nowadays, demeanor cannot give a poor man money or education, but can give him value in society. Just because he works hard it doesn’t mean that he will become rich ,but he will be a great workman. (Paragraph 11,
All individuals have different paths and life goals. It is true that individuals may start out with more advantages than others, but it should not be used as a limitation to others. Mantsios lists several realities discussing the different levels of opportunity for Americans. In these realities, he describes that wealth and our economic status is important in order to reach success. In one of his realities, Mantsios discussed the privileges within inheritance laws stating: “…Americans do not have an equal opportunity to succeed, […]. Inheritance laws provide built-in privileges to the offspring of the wealthy and add to the likelihood of their economic success while handicapping the chances for everyone else” (392). It appears as if he only believes success comes out of extreme wealth, and if someone is not, they’re disadvantaged and will ultimately be less successful than others. Mantsios talks only in extremes; he discusses the very rich, the very poor and how each affects each other, while simultaneously arguing that there is little to no chance for those in the middle or lower class to grow and become successful. In contrast, Jay-Z discusses how he did not let the obstacles he faced, or his economic status limit him. He is quoted saying, “don’t let [society] diminish your accomplishment or dim your shine” (Packer 361). Here, he is taking a much more positive approach, stating that individuals should not limit their success based on their social class. Class should not be a tool used to limit individuals and their success. To say that an individual born into the upper class will just coast through life without hardship is untrue. In the same respect, to say that an individual born into lower or middle class will have no chance at success, is just as untrue. We all face different levels of hardship in life, therefore condemning an individual because they have a leg up or down in
Examples of this are people like Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, who were the perfect age during the computer revolution in 1975, when the personal computer was invented and made widely available. However, not every person born in the same year as Steve Jobs and Bill Gates became a multimillionaire. Why? The ones who became successful were those who took a risk, and were willing to work hard to make something out of the computer revolution. When looking at people who gained their success from the invention of personal computers, Gladwell points out that “These are stories… about people who were given a special opportunity to work really hard and seized it” (67). One of Bill Gates’ advantages was that he went to Lakeside High School, which had a computer lab in a time when most schools did not. Everyone at Lakeside had access to that computer lab, but only a few students grew up to be the creators of the world’s best computer companies. Those who became successful were the students like Bill Gates, who worked hard in that computer lab and grew up to be world-class programmers. If someone is given unique opportunities but is not willing to seize them, they will not gain any success from those opportunities. Success is self made because in order to be successful, one must take advantage of the unique chances they are
... understanding amongst his audience and enhancing his instructive tone. When the speaker meditatively states, "As the Yuppie was to the 80s... maybe Abraham Lincoln could be for the coming decade" he utilizes his academic tone as well as the analogy of Lincoln to the Yuppie, to effectively emphasize the fact that he views Lincoln as paragon of his own definition success, as arising from hard work, which further develops ethos through his allusion to the prominent historical figure that is Abraham Lincoln. By employing both an illustrative allusion as well as a thought provoking analogy as well as his scholastic tone the author is able to make the audience more likely to accept his definition of success as deriving from hard work and sound work ethics due to his development of common ground which results in general understanding of his assertion within his audience.
Determination Generates Success Many people believe that students that encounter hard lives will commit academic sins. However, many professionals that successfully graduated college while having struggles in their lives, proved otherwise. In fact, Culpepper mentioned in his composition, “The Myth of Inferiority”, students might succeed in any academic institution, even if they experience hard lives (330). Also, he states that students with light loaded routines have the same chances to fail in college (330).
...at the American culture places economic success at the pinnacle of social desirability, without listing legitimate ways for attaining the desired goal (Merton 672-682). Today, the American Dream no longer reflects the dream Adams had, but instead, the idea that one can only call themselves truly successful if they have become rich, regardless of the way they got there. The American Dream does not guarantee happiness, but rather the pursuit of it, but with the media strongly persuading people that money guarantees happiness, people are encouraged to do whatever it takes, even it means disregarding their morals, so that they achieve ‘success.’ The inability to achieve this goal often leads people to destructive, and ultimately life-threatening criminal behavior as their feelings of anxiety and frustration over this vision of the “American Dream” get the best of them.
Some people may be born into a family with wealth, and that is acceptable. Some people on the other hand, are not born into a family with wealth, and that is acceptable too. The work that families have done to get to the level they are in, are just a cushion. People should try to build their own reputation or success. Even if people work toward their goals of success, it could take years to reach, it isn’t something that happens over night usually. The way they act or present themselves in certain circumstances will determine if they succeed or fail. As much as people want to control every step toward that, there are things that are out of everyone's control. Every action they do, every decision they make, they can not control everything. There are certain things that can put a halt toward success, things many do not see coming till it happens. Oedipus had no idea that he was the one causing the sickness that was spreading through his kingdom. He was doing well as a king, but certain things can change that. His curse put on him when he was younger, was out of his control. The priest reminds Oedipus of his success depict the sickness surrounding them, “You saved us from Sphinx…”(40). Success may be the one thing you can control, but at the same time have no idea what could come
Everyone has their own vision of success. For some,it is being rich and famous and for others it is to have a great impact on the world. In the first chapter of outliers Gladwell claims that success is something you need to work for in some ways, he fails to come up with a solution for people that became successful without working for it.
This idea about becoming multimillionaires over a short period of time or mere hard work has been wide spread through success stories of people’s achieving opportunity in spite of the disadvantages that everyone else has. It seems that in America people are willing to believe any success story that they hear and because of this it gives many Americans a false image of the real world or life. Many people see champions like in boxing for instance, to be complemented with fame, money, and better life while doing what they enjoy the most, but they fall short to realize that there can be one champion. It success stories like these that Mantsios in “Class in America-2012” says that the media has a terminus influence on the perspective of success stories and suggests that Americans live in a facade going from nothing to extremely wealthy society (391). What this shows is that through the use of media people are becoming blind to the idea it will take much more than hard work to achieve upper class status. Because of this blindness, the rich will keep getting richer while everyone else will spend their lives falsifying hope that one day they too will achieve upper class levels status. In the film Trading Places, Ophelia says, “[reading Louis ' palm] You 've never done a day 's work in your life” (trading places). In the film, Luis lived a privileged life where he did not have to do labor-intensive work for a living in comparison to the upper class Americans. The film clearly demonstrates that the idea is falsified, since it can be concluded that the people in the upper class (the one percent) do not work hard at all and still make tons of money
Success is a unique characteristic that almost everybody has strived for since the beginning of time. There are many different ways to define and explain success, and in Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell sets out to rationalize it and explain the circumstantial happenings that lead people to the success they have acquired. Success is about becoming an outlier; someone who has completely mastered their craft and is an expert in their field that few other people would be able to match. No matter your stance on Obama’s success as a president, it is fact that to win the election in the first place Obama already had to be a major success. Gladwell argues many claims that strive to help his audience understand the factors that come together to create success. Some claims he argues revolve around how success is determined by someone’s childhood and the way they were raised. He also states how time period and work ethic play major roles in the quest for success. One person who fits almost any definition of success is United States President Barack Obama. Becoming the leader of the free world is a position that
Seeking for success should not be an easy task. Success is not a gift, it would not appear spontaneously unless you work hard on it. To reach the pinnacle of life, people should work hard on it. No one should take success lightly or cheat other’s way to greatness. Every personality who has high achievement has the common qualities which lead them to be successor. The qualities that found from Archimedes are dedication in gaining knowledge, excellent in critical thinking skill, take up the challenge and loyalty. These qualities of life shape him to be a good person.
It has been said that if someone works really hard and pushes oneself to become more than what one is, then he/she will make something out of his/her life. This statement is not always true though, because it depends on the person who is attempting the task. One would find just as many people who would agree with this point as to those who would oppose this view. For example, take these two works by two completely different authors, “Woman Work” by Maya Angelou; which tells of a women’s many tasks that she must complete, but unfortunately she has nothing to call her own, and the song “She Works Hard for the Money” by Donna Summer, which is about a women who works extremely hard every day just to make ends meet, but she will never give up. Both
Robert Kiyosaki said “You’re only poor if you give up. The most important thing is that you did something. Most people only talk and dream of getting rich. You’ve done something” There is no way of becoming successful in life if you aren’t driven and don’t have determination in what you believe in. The main point of this book was that you need to make money work for you and not the other way around. It is tough trying to put your wants and fears to the side in order to get rich and stay rich. One tip given was that you need to stop what your doing if what your doing isn’t working for you. Robert Kiyosaki did a great job of taking us into his life and his journey into becoming successful.
The complexity of the term success in unbounded, with little to no restraints on how the term can be construed to the liking of the one doing the defining, however, true success will always be classified by the basic principles of morality, happiness and altruism. Unfortunately, many people aspiring to success in modern society are driven by the most luxurious objects that are present in society, but these are unfulfilling and short-lived. To be truly successful, one must not only benefit themselves in the present, but benefit the entirety of the human race for generations to proceed.
Something to make clear is that the believer works, not to be admired, much less to get rich, but because this is the plan that God has for each of their lives, and that in this way will be testifying to the order and discipline that God wants to exist in the life of each of their children.
Many people are successful in life by doing things their own kind of way. Some people are not successful because of their pride, it is bigger than their own goals. A way to be successful is being respectful to others everyone deserves to be respected. Ambition can make people successful because they love money more. Determination to get things done can get us in a better position in life. Responsibility is one of the most important things because without it no one will ever take us serious.