Six Simple Secrets of Success

     I've always wanted to be a motivational speaker.  You know, one of those guys who speaks at management retreats and sales conventions when he's not filling ballrooms at airport hotels with low-level ladder climbers craving the secret of success. 

     How hard could it be?  You write a stemwinder of a speech, one that'll knock 'em down then build 'em up while holding back just enough so they'll buy the $49.95 pocket planner and the $495 home study program and the $4,995 week-long masters seminar at a ski resort in August.  You hire facilitators.  You start an institute.  You recycle your speech into a bullet-pointed big print tome with a catchy title and a huge author shot -- capped teeth, sharp suit, deep tan, confident smirk -- and the royalties roll in even when you're not speaking.  Sweet. 

     I just need secrets of success.  Ideally, six simple secrets.  Six seems like the right quantity; any less, and they might feel cheated, any more, and it would devalue my secrets.  Secrets look cheaper by the dozen.  Simple is good because simple is profound.  You know, zen and all that.  And, of course, "six simple secrets of success" is wonderfully alliterative.  You gotta love that.  Unless you lisp.

     Six simple secrets of success.  Sounds simple, doesn't it?  Well, it's not.  Over the years I've analyzed countless careers, successes and failures, identifying and isolating variables, crunching and recrunching the numbers, sifting and culling them every which way.  I've thumbed through a self-help book or two or ten.  I've sat through seminars and conventions and rallies.  I've watched infomercials on late night TV.  I've thought outside the box.  Inside too. Shifted my paradigm so often I lost count.  And after all this, I've come to believe that there are only two secrets to success.  Just two. 

     Oh, sure, there are many factors that one needs for success: one must be alive, one must be sentient, one should probably possess some intelligence, ideally above average, one must not spend one's days in bed with the shades drawn, one must be able to deal with other people in a manner that does not routinely result in rage and revulsion.  But these aren't secrets, and, what's worse, most people who possess these attributes aren't successful.

     So what does separate the successful from the rest of us? 

     My working hypothesis is that the two simple secrets of success are Poverty (the burning desire to never be poor again) and Insecurity (the crushing sense that you're never good enough).  Combine those and you're bound to succeed. 

     The problem is, these secrets of success aren't very inspiring.  In fact, they're downright depressing.  I mean, if I dare you to doubt yourself, would you stand up and cheer? 

     These also aren't learned traits, so it's not clear why anyone would pay good money to learn that only those who can't afford to pay good money are going to succeed.

     And these secrets lead to the kind of success that comes from endless striving, never resting, for you always see that wolf at the door.  The success that comes from driving yourself harder than everyone else, for everyone else is better than you, so you'll just have to make up for it by working like a galley slave, never slowing down long enough for anyone to unmask you as a fraud.  The success of that comes from never resting on your laurels, for you deserve none.  The success that comes from worrying every detail, leaving nothing to chance, for having grown up on the wrong side of the tracks you can never shake the conviction that fortune has always had it in for you.

     In short, the kind of success no one wants.

      My budding young self-help empire needs something a bit more aspirational and inspirational if it's to ever be remunerational, so it's back the drawing board.  This time, though, I won't waste any time searching for secrets of success.  No, this time I'm going to redefine success. 

Comments

[jenny]

Maybe you could teach people how to break a board in half. My old company brought in a famous motivational speaker to one of our big leadership conferences, and that's what he did. That's really all I remember, so the 6 steps don't matter. Just break boards.

[R J Keefe]

Happily for motivational speakers, substance is not the point of a pep rally.

Poverty and insecurity may indeed be the most effective engines of financial success. But they seriously hamper the attainment of any other kind.

[Lynn S]

Six Cynical Secrets of Success:

1. Marry well.
2. Work late and neglect your family.
3. Know the right people.
4. CYA
5. Kiss A__
6. Forget the ladder; climb up on the backs of the little people.

[DarkoV]

Although Poverty and Insecurity may be the large blankets already covering a third point, I'll still bring it up.
Lousy Childhood.
1) Devoid of Love.
2) Chock full of creatures that nibbled at your bones at night (Menagerie would include any combination of roaches, rats, mice, bedbugs, et al (Question: "et al" is usually used with people. Is it grammatically correct to use it with creatures? I mean, I don't want to offend them or anything).
3) Daily rations limited to crusts and dumpster dives.
You get the idea. I threw in a third item as THREE, Trinity, Power of Three are also good selling points. Plus TWO against ONE (because you know 2 of these 3 principles will gang up on the third at some point) make it a more dynamic process. Besides, the detritus of Catholic grammar school and high school are still washing around in the sludge of my soul.
When you do go out on the road with this Plan for Success, I only have one request. please, Please, PLEASE do not price it with the 99 cent tail attached. It reads so...chintzy.
Will there be a Poverty/Insecurity costume attached with the program?

[oudeis oudamou]

Very interesting. Do you have as a sequel some further thoughts on success redefined?